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Page 49

 

49 RELIGIOUS. ENCYCLOPEDIA Ritter

engaged to be married, covering the smaller Catechism of Luther; (3) church examinations consisting of questions on the catechism and in the season of Lent on the passion of Christ; (4) in the home, in which the entire family participated, and lasting for from five to eight hours. The subject was usually the catechism, some passages of the Bible, or the conduct of the people present. At the end a simple meal was served. These home-examinations were highly appreciated by the peasants, while in the cities they were not always well attended, the wellto-do especially keeping aloof. In East Prussia the development of catechetical examination underwent several phases. The first is characterized by the order of Margrave Albert (1543), according to which it was the duty of every pastor to examine and instruct all his parishioners in every place of his pariah at least once a quarter. The order of 1633 marks a second phase according to which the examination was to take place once a year in the home of the burgomaster or village mayor. In the course of time the institution was frequently dropped altogether or maintained itself only sporadically. After the middle of the nineteenth century these examinations again came into vogue. The pastor visited once a year, usually in the fall, every village and hamlet of his parish. The parishioners provided for his conveyance and paid other expenses. Each family had the conference held in the home in turn and provided for a common meal. The pastor also usually received a contribution in money and products of the field. Later the people began to refuse to p-ovide the pastor with the facilities for travel, and the conferences sometimes degenerated into carousals. So they have in large part taken the form of church services in places where there

is no church. (H. JACOBY.)

BIBI.IOQRAPBY: H. F. Jakobeon, in Deutsche Zeitschrift far chriattiche Wiesenachaft and chr%Wichm Leben, vi (1855), nos. 43 15; idem, Dae evanpelische KirchmrecU des prewaiaden Staatm ii. !608, Halle, 1866.

RITUALE ROMARUM: A Roman Catholic liturgical book containing the prayers and forms for the administration of the sacraments, together with directions for pastoral care, compiled for the special assistance of parish priests. Books of this type were drawn up as early as the twelfth century, primarily for the monasteries, the secular clergy having none until the fourteenth century. There were at first no diocesan ritualia, but each parish priest might compile his own according to local usage. A book of the type in question was called Manuale in the thirteenth century, Rituals or Liber benedictionum in the fourteenth, and Agenda, Liber obsequiorum, Parochiale, Pastorale, etc., in the fifteenth. The name Rituale, however, came into general use through the introduction of the Rituals Romanum, when the attempt was made to obviate the wide divergencies of local usages and at least to secure harmony in each diocese. It was not, however, until the Council of Trent that real headway was made in securing liturgical uniformity; and even then, though the Roman breviary, missal, pontifical, and ceremonial were officially sanctioned, there was no single rituals. Paul V. (1605-21), however, appointed a committee of cardinals who, X.--4

on the basis of the rituals of Cardinal Sanctorio (1584), the Stlcerdotale Romanum of the Dominican Castellani (1537),and the S'acerdotale of the Lateran canon Samarino (1579), drew up the Rituals Romanum, which was officially confirmed by the constitution APosdolicte sedia of Paul V. (June 17, 1614). So great, however, was the tenacity of local usages that this rituals, based on the Roman use, made slow progress, though it ultimately prevailed.

The Rituals Romanum of Paul V. was revised in 1752 by Benedict XIV., who added two formularies for the papal blessing, and Leo XIII. had a definite edition prepared (Regensburg, 1884). It is divided into ten " titles," subdivided into chapters. The first title contains general directions for the administration of the sacraments; the second treats of baptism; the third of penance; the fourth of the Eucharist (the liturgy for which is given ill the missal); the fifth of extreme unction and all pastoral care of the sick sad dying; the sixth of burial;

I the seventh of marriage and churching; the eighth of the various benedictions; the ninth of proces sions; and the tenth of exorcism, and the keeping of pariah records; the whole being concluded by an appendix containing instructions for missionaries with various benedictions. (P. Dx>;wa.)

BIBI,IOasAPSY: On ritualia in general consult A. Franz, Daa Rituals van 3t. Flmian aua dem IY'. Jahrhundert, pp .

3-12, Freiburg, 1904 (contains useful bibliography). On

Baruffaldi. Ad tsEuale Romanum commentarsi, Venice,

" Ritualism " is used as a popular catchword to describe the second stage of that movement in the English Church which in its earlier condition had been named Tractarianism (q.v.). The name first appears, probably, in connection with the riots in London at St. George's-in-the-East in 1859 (cf. quotation from East London Observer of May, 1859, in Bryan Ding, Sacrilege and its Encouragement . a Letter . . . to the Lord Bishop of London, London, 1860)..

The revival of interest in Roman dogma, effected by the Oxford writers of the Tracts for the Times, was naturally suceeded by a revival of interest in Roman observances. This practical

r. Origin revival carried the movement into in Tractari- novel circumstances and situations;

anisnn. for the earlier detection and exhibition of that sacerdotal structure of the church which had been secured to it by struggles of the Elizabethan divines, was carried on, of neces sity, in the intellectual, academic region. The claim