Rev. Dr. Paul Pallath

From apostolic times until the practice of the liturgy facing the people became prevalent in the Latin Church, the St Thomas Christians in India always celebrated liturgy facing the East or towards the Lord. According to the common tradition of the Western and Eastern Churches and the practice of the St Thomas Christians from the apostolic period, the 1962 restored Missal prescribed the celebration of the entire Eucharistic liturgy facing the East (or versus Deum). The celebrant turned to the people only for the greetings, blessings, prayer requests and the proclamation of the Gospel.

After the Second Vatican Council, without any authorization or permission from the competent authority, Archbishop Joseph Parecattil began to celebrate the Qurbana facing the people. Gradually the practice was introduced in the entire archdiocese of Ernakulam. Then this new manner of celebration spread to neighbouring dioceses as well. However, Mar Sebastian Valloppilly by order No. 5/65 dated 15 July 1965 prohibited offering the Mass facing the people.¹ Mar George Alapatt, bishop of Trichur, also did the same; on 10 May 1967 he ordered: “There is no permission for the celebrant to face the people while offering the Mass”.²

However, in the course of time gradually the practice was introduced in both of those dioceses, perhaps because of the great influence of Archbishop Parecattil, who at that time acted as the head of the Syro-Malabar Church and permanent president of the Bishops’ Conference and liturgical committee. According to Parecattil, “two dioceses alone are ‘backward looking’ even now, both in the literal and ceremonial sense”.³ One may note that this very fundamental change concerning the orientation of the celebrant during the Qurbana was introduced without any authorization or approval of the Apostolic See, the only competent authority for this at that time.

In the letter of Archbishop Parecattil requesting approval for the 1968 Missal and in the attached notes on “Some Changes in the Rubrics of the Mass” attached to it,”⁴ he did not even indicate this fundamental change regarding the orientation of the celebrant during the Qurbana, which would torment the Syro-Malabar Church for more than half a century. The text submitted to the Oriental Congregation only in Malayalam language contained the norm permitting only the liturgy of the Word facing the people: “The first part of the Qurbana (liturgy of the Word) may be said facing the people”.⁵

However, the Congregation was unaware of this change, since the translation of the text was not submitted, according to the regulations of that time for the approval of liturgical books. It seems that for reasons unknown the Cardinal Prefect was determined to grant the approval without examining the text and without consulting any expert as the praxis and norms of the Congregation required; hence the Syro- Malabar bishops were not even asked to submit a translation of the Malayalam text. It is noteworthy that even in the 1968 Missal permission was not given at all for celebrating the entire Qurbana facing the people. Many modifications were made on the pretext of satisfying the laypeople, but surprisingly enough in none of the petitions or memorandums at that time they asked for liturgy facing the people.

During the course of the second restoration of Syro-Malabar Qurbana (1980-1989) the Congregation for the Oriental Churches prescribed that the “traditional posture facing East is not be abandoned for another Westernization, the versus populum position”.⁶ However, some bishops who were already accustomed to celebrate the whole Qurbana versus populum continuously insisted that they should be permitted to do the same. Hence the Oriental Congregation later stated:

On the difficult question of celebrating the entire Eucharist versus populum, rather than preserving the traditional distinction between the position of the priest during the Liturgy of the Word and during the anaphora, when he stood at the head of the people, facing in the same direction as the congregation he was leading in prayer, the S. Congregation has the following to say:

a) The introduction of the mass versus populum was done without any approval from the Holy See.

b) The tradition in this matter remains the ideal and clearly represents the will of the Holy See in this matter.

The Eucharist celebrated versus populum certainly runs counter to the basic approach to worship in any Eastern tradition worth the name.

c) The celebration, therefore, is not to be versus populum but in conformity with the normal way of standing at the altar in the Oriental tradition.

Care must be taken:

• to celebrate the Liturgy of the Word among the people, as was done in the more ancient tradition.

-to see to it that every cathedral and parish church is eventually provided with bema, constructed in the middle of the central nave and regularly put to use.

d) The versus populum position may be tolerated, in parishes where it has already been introduced, provisionally and for as brief a time as is reasonably possible, while keeping the fact in mind that all permissions and dispensations of whatever kind given during the experimental period are revoked.55

The Congregation officially stated what we have already seen above: “The introduction of the mass versus populum was done without any approval from the Holy See”. It again confirmed the authentic tradition of the Church, namely the Eucharistic liturgy facing the East, but provisionally tolerated the versus populum position only in parishes where it was already introduced. It is beyond the scope of this work to deal with further developments in this regard.

(An extract from the book ‘Restoration and Reform of Syro Malabar Missal: Important documents from 1954-1969 by Rev.Dr. Paul Pallath)

1. J. Parecattil, Syro-Malabar Liturgy as I See It, 99. ↩︎
2. As cited in J. Parecattil, Syro-Malabar Liturgy as I See It, 99. ↩︎
3. J. Parecattil, Syro-Malabar Liturgy as I See It, 99. The two dioceses mentioned by Parecattil may be Changanacherry and Palai. ↩︎
4. Document 53. ↩︎
5. General Norms, no. 5; document 55. ↩︎
6. Sacra Congregatio pro Ecclesiis Orientalibus, Observations, 53a; in Roman Documents on the Syro-Malabar Liturgy, 78 ↩︎