General Characteristics

Of the Liturgical Uses of the Northeastern Indian Missions


Background

For at least 1500 years prior to the Second Vatican Council, the norm throughout the Catholic world was the Mass in Latin, whose usage has just recently been restored throughout the Church by Pope Benedict XVI. The traditional Mass, like the more modern form of Mass promulgated in 1970, was composed of fixed sections that were the same throughout the year as well as sections that varied with the season and the feast day.

The schola, or choir, played a very important part in the traditional High Mass, and there were two basic kinds of texts that it sang.

First were the ordinaries, those fixed texts which remained the same week after week. These were:

Kyrie (Lord, have mercy)
Gloria (Glory to God in the highest)
Credo (Creed)
Sanctus (Holy holy holy)
Agnus Dei (Lamb of God).

Second were the propers, those texts which changed every day depending on the season and the feast. The traditional propers were:

Introit
Gradual
Alleluia or Tract
Offertory verse
Communion verse

Another proper, called the Sequence, was sung before the Gospel but had become rather uncommon at this time, only appearing in five feasts throughout the year. (Note that by and large, most modern Catholic parishes have abandoned the use of propers, and substitute hymns instead: e.g., an Opening Hymn for the Introit)

Also, certain other texts outside of the two main categories, like the Asperges or Vidi Aquam at the Rite of Sprinkling, or other hymns or motets, also were sung at High Mass.

Variations in the Indian Missions

In the Indian Missions of Northeastern America and Eastern Canada—predominantly those areas first explored and missionized by the French—the Mass had developed along its own distinct lines beginning in the late 1600s.

The first major difference between Mass at these missions and elsewhere was that the missions had a very special and rare permission to use the vernacular instead of Latin for the parts sung by the schola: the ordinaries and the propers. The actual vernacular used, of course, varied by whatever tribe happened to predominate at the mission: at Kahnawake it was Mohawk, at Lorette it was Huron. Less commonly, multiple languages were used, such as at the Lake of Two Mountains (Kanesatake/Oka), where both Mohawk and Algonquin were used liturgically, sometimes even within the same Mass.

The second major difference was in the system of propers. The missions dramatically simplified the complex Latin propers by reducing their number and by simply substituting native-language hymns. The Introit was one of the only propers that was always retained, but typically, the Indian Mass used a very small set of them (anywhere from 2-6) which were repeated throughout the season. The rest of the propers were typically replaced by hymns; so there would be a hymn between the Epistle and Gospel replacing the Gradual and the Alleluia/Tract, a hymn for Offertory, and a hymn for Communion. Some of the liturgies show true Graduals and Alleluias, but this was not the case generally. Most, however, do show true Sequences in the few Masses that call for them.

Structure

The overall structure of the Indian High Mass was as follows:

Schola or Choir
in the Vernacular
 		Priest / Deacon
in Latin
Asperges/Vidi Aquam
Introit Prayers at the Foot of the Altar
Kyrie
Gloria

Collect

Epistle
Hymn

Gospel

Homily
Creed
Offertory Hymn

Secret (silently)

Preface
Sanctus

Canon (silently)

Pater Noster
Agnus Dei
Communion Hymn

Postcommunion

Dismissal

Last Gospel


The Requiem Mass

The Mass of the Dead was an important exception to the overall rule. In these Masses, the Roman propers were followed.