Yet ANOTHER Vatican docuмent that can't stand on its own.

Now we are given the MEANING of the docuмent as "unpacked" and "clarified" by Msgr. Pozzo,  the same man who basically told the FSSP priests in Europe they had devoted their entire lives as priests to a mere liturgical preference. (see here)

Fr. Z personally translated this "work" and is gushing over its profundity.

He calls it "MUST READ" material!

http://wdtprs.com/blog/2011/05/must-read-msgr-pozzos-comments-on-the-instruction-universae-ecclesiae-in-losservatore-romano/

The meaning of the Instruction “Univerae Ecclesiae”

The liturgical Constitution Sacrosanctum Concilium of the Second Vatican Council, affirms that “the Church, when the faith or the general common good is not in question, does not intend to impose, not even in the Liturgy, a rigid uniformity” (n. 37).  It has not escaped the notice of many people that today the faith is in question, for which reason it is necessary that the legitimate variety of ritual forms must recover the essential unity of Catholic worship. Pope Benedict XVI accurately called this to mind: “In our days, when in vast areas of the world the faith is in danger of dying out like a flame which no longer has fuel, the overriding priority is to make God present in this world and to show men and women the way to God. Not just any god, but the God who spoke on Sinai; to that God whose face we recognize in a love which presses “to the end” (cf. Jn 13:1) – in Jesus Christ, crucified and risen” (Letter of His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI to the Bishops of the Catholic Church Concerning the Remission of the Excommunication of the Four Bishops Consecrated by Archbishop Lefevre, 10 March 2009).

Blessed John Paul II in his own turn recalled that “Sacred Liturgy expresses and celebrates the one faith professed by all and, being the heritage of the whole Church, cannot be determined by local Churches in isolation from the universal Church” (Encyclical Ecclesia de Eucharistia, n. 51) and that “Liturgy is never anyone’s private property, be it of the celebrant or of the community in which the mysteries are celebrated” (ibid. n. 52).  In the Conciliar liturgical Constitution there is affirmed moreover: The sacred Council declares that holy Mother Church holds all lawfully acknowledged rites to be of equal right and dignity; that she wishes to preserve them in the future and to foster them in every way” (n. 4). Esteem for ritual forms is the presupposition of the work of revision from time to time becomes necessary.  Now, the two forms, Ordinary and Extraordinary, of the Roman liturgy are an example of reciprocal growth and enrichment.  Whoever thinks or acts to the contrary, undermines the unity of the Roman Rite which must be tenaciously protected, does not carry out an authentic pastoral activity or correct liturgical renewal, but rather deprives the faithful of their patrimony and their inheritance to which they have a right.

In continuity with the Magisterium of his predeceessors, Benedict XVI promulgated in 2007 the Motu Proprio Summorum Pontificuм, with which he made more accessible the Universal Church the riches of the Roman liturgy, and now has given the mandate to the Pontifical Commission “Ecclesia Dei” to publish the Instruction “Universae Ecclesiae” in order correclty to favor its application.

In the introduction to the docuмent there is affirmed: “With such a Motu Proprio the Supreme Pontif Benedict XVI has promulgated a universal law for the Church” (n. 2).  This means that one isn’t dealing with an indult, nor with a law for particular groups, but with a law for the whole Church, which, given the subject matter, is also a “special law” which “derogate from those legislative provisions, inhering in the Sacred Rites, issued from 1962 onward and incompatible with the rubrics of the liturgical books in force in 1962″ (n. 28).  Let it be remembered here the golden patristic principle on which the Catholic communion depends: “every particular Church must be in harmony with the Universal Church, not only insofar as the doctrine of the faith and sacramental signs are concerned, but also concerning to uses universali received from the uninterrupted apostolic tradition, which must be observed not only in order to avoid errors, but also to transmit the totality of the faith, because the law of the prayer of the Church corrisponds to its law of the faith” (n. 3).  The celebrated principle lex orandi-lex credendi recalled in this paragraph, is at the foundation of a restoration of the Extraordinary Form: Catholic doctrine of the Mass in the Roman Rite has not been changed, because liturgy and doctrine are inseparable.  There can be in the one and the other form of the Roman Rite, accentuations, underscorings, clarifications which are more marked of some aspects in respect to others, but this does not undermine the substantial unity of the liturgy.

The liturgy was and is, in the discipline of the Church, a subject matter reserved to the Pope, while Ordinaries and Episcopal Conferences have some delegated responsibilities, specified by Canon Law.  Moreover, the Instruction reaffirms that there are now “two forms of the Roman Liturgy, defined respectively as Ordinary and Extraordinary: that is, two uses of the single Roman Rite (…) The one and the other form are expressions of the same lex orandi of the Church.  Because of its venerable and ancient use, the Extraordinary Form must be preserved with due honor” (n. 6).  The following paragraph quotes a key passage of the Letter of the Holy Father to the bishops which accompanied the Motu Proprio: “There is no contradiction between the two editions of the Roman Missal.  In the history of the liturgy there is growth and progress, but no rupture.  What earlier generations held as sacred, remains sacred and great for us too, and it cannot be all of a sudden entirely forbidden or even considered harmful”(n. 7).  The Instruction, in line with the Motu Proprio, does not regard only those who desire to continue to celebrate the faith in the same way by which the Church substantially did for centuries; the Pope wanted to help all Catholics to live the truth of the liturgy in order that, by knowing and participating in the old Roman form of celebration, they might grasp that the Constitution Sacrosanctum Concilium wanted to reform the liturgy in continuity with tradition.