Those who want to restrict the Church's power over the liturgy have the burden to identify the basis for that assertion, and I have give the basis in my claim that the Church cannot alter the sacramental form of the Eucharist by changing the words of Christ in the institution of the sacrament.
I agree with the bolded. At one point, a poster asked for docuмents showing that the Pope CAN change the Canon, but I agree that the burden would be to show docuмents/teaching that the Pope CANNOT change the Canon. I'm not seeing why a Pope could not change the Canon. We do have Quo Primum, but a Pope cannot bind another Pope (an equal cannot bind an equal) ... outside of that which has been established by Divine Law, or solemn teachings, etc.
At some point we had the various saints currently in the Tridentine Canon added to it, and there's a good chance others were added here or there in different parts of the Church. I also don't see a theological reason why St. Joseph couldn't be added to that list, or other saints added to the list, or even some removed from the list. Since the section concludes with "and all the saints", they're all virtually included anyway, so it seems a bit arbitrary which names are mentioned, outside Our Lady of course, and the Apostles.
Snips from Dimond-Wathen interview:
Here is a key question, whether a successor can override pope Pius V with regard to the establishment of the Rite of the Mass. It’s a key question.
It was never considered that the pope could go contrary to this ruling because
Quo Primum was issued to protect the Mass. It was as strong of legislation as the pope could possibly impose.
If we say that his successor is not bound by this legislation, we have to say that the Church has no way of protecting it’s own liturgy....
... People have the idea that the pope, because he is the head of the Church, has limitless authority. This is altogether wrong.
He is not at all limitless in what he may do, he is strictly bound to what he must do and he is bound to adhere to what has been established. The role and the duty of the pope not to deviate from what has been established, but to make sure that all his subjects don’t deviate from it....
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Question: ....Fr., there's an old legal principle which says; "he who makes the law can change the law", would this also apply in the church? In other words, we had pope Paul VI making a change, did he not have a right to make this change and must not we, as Catholics, follow whatever change he authorizes?
Fr. Wathen:I do not agree that he who makes the law may always abrogate it, especially if he who makes the law is doing nothing else but enunciating and particularizing a tradition.
When pope Pius V established the Mass, he was merely canonizing a tradition. He was fixing something and making it irrevocable and unchangeable after centuries of development. Pope Pius V, once he made this law, had no right to change it, simply because, that is an error. The pope's business is not to make and then to change, the pope's business is to preserve, to formulate, in order that there be a preservation of all that was established, even by the Apostles...
...The Mass of the Roman Rite, there is only one, Pius V said that there could never be but one, and he had the authority to impose this for all time.
If he did not have the authority to do so. even to the extent of binding all his successors, this is to say that he, the pope, did not even know the limits of his own authority.
This is to say that this pope attempted to do something which he had no authority to do. And we say well then, if he did not have that authority, then his authority was limited. We say that if his authority is limited, then all his successors authority is limited also.
We say yes, the authority of the pope is limited, but it is not limited to establishing the liturgy of the Mass for all time, [rather] it is limited to where a successor cannot discard this Mass because of a whimsy or a deviation in Catholic belief, and there has to be a deviation in Catholic belief on the part of pope Paul VI who would introduce such a mass as what we have, the Novus Ordo Missae….
Poll
