“Ars Celebrandi” liturgical workshops started on July 8, 2021, with a record number of over 230 participants -- among them priests, seminarians, lay brothers as well as laymen and laywomen. They will learn the secrets of all the skills needed to celebrate Holy Mass and other sacraments in the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite, as well as the Divine Office and selected services, in nine different workshop groups.
“Ars Celebrandi” takes place at the Basilica-Shrine of Our Lady at Licheń, Poland, where several churches and a dozen or so chapels as well as an excellent accommodation are available. This year's edition is the eighth one. Most of the participants come from Poland, but participants from Germany and France also arrived despite travel difficulties resulting from the pandemic.
The organizers are particularly pleased with the participation of a large group of 60 clergymen. There are diocesan and religious priests: Salvatorians, Franciscans, Piarists, Pallottines, and others. Another large group is male youth who are learning altar service. There are also two groups of singers, separately for men and women, who prepare Gregorian chants for solemn or sung Masses as well as services celebrated during the workshops.
On Wednesday, 14 of July at 13.40 an old music consort “Bornus Consort” sang the Mass by the Polish Renaissance composer Krzysztof Borek during the Solemn Mass celebrated in the main Basilica. Two Masses in the Dominican Rite – a form of the Roman rite dating back to the thirteenth century, which only priests of the Order of Preachers are entitled to celebrate, were also celebrated.
The organizer of the “Ars Celebrandi” liturgical workshops is the “Una Voce Polonia” Association, affiliated to the international federation of associations of Catholics attached to the Tridentine Mass, FIUV. From the beginning, they have had the honorary patronage of Bishop Wiesław Mering, who until recently was the ordinary of the Włocławek diocese. The media patronage is granted by prestigious Catholic titles, including Rorate Caeli, EWTN Polska, Przewodnik Katolicki, Rycerz Niepokalanej (the journal established by St. Maximilian Kolbe), Pastores, Miłujcie się and liturgia.pl.
In total, about a hundred priests have already learned to celebrate Holy Mass in the extraordinary form of the Roman rite during the eight years of the “Ars Celebrandi” workshops. Some of them began regular celebrations in places of their ministry. The interest in this form of the Roman rite among the faithful is still growing in Poland, as evidenced, among others, by the fact, that the number of places for the regular celebration of the Holy Mass in the extraordinary form of the Roman rite in Poland increased from 116 to 155 over the past two years.
