GREAT RELIGIOUS CEREMONY

Wanganui Chronicle, 1 November 1950, Page 5

GREAT RELIGIOUS CEREMONY

Big Array Of Dignitaries Of The Catholic Church (By Adrienne Farrell, Reuter’s Correspondent in Vatican City). Vatican authorities are preparing to make the proclamation of the new dogma of the Assumption in Rome today (November 1) the greatest religious ceremony of the century. Thirty cardinals and 500 archbishops and bishops are expected to attend the solemn rite—the biggest array of high Church dignitaries ever assembled in modern times. Triple tiers of seats have been erected down each side of the western nave of St. Peter’s Basilica, flanking the damask-hung papal throne near the central altar where Pope Pius will say the first Mass in honour of the Assumption immediately after the proclamation of the dogma. The actual proclamation will be made outside the Basilica, from a gold and white papal throne erected at the top of the wide flight of steps leading from the Great Square into the church itself. From there, flanked on either side along the facade of the Basilica bj cardinals, archbishops, bishops and abbots from all over Christendom, the Pope will read the Papal Bull decreeing that the bodily Assumption of the Virgin Mary into Heaven on her death is henceforth an essential article of faith for the world’s 400,000,000 Catholics. Half a million people, including 200,000 foreign pilgrims, are expected to throng the immense square and the broad avenue leading out of it down to the Tiber, for the proclamation of the new dogma. Before the ceremony begins, the Pope will be carried across the square from the bronze door of the Vatisan to the Basilica steps. Immediately after the proclamation, his Holiness will enter the Basilica to celebrate Pontificial High Mass at the Papal Altar standing over the traditional site of St. Peter’s Tomb. To the 50,000 people who have been able to pack inside the great church to hear this Mass, the Pope will deliver a homily on the virtues of the Madonna. Music for the Mass will be the “Assunta Est Maria” of the composer Palestrina. Announcement of the Assumption dogma has been preceded by two days of ceremonies in Rome.

Today the ceremony for the proclamation of the new dogma will follow closely the ritual used in 1854, when Pope Pius IX pronounced the dogma of the Immaculate Conception of Mary. A stone in the entrance of Saint Peter’s records that 200 bishops were present at that last proclamation of a dogma honouring the Madonna, nearlv a century ago. As the Pope, in majestic robes of white and gold, wear’ne the triple jewelled crown of the Supreme Pontiff. reads out the proclamation, he will see assembled around him, compact in their unity, the m’tred heads of more than one quarter of the 1775 Catholic bishops in the world. A Papal Bull on illuminated narchment will be promulgated immediately to record the pronouncement. On the evening of November 1, all Rome will be ablaze with torchlights as it was for the dogrrm nf the Immaculate Conception <n 1854. The riant cunola o c Saint Peter’s will he lit by hundreds of flares fitted into sockets on the face of the dome. Members of the Vatican Sacred Congregation of Rites are already nreparinp- the new Mass in honour of Maria Ascunta which will be inserted in all Catholic breviaries.