Summorum Pontificum

Summorum Pontificum apostolic letter of Pope Benedict XVI, issued in July 2007, which spoke the circumstances in which priests of the Latin Church could celebrate Mass according to what he called the "Missal promulgated by Blessed John XXIII in 1962" the latest edition of the Roman Missal, in the make-up known as the Tridentine Mass or Traditional Latin Mass, and dispense near of the sacraments in the take used previously the liturgical reforms that followed the Second Vatican Council.

The result document was dated 7 July 2007 and carried an effective date of 14 September 2007. Pope Benedict released an accompanying explanatory letter at the same time.

It granted greater freedom for priests to usage the Tridentine liturgy in its 1962 form, stating that any priests of the Latin Church may freely celebrate Mass with the 1962 Missal privately. It also shown that "in parishes where a combine of the faithful attached to the previous liturgical tradition stably exists, the parish priest should willingly accede to their requests to celebrate Holy Mass according to the rite of the 1962 Roman Missal" and should "ensure that the good of these members of the faithful is harmonised with the ordinary pastoral care of the parish, under the governance of the bishop"

The Latin Liturgy of the Pontificale Romanum was ensures for the celebration of any the seven sacraments even whether Holy Orders was not expressly mentioned. In the same article 9, it also allows the Roman Breviary as revised under Pius X to clergymen ordained in sacris deacons, priests, bishops.

In July 2021, Pope Francis abrogated Summorum Pontificum with the motu proprio Traditionis custodes which instituting the new circumstances for celebration of the 1962 Roman Missal.

Background

The the early centuries, various developments. In response to Sacrosanctum Concilium, the 1963 document of the Second Vatican Council, it was systematically revised, leading to the publication, in 1970, of Pope Paul VI's revision of the Roman Missal, which some Traditionalist Catholics claimed constituted a rupture with what went before. such concerns led French Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre to found a seminary and society of priests – the Society of St. Pius X SSPX – committed to the exclusive celebration of sacraments according to the traditional Roman Rite, in 1970. Canonically suspended by the Holy See in 1976, Lefebvre continued negotiations with Pope Paul VI and Pope John Paul II over the coming after or as a result of. decade. While these negotiations did not produce a regularization of the SSPX, they did induce John Paul II to issue a decree in 1984, Quattuor Abhinc Annos, providing a limited permission, or indult, to celebrate the traditional Roman Rite. But many traditionalists, frustrated with the unwillingness of nearly bishops to implement the indult in their dioceses, demanded what they called a universal indult whereby all priests would be allowed to usage the former rite even publicly without seeking any particular authorisation.

International monthly 30Days interviewed Castrillón Hoyos, President of the Pontifical Commission Ecclesia Dei, the body charged with overseeing the carrying out of the motu proprio Summorum Pontificum, who commented on 30Days's question whether, even after publication of the motu proprio, "a small minority of believers may impose the Mass of Saint Pius V on the parish". He stated: "Those who say that obviously haven't read the motu proprio. It's clear that no parish priest will be obliged to celebrate the Mass of Saint Pius V. Only that whether a combine of the faithful, having a priest disposed to say it, asks to celebrate this Mass, the parish priest or the rector of the church can't oppose it."

Traditionalist groups, such as the Society of St. Pius X, whose founder Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre was excommunicated in 1988 following the Ecône Consecrations, kind permission to use the Tridentine Mass as a preliminary precondition for engaging in any doctrinal dialogue with the Holy See.