As we have already said, it seems to be natural for men to connect certain thoughts or words with certain actions. Thus, when we greet a friend we shake hands with him. Again, actions seem to add force and impressiveness to what we say. In public speaking an orator who is a master of gesture speaks with his hands as well as with his tongue. Natives of certain countries use so many gestures in ordinary conversation that they may be said to speak two languages. Again, in private life, as well as in public assemblies, a certain order is always necessary for the decent carrying on of affairs. Now, all these actions are called ceremonies. When, therefore, in religion we pray or offer sacrifice, it is but natural that we should make use of ceremonies. Thus, we kneel, stand, join our hands, strike our breast, make the Sign of the Cross, and perform our actions in a fixed sequence and order, and all these things we call religious ceremonies.
In ancient Athens there was a curious custom that the wealthier citizens should take upon themselves the more burdensome public offices and discharge them at their own expense. A public service of this kind was called a "Liturgy," which is merely the Greek for a "public work." In course of time the word liturgy was applied to the public services of religion, such as prayer and sacrifice. Liturgy, then, means for us the regular order of public worship. That is to say, this usage obtains among the communities that employ what is called the Roman rite. In the old Oriental countries, or those lands that are now popularly known as the "Near East," where languages other than Latin are employed in the public worship the word liturgy is restricted to the Sacrifice or the Mass. Rite and Use are used much in the same sense as liturgy. Thus we speak of the Latin Rite or the Roman Use.
The nature of the prayer and sacrifice is always the same, but of course the words employed and the ceremonies used may be very different. Even when the words mean the same thing the language may change, and where the ceremonies are identical the order in which they occur may be altered. Hence it follows that we may have different liturgies, and these, too, in the Catholic Church. We must not imagine that it is wrong to have different liturgies. As long as the Church approves of them they are really public worship, just as in one city we have a government of one kind and in another city a government of another kind. All these governments are really public governments as long as they are constituted according to the law.
The Catechism tells us that "Holy Order is a Sacrament by which bishops, priests and other ministers of the Church are ordained and receive the power and grace to perform their sacred duties." The power of performing these duties is called the power of Orders. There is another power called the power of jurisdiction. Jurisdiction means the authority to rule others. In our government we have this author ity broken up into the legislative, judicial and executive departments. In other countries the three functions are united in one man or in one body of men. Our Lord organized the Church on the Apostles, with Saint Peter at their head. Today the Church is governed by the Pope, Saint Peter's successor, and by the Bishops, the successors of the other Apostles. To the priests the individual Bishops commit jurisdiction over part of their flocks. Usually, therefore, in countries like our own, we find the power of orders and the power of jurisdiction going together, and we are apt to confound them. A little reflection will show us that they are two different things. If a layman were elected Pope, he would rule the Church from the moment of his election, but he could not say Mass until he had been ordained. A woman cannot receive Holy Orders, but she can exercise jurisdiction over others, as, for instance, in the case of religious Orders. The superior of the Jesuits is a priest, but a Bishop joining the Jesuits would have to obey his superiors like the humblest lay brother.
The form of Church government to which we are accustomed in this country is very simple: we have priests, bishops, archbishops and the Pope. In practice, indeed, we might say we are governed by the bishops and the Pope. In olden times, however, when communication was not as easy as it is now, the system of Church organization wa,s more complex. The bishops were grouped in provinces around a metropolitan or archbishop. The provinces were assembled about a primate. The primates were subject to a patriarch, and over all was the Pope.
As Saint Peter was the head of the Church, we should expect that the cities most closely connected with him should receive special consideration. See means the same as seat, and a seat or throne is not only a symbol of teaching, but also of authority. The first See of Saint Peter was at Antioch, and the second at Rome. Hence, we find Antioch designated as a Patriarchate, and while the Patriarchal dignity of Rome was, so to speak, obscured by its dignity as the seat of government of the Universal Church, we find that one of the chief titles of the Pope is Patriarch of the West. The Evangelist Saint Mark, who was Saint Peter's disciple, is the founder of the See of Alexandria, and thus we have the three original Patriarchates, Rome, Antioch and Alexandria.
In studying history it is very important to keep in mind the distinction between the East and the West. The distinction is as acute today as it was two thousand years ago, but with our larger horizon we now speak of the Near East and of the Far East. When the Church was young the East was the old Empire of Alexander, that is, roughly everything east of the Adriatic, where, in addition to the local dialects, Greek was the language of commerce and culture. The West was the Latin-speaking world, comprising Europe from the Adriatic to the Atlantic. The northern shore of Africa was divided between the Greek and the Latin. Egypt, with its immemorial culture, was ruled by a Greek dynasty; the ancient territories of Carthage were reckoned in the West. The three Patriarchates, therefore, corresponded to the main divisions of the old Roman Empire. The West formed the Patriarchate of Rome, the East the Patriarchate of Antioch, while Egypt and the territories to the South were ruled from Alexandria. After the peace of the Church the new city of Constantinople gradually absorbed all the privileges of Antioch, while Jerusalem received the title in consideration of the part it played in the history of revelation. Still later in Church history other cities received the title of Patriarchate, but as far as the liturgy is concerned everything hangs on the three original Patriarchates, Rome, Antioch, Alexandria.
This statement is especially true when we undertake to classify the liturgies that have come down to us. They all group themselves about the Patriarchates. The Latin family looks to Rome; the Greek family to Antioch, and the Egyptian family to Alexandria. The Antioch family divides itself into two main branches. Constantinople usurped Antioch's privileges, and the liturgy of Constantinople spread there from into the Balkans and Russia; from Antioch herself her rite crossed the Euphrates and was carried to India and China. The liturgy of Alexandria penetrated as far south as Abyssinia, where it is in use today. The Roman rite has followed Latin culture all over the world. The Latin liturgy as we use it is uniform every where, with the exception of Milan, in Italy, and Toledo, in Spain, where slightly different forms are still kept up. The Milan use is known as the Ambrosian rite, and the Toledo use is called the Mozarabic rite.
- taken from The Mass, by Father Peter Christopher Yorke