Indults of Paul VI In June 1971,
Pope Paul VI gave bishops permission to grant faculties to elderly or infirm priests to celebrate the older Roman Rite Mass without a congregation. Later that year,
Cardinal John Heenan presented Paul VI with a petition signed by 57 scholars, intellectuals, and artists living in England, requesting permission to continue the use of the older Mass. On October 30, 1971, Paul VI granted this permission for England and Wales. Because
Agatha Christie was one of the petition's 57 signers whose name Paul VI is said to have recognized, the indult became known as the
Agatha Christie indult. Masses celebrated under the
Ecclesia Dei framework came to be known as "Indult Masses." On March 25, 2020 the
Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith issued two decrees giving new
Eucharistic prefaces and provision for the optional celebration of more recent saints in the Tridentine form. The decree
Quo magis provides seven new Eucharistic prefaces for the extraordinary form of the Mass, which may be used for particular occasions, such as votive Masses or the feast days of saints. The second decree,
Cum sanctissima, establishes a provision for the celebration of the third class feasts of saints canonized after July 1960, whose memorials were established after the 1962 Roman Missal.
Cum sanctissima includes a list of 70 third class feasts, equivalent to a
memorial in the ordinary form.
Traditionis custodes (2021) In 2021,
Pope Francis, motivated by a desire to stave off what he perceived to be growing rejection of the Second Vatican Council developing from groups using the preconciliar rites, issued the
apostolic letter Traditionis custodes to restore the previous
status quo of bishops having authority over the celebrations of Mass in the preconciliar Roman Rite. Francis stated in the letter that the current version of the Roman Rite ought to be regarded as the "unique expression of [its]
lex orandi." == Liturgies ==