Scottish Catholic Observer

The Vatican announced this week that the feast day of Blessed John Paul II is to be held on October 22 each year in Rome and the dioceses of Poland. The date chosen as the day to remember John Paul II is the anniversary of the liturgical inauguration of his papacy in 1978.

The Vatican also said that Catholics throughout the world will have a year to celebrate a Mass in thanksgiving for the Beatification of the late Pope from May 1.

The decree included information about the thanksgiving Mass, Pope John Paul’s feast day, annual Masses in his honour and naming churches after him. The newspaper also published the text of the opening prayer, formally the ‘collect’, for his feast day Mass in Latin, English, French, German, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese and Polish.

Thanksgiving Mass

Thanksgiving Masses for a beatification, like the observance of a feast day, are usually limited to places where the Blessed person lived or worked. However, ‘the exceptional character of the Beatification of the Venerable John Paul II, recognised by the entire Catholic Church spread throughout the world,’ led to a general permission for the thanksgiving Mass, according to the decree from the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Sacraments.

A local bishop or the superior general of a religious order will be free to choose the day or dates as well as the place or places for the thanksgiving Mass, as long as the Masses are celebrated by May 1, 2012, which is one year after the beatification. In Rome Diocese, where Pope John Paul served as bishop, and in all the dioceses of his native Poland, his feast day is to be inserted automatically into the annual calendar, the decree said.

Outside Rome and Poland, bishops will have to file a formal request with the Vatican to receive permission to mark the feast day, the decree said. The local-only celebration of a Blessed’s feast is one of the most noticeable differences between being Beatified and being Canonised, which makes universal public Liturgical veneration possible.

Parish naming

According to the decree, the only places where parishes and churches can be named after Blessed John Paul without special Vatican permission are in Rome Dioceses and the dioceses of Poland or other places that have obtained specific Vatican permission to insert Pope John Paul’s October 22 feast in their liturgical calendar, the decree said.

The text of the opening prayer for the Mass in honour of Blessed John Paul is: “O God, who are rich in mercy and who willed that the Blessed John Paul II should preside as Pope over your universal Church, grant, we pray, that instructed by his teaching, we may open our hearts to the saving grace of Christ, the sole redeemer of mankind. Who lives and reigns.”