The short answer is, No, he did not.
A friend recently sent me a question about an old article of mine (the best way to flatter an author’s vanity!), titled “Vespers in the Morning?”, in which among other things, I explained the very ancient custom by which Mass was traditionally celebrated after either Terce, Sext or None, according to the quality of the liturgical day: after Terce on Sundays and greater feasts, after Sext on ferias and lesser feasts, and after None on vigils and fast days. |
| Folio 1v of the Gellone Sacramentary, ca 780 AD., with the rubric before the Mass of Christmas Eve, “On the vigil of the birth of the Lord, at the ninth hour, (station) at St Mary (Major.)” In the ancient liturgical books of the Roman Rite, the year begins with Christmas Eve, and ends with Advent. (Bibliothèque nationale de France. Département des Manuscrits. Latin 12048) |
I should add first that this is now a strictly historical question, since this discipline no longer obtains in any form in the Roman Rite. Furthermore, what is said here applies to conventual and solemn Masses, but not to private Masses. Regarding the latter, the rubric in the Roman Missal “on the hour of celebrating Mass” stated they had to be celebrated after the recitation of Matins and Lauds, anytime from one hour before dawn until noon. (Noon was the latest permitted starting time, so ending by about 1 p.m. at the latest.)
My friend’s question was, Why did St Pius V impose noon as the latest starting time for the Easter Vigil? to which I replied that I was not aware that he had made any such imposition. He then directed me to some articles which made this claim, citing the bull Sanctissimus, issued on March 29, 1566. (Cherubini, Magnum Bullarium Romanum, vol. 2, p. 178; Lyon, 1682.) But it is a misinterpretation to assert that this bull mandates that all Masses be celebrated before noon. It does not. What it does is revoke a privilege by which some Masses were celebrated in the evening, which is not the same thing.
It must be borne in mind that curial documents of all sorts, not just bulls, were written by canon lawyers trained to be very precise in their language, and they must therefore be read very precisely. If something is not mentioned by a document, then that document is not relevant to it. One cannot treat the admission as accidental, or extrapolate from the text beyond the strict bounds of its letter to apply it to something to which it does not expressly refer.
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| Portrait of St Pius V, by the Venetian painter Iacopo Negretti, generally known Palma il Giovane (1548/50-1628). |
That being said, Sanctissimus begins by explaining that some rectors and superiors of various kinds of churches have obtained permissions to celebrate the midnight and dawn Masses of Christmas, the Mass of Easter morning, “and perhaps (the Masses) of other festivities… late (de sero), perhaps also around sunset of the vigils of these same feasts.”
Note that the only Masses which are specifically mentioned here are those of feasts, specifically, those of Christmas and Easter, “perhaps” some others. In the first place, therefore, this bull is relevant only to the hour at which feasts are celebrated. It has nothing to do with those of ferias, vigils and fast days, including Holy Saturday, the occasion for my friend’s question.
Secondly, the bull declares that all such permissions are permanently revoked, and must no longer be used as a pretext to celebrate Masses “vespertino tempore – in the evening.” But the sixth hour, after which the Masses of lesser feasts and ferias are celebrated, is not in the evening; it is at noon. Likewise, the ninth hour, after which the Masses of vigils and fast days are celebrated, is also not in the evening; it is in the mid-afternoon. So even if the restriction were applied to such Masses other than those of major feasts, it would not prohibit their celebration after noon or around 3 p.m.
Third, that is the end of what the bull orders; the rest is a standard legal “anything to the contrary notwithstanding” formula, and the decree for promulgation. The bull makes no mention of a positive mandate to say all Masses in the morning hours, contrary to the letter of the pertinent rubric in the Missal itself (which, by the way, was promulgated after the bull, by the very same authority.) Therefore, as I stated in the article linked above, a religious community of any sort was always free to observe the ancient discipline on Holy Saturday and other fast days, that is, to say None, Mass and Vespers at the appropriate time in the afternoon.
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| The papal chancery in Rome, in an engraving by the Italian artist Giuseppe Vasi (1710-82); in St Pius V’s time, official documents of the Holy See were often formally promulgated by affixing a copy of them to the doors of this and various other buildings. |
In passing, I note that less than five months later, in the bull Providentia, St Pius V also permanently (“perpetuo”) revoked all faculties for clerics of the Roman Rite to celebrate the Byzantine Rite, and vice versa, using very similar language. (A good portion of this bull is copied word-for-word from Sanctissimus.) It would obviously be rash to claim on the basis of this one document that no such faculties were or could ever be granted again. One should always be very careful and precise in treating all such documents.
