Bartolomé Carranza de Miranda's ‘Little Treatise on how to attend Mass‘ (1555): A Translation

Abstract

Presented here is the first English and annotated translation of the Spanish sermon on congregational participation in the Mass delivered by the Dominican Friar, Bartolomé Carranza. It was originally preached at Whitehall, in the first week of Lent, 1555, before King Philip I and Queen Mary I of England. The text was subsequently written down by the preacher at the request of one of those present, the Duke of Medinaceli, and published in Salamanca and Antwerp. After a lengthy historical introduction, bolstered by quotations from Scripture, papal and conciliar documents, as well as from the writings of patristic and medieval theologians, the text is divided into three parts, which reflect the phases of the liturgy. The first covers the service from the entrance of the celebrating priest to the Preface of the Canon of the Mass; the second continues up to the recitation of the Lord's Prayer, and the third discusses the conclusion of the Mass. Then follows a short guide to help worshippers unfamiliar with Latin to participate as fully as possible in the service. Carranza rejects the medieval practice of bringing private prayer books to church for use during Mass, and instead urges full participation, as far as the rubrics of the liturgy permit, in the activity of the priest and his assistants at the altar. He also expresses a preference for frequent communion by the laity, which some Catholic reformers were advocating in the mid-sixteenth century. Although first preached in England, the published text was evidently as much directed at the Spanish market, where the writer evidently hoped that a reform of Catholic practice would help stave off Protestantism as well.