Archbishop Arthur Roche, the leader of the Holy See’s divine worship office, has spelt out the Vatican’s position on the Old Rite. The liturgical celebrations which took place before the Second Vatican Council, he says, were legally abolished – “abrogated” – by Pope Paul VI. Although pre-Vatican II liturgies can continue as an “exceptional concession”, the reformed version is the norm. In other words, a new currency was adopted even though it’s still permissible to use old money.
The British archbishop’s remarks, revealed in a leaked letter sent to Cardinal Vincent Nichols, the Archbishop of Westminster and President of the Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales, are significant. It is often claimed by traditionalists that St Paul VI did not legally abolish the Old Rite and when he lifted restrictions on the pre-Vatican II Mass in 2007 Benedict XVI said that it was “never abrogated, as an extraordinary form of the Church’s Liturgy.”
All of this reflects the dominant line of thinking from the Holy See: the Old Rite is to be gradually phased out, although pastoral care has to be offered to those attached to these liturgies.
During Benedict’s papacy, an attempt had been made to allow the old and new liturgies to exist side-by-side. That experiment has been ended by Francis, whose approach is closer to that of Paul VI who only envisaged the Old Rite for sick and aged priests.