Mark Shea getting Liturgic History Wrong

Blog post from today:

Vernacular Masses Before the Vatican Council…
June 17, 2014 By Mark Shea
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/markshea/2014/06/vernacular-masses-before-the-vatican-council.html

... and he meant the First Vatican council (which really has a claim to be called Vatican Council). When he speaks of Ephesus, does he feel obliged to be precise he means First Ephesus (Second Ephesus being the classic example of Robber Council, at least in Latin Church).

Now, what he describes is not a Vernacular Mass, or rather the description he quotes:

Mark, a 1710 letter from the Jesuit superior for New France (modern-day Quebec) describing a specific mission among the Hurons: “All are present in the morning at the sacrifice of the mass, which is celebrated in behalf of the whole village. Nearly all assist at the mass of a second priest, and not a few at another if there be a third celebrant. While the first mass of all, which is called “the Mission Mass,” is being said, they sing sacred Hymns written in the vernacular tongue, and adapted to the feasts which are then being celebrated, — with a harmony truly beautiful, and not at all barbarous.” (page 149)

This, my dear Mark, does not mean Mass was vernacular. If a lady not knowing Latin prayed a Vernacular Rosary during Latin Mass, you would not call that a Vernacular Mass, would you?

"While the first mass of all, which is called “the Mission Mass,” is being said,"

Note "while".

"they sing sacred Hymns written in the vernacular tongue"

The hymns were vernacular. The Mass was obviously said silently in Latin while the choir sung the vernacular hymns.

Here’s another article from traditionalist web-journal New Liturgical Movement which I helped fellow traditionalist (faithful to the Church) Shawn Tribe to found several years ago. In it, the author provides actual pages of pre-Vatican II Roman Catholic liturgies celebrated in the languages of North American First Nations peoples

Even before clicking the link, I have a hunch that it will be not a Huron Te igitur clementissime Pater said by the priest, but a Huron hymns sung while the priest was saying Te igitur in Latin.

Not quite, now that I clicked it. There has been a translation of propers of the Mass (like Dies Irae) into diverse first nations languages.

NLM : American Indian Requiem Masses from the Book of the Seven Nations
by Shawn Tribe Monday, November 21, 2011
www.newliturgicalmovement.org/2011/11/american-indian-requiem-masses-from.html

These Masses come from the Tsiatak Nihonon8entsiake, or Book of Seven Nations, published in Montreal in 1865 for the American Indian mission of Lake of Two Mountains, which contained both Mohawk-speaking and Algonquin-speaking Catholics. This mission, like others in the area, was permitted to use the vernacular for the sung propers and ordinaries of the Roman Mass.

The Requiem Mass was called in Mohawk, Iako8entaon Akohasera. It is the first one featured in the Book of Seven Nations and, judging by its prominent position and the inclusion of the chant notation, seems to have been the main Requiem in use at Lake of Two Mountains.

Now, the priest still said Te igitur silently in Latin - after the Mohawks had sung Sanctus in Mohawk. Or while they were doing so.

I could otherwise have provided a real example of Vernacular Mass previous to the real Vatican Council as much as to the other one. Glagolitic Mass. The text of the Latin Mass in Croatian or Slavonic, written not in Cyrillic but in Glagolitic writing.

Now, some think that Latin is the main point with Latin Mass. It is one point. But not the one which makes certain Trads and most Sedes suspect or even feel certain that Novus Ordo is invalid. After all, there is a Novus Ordo in Latin as well.*

Christmas Carol in Huron, courtesy of Mark Shea
http://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=BN4Vi9SPs8s

And all the while Calvinists were doing nothing to convert Hurons or Iroquois. And there was this Prot who was complaining that Cloistered people do not evangelise ... to top it, he was French, and it were precisely French Jesuits who came to Hurons and Iroquois. Even the spelling of Iroquois is an éloquent témoignage that they were not Spanish.** Nor were they German. Or Swiss. Or Dutch. Actually even less so than Spanish, I would say.**

Hans Georg Lundahl
Nanterre University Library
Two Hundred Sixty Martyrs
of Via Salaria
17 / VI / 2014

* Some Vernaculars previous to Benedict XVI / Ratzinger had erroneous translations of it.

** The Swedish name of a person of that tribe seems to remind of Spanish version: Iroqués / Irokes.