E SACRIFICE OF THE MASS

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APPENDIX.
all her priests in the Western Church to celebrate
Mass in Latin, she likewise requires those clergy
of her communion who follow the Oriental rite, to
use Greek and Syriac, Coptic and Slavonic. In
p. 52 of the Catholic Directory for 1903 for Great
Britain, under the general heading of the Oriental
rite, we have some twelve rites with six different
languages prescribed for the Holy Sacrifice. The
Church, then, cannot be said to use any one language
to the exclusion of all the rest.
But the fact remains, that Latin is the most widely
diffused of all ritual languages, and it is of obligation
in the liturgical services of the Western Church.
Non-Catholics occasionally, and also some ill-instructed
Catholics, clamour for the vernacular in Mass. Can
the Pope allow Mass to be said in the vernacular
of any country? Most unquestionably he can. He
cannot change a single point of doctrine, or any
essential point of the discipline which our Lord
Himself established. But the choice of a liturgical
language falls under neither of these categories. It is
a matter of mere ecclesiastical law, and he can make
or unmake laws which help or impede the Church s
work on earth. With regard to the use of the Latin
language, the Council of Trent declares (Sess. xxii. ch. 8,
on the Sacrifice of the Mass, Denzinger, 823), that the
Fathers thought it inexpedient to have Mass said
everywhere in the vernacular ; and in the ninth canon
the Council condemns those who maintain that Mass
ought only to be celebrated in the vulgar tongue.
(Denzinger, 833.) The Church s authoritative teaching
then, as declared by the Fathers of Trent, was com
prised in these two points: (i) that it was inexpedient
to say Mass everywhere in the vernacular, (2) that it