Pope Benedict XVI's Ash Wednesday Mass. From illuminated manuscripts to iPads - the changing face of our liturgical "books"

Pope Benedict XVI celebrated Mass for Ash Wednesday last week in the Roman Basilica of Santa Sabina, after leading a penitential procession from St Anselm's on the Aventine. During his homily, in which he called on his bothers and sisters to begin their "Lenten itinerary confident and joyful," the Holy Father reminded us that all "are in need of the grace of God, to illumine their minds and hearts."

Whenever I come across the verb "to illumine", it is hard for me not to think of those beautiful illuminated antiphonaries and copies of the Bible created by our ancient monasteries. The monks often spent years decorating the books that they would subsequently use for the opus Dei - the singing of the Divine Office and the Mass.

The dawning of the printing press led to a certain dumbing down as regards the beautification of the antiphonaries, missals and lectionaries used by choir monks, nuns and secular priests. The subsequent mass printing and production of later ages led to the general availability of breviaries and missals, but also to the death of illuminated manuscripts, even if some monks still hold on to the tradition. The glories of the internet, though, seem to be posing a new threat to liturgical books, especially, it seems, to the Graduale Romanum - the book of chants used for Latin Rite Masses.

An eagle-eyed blogger at Sacris Solemniis noticed that some choristers at the Ash Wednesday Papal Mass in Santa Sabina were using iPads instead of books or score-sheets! Apparently, iPads are now being used by members of the Sistine Chapel Choir as this saves on photocopying. In that sense, then, I guess this new technology is helping to preserve the rain forests!

But, two questions remain: a) What happens if choristers forget to charge up their laptops or iPads before services, and their batteries run out during an offertory chant or Communion antiphon? b) Will we soon see priests carrying iPads up to the altar, using them instead of missals!?

Link: An Italian priest has already created the iBreviary and iMissal, with the hope that they will be used by priests and religious at celebrations of the Divine Office and Mass. To read more on this, please see Fox News (here)

[Picture note: Top and bottom: images from the Ash Wednesday Mass at St Sabina's Basilica, taken from the Sacris Solemniis blog. Middle: monks around an antiphonal; source: in the public domain, reproduced on several websites]