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Church Documents: Roman Catholic

PAUL VI, Address on carrying out the reform of the liturgy

PAUL VI, Address to a consistory, on carrying out the reform of the liturgy, 23 June 1964: AAS 56 (1964) 581-589 (Italian). [Documents on the Liturgy, 1963-1979, (Collegeville: Liturgical Press, 1983) Document 22, p. 88.]

[…] The results of the intense work [of the Council] are the first two great conciliar documents, the comprehensive and carefully structured Constitution on the Liturgy and the Decree on the Media of Social Communications. Both have been promulgated and are beginning to work in the Church with great promise for their increasingly effective application on behalf of the spiritual life of the faithful and the spread throughout the world of the Christian message and Christian thought.

With the motu proprio of 25 January 1964, i.e., Sacram Liturgiam [DOL 20]. we have indicated our will that certain of the norms of the Constitution go into effect immediately and have put into the hands of a special Consilium the responsibility both for preparing the overall liturgical reform on the basis of the norms of the Constitution and for studying how the decisions of the Council may be applied in letter and spirit through ways that are effective and proper to the Holy See.

We are extremely pleased to learn that in the various countries of the world the bishops are already intently engaged in studying and settling on the particular adaptations required by local conditions for the liturgical reform to correspond more closely to concrete needs and requirements. […]