I need to write a letter to a priest who I believe is intentionally making an error in his celebration of the Mass. I am furious by what I perceive to be an undisguised attempt by a rebelious priest to commandeer the Mass away from its intended purpose in order to promote a personal agenda. I want to be certain that I explain my contention to him (and perhaps to his bishop) appropriately, fully and with charity. Your help in this matter is truly appreciated.

First, the situation that is prompting my letterto the priest...

Last Sunday, I attended a Mass in the diocese of Albany, NY. During the Mass, I witnessed a priest who was clearly using substitutionary language in the Mass (he also, btw, withheld using certain words in the liturgy). In particular, he avoided at all costs any mention of gender. So, for instance, when he recited the Credo, he purposely avoided saying, "For us MEN (my capitalization) and for our salvation" etc. But more troublesome for me was his use of substitutionary words in the doxology that concludes the Eucharistic Prayer (that which precedes the "Great Amen").

This is the Issue: Instead of saying, "Through him, with him and in him, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, all glory and honor is yours almighty Father, for ever and ever," this priest recites: "Through Christ, with Christ and in Christ ... all glory and honors is yours O almighty God..." etc.

The reason (if one can call it that) that the priest uses these substitute words is that he is openly and ardently a feminist who chooses to negate, hide, or obfuscate any words that specifically refer to the sexual nature of Jesus' incarnation, or any words that point to gender identification with regards to God.

My argument in opposition to this is based on the following:

First: No one -- not even the pope -- has the right or the authority to utter substitute words during the liturgy -- particularly during the portion of the Mass relating to the Consecration.

Second: To use substitute words in the "Per ipsum" section of the Eucharistic Prayer -- even when using the name "Christ" as the substitute word, and particularly in choosing that title as the substitute for the word "him" -- is, in essence and de facto, whether by conscious action or by accident, publically denying the very humanity of Jesus by replacing the word that embodies both His divinty and His humaness ("him"), and putting in its place a word that only points to His divinity ("Christ").

By changing the words of the doxology, the result is that the words will lose their specific and intended meaning, and that a heresy is being uttered -- for political reasons -- during Mass.

Am I way off base here? Are there rules that guide these kinds of things? If so, what are the rules?

Your kind response is very much appreciated.

"51.] Only those Eucharistic Prayers are to be used which are found in the Roman Missal or are legitimately approved by the Apostolic See, and according to the manner and the terms set forth by it. “It is not to be tolerated that some Priests take upon themselves the right to compose their own Eucharistic Prayers”[129] or to change the same texts approved by the Church, or to introduce others composed by private individuals.[130]"

Redemptionis Sacramentum

"5. Only the Eucharist Prayers included in the Roman Missal or those that the Apostolic See has by law admitted, in the manner and within the limits laid down by the Holy See, are to be used. To modify the Eucharist Prayers approved by the Church or to adopt others privately composed is a most serious abuse."

Inaestimabile donum

Hope this helps

Pax Christi

Good Luck complaining. I complained about the Mass at my son's college in the Albany Diocese and got no where.

What I don't get about this whole issue is that people

1. Think that if we don't say "Him" that will somehow have anything to do with the fact that Christ is God the SON. Whether they admit it in their prayers are not does not change the fact, so why do they want to play the charade? What's next, we stop saying the Father and Son and say God the Parent, God the Child? I mean, really.

2. Somehow think this is inclusive to omit any references to maleness. If I were a man, being in an environment where it was becoming taboo to make any reference to maleness would not make me feel included at all. If one's "inclusive" measures make people feel excluded, they're self-defeating.

I don't know all the specifics of the rules like Teacher does, so I am leaving the good advice giving to him.

Just wanted you to know that you have support. I'll keep you in my prayers!

Dani

It is my contention that there are some clergy and religious in our present day Church who wish to do exactly that. This substitutionary movement is quite developed.

The implications of this trend is that replacement words that have non-genderized iconic or symbolic meanings should trump any words that lend themselves to gender specificity. Hence, we are encouraged not to think of God as Father, Jesus as Son, etc., but as Parent & Child because (after all) all humans regardless of their sex, are children who have parents. The identification, then, of the Deity as a gender neutral Being serves to embrace all humanity regardless of sex. How nice.

What is missing in this analysis, in my opinion, is that certain words in Sacred Scripture may have been chosen precisely because the symbolic/iconic language as written is intended to be gender specific. The mystery of gender language in Sacred Scripture is worthy of the fullest analysis. The premise behind any such analysis, however, would have to be that the Author of Sacred Scripture knows exactly which words to use, and is using them with decisve purpose. To second-guess God in this matter would have to be construed as being sinful and presumptuous in the extreme. I could go on, but suffice it to say, those who are using substitutionary gender-inclusive language in our liturgies and in the proclamation of the Gospel believe that this issue has been decided once and for all -- and that at least 6,000 years of faith expression and critical analysis of Sacred Scripture has been faulty!

To those who promote this gender-inclusivity, all of Sacred Scripture and all of the liturgies of the Church are nothing but a vast conspiracy engineered by people whose only interest is in maintaining some ill-defined and evil Patrimony.

Man-hatred is just as evil as Woman-hatred and it should be squelched whenever it raises it's ugly head. In my opinion, this gender-inclusive mode of thinking, at its base, is a disgusting and hateful theory that is leading our beloved Church into disintegration and heresy.

Who ARE these people? How dare they insist on imposing their novel interpretations on the innocent and most-often compliant members of their flocks. Where are our Shepherds?

Latin words IPSUM or IPSO in phrase "Per ipsum, et cum ipso, et in ipso" are intensive pronouns.

Thus, IPSE nominative (declined as IPSIUS genitive, IPSI dative, IPSUM accusative, and IPSO ablative) is usually translated like HE HIMSELF and not just HE or HIM.

lbt,

Fascinating!

The language of the doxology is exactly this in Latin...

"Per ipsum, et cum ipso, et in ipso, est tibi Deo Patri omnipotenti, in uniate Spiritus Sancti, omnis honor et goloria per omnia saecula saeculorum."

So, by your understanding of Latin, the phrase could be spoken most literally in English (in part) as:

"Through He Himself, with He Himself, and in He Himself..."

Do I have that right?

If so, that is a VERY gender specific formula. Please elaborate if you can.

And thank you.

This is very interesting and it makes sense.

The whole concept of trying to redefine (or eliminate) gender specifity in Christianity just seems selfish and illogical to me. If God intended His begotten Son to be born without a specific gender, and to be His begotten child and neither son nor daughter, He would have arranged it that way.

God didn't do it that way, so who are the humans to mask God's choices?

Dani

Well, if you know how:

/ IPSE / IPSA / IPSUM
Singular
/ masc. / fem. / neut.
Nom. / IPSE / IPSA / IPSUM
Gen. / IPSIUS / IPSIUS / IPSIUS
Dat. / IPSI / IPSI / IPSI
Acc. / IPSUM / IPSAM / IPSUM
Abl. / IPSO / IPSA / IPSO

Plural
/ masc. / fem. / neut.
Nom. / IPSI / IPSAE / IPSA
Gen. / IPSORUM / IPSARUM / IPSORUM
Dat. / IPSIS / IPSIS / IPSIS
Acc. / IPSOS / IPSAS / IPSA
Abl. / IPSIS / IPSIS / IPSIS

Note that for several cases such as dative, the word isn't gender-specific.

No.

In English, "through", "with" and "in" are pronouns. Pronouns require the objective case -- and so one can never say "through He"; it is as bad as saying "he spoke to my wife and I about it." I suppose one might say "Through Him Himself", but that is really redundant.

It would therefore be best to translate this as "Through Himself, with Himself, and in Himself"

One feminist lesbian theologian I have had the questionable pleasure talking to over the internet would not have used that exact wording but "God the Creator, God the Redeemer and God the Sanctifier". This kind of language replaces attributes that express who God IS with expressions of what he DOES for me.

And BTW, the Polish version of the Eucharistic Doxology goes: "Przez Chrystusa, z Chrystusem i w Chrystusie". I never even thought about it as an issue of gender. Especially since in my language (Finnish) he and she is the exact same word and there just cannot be any specificity... "hänen kauttaan, hänen kanssaan ja hänessä".

And that's why baptisms attempted with that formula are invalid: It's Sabellian, not Trinitarian.

I think you meant to say that 'through', 'with', and 'in' are prepositions ... not pronouns.

Awww. You beat me to it!

I certainly did mean prepositions and not pronouns. I can't believe I wrote anything so dumb. That will teach me to post at that hour of the morning.

What can I say -- it was a case of cerebral flatulence...

If we change the word "pronoun" to "preposition", though, my statement now makes sense.

no big deal.. just an oversight!