Requiem

For other uses, see Requiem (disambiguation).
Requiem for Bishop Cirilo Almario, in the Mass of Paul VI at Minor Basilica and Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception, Malolos, Bulacan, 2016
The Requiem, in the Tridentine Mass, celebrated annually for Louis XVI and victims of the French Revolution, in the crypt of Strasbourg Cathedral, 2013
Requiem Mass for Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria at St. Catherine's Cathedral, St. Petersburg, published in a Russian newspaper, 1914

A Requiem (Latin: rest) or Requiem Mass, also known as Mass for the dead (Latin: Missa pro defunctis) or Mass of the dead (Latin: Missa defunctorum), is a Mass of the Catholic Church offered for the repose of the soul or souls of one or more deceased persons, using a particular form of the Roman Missal. It is usually celebrated in the context of a funeral (where in some countries it is often called a Funeral Mass).[citation needed]

Musical settings of the propers of the Requiem Mass are also called Requiems, and the term has subsequently been applied to other musical compositions associated with death, dying, and mourning, even when they lack religious or liturgical relevance.

The term is also used for similar ceremonies outside the Catholic Church, especially in Western Rite Orthodox Christianity, the Anglo-Catholic tradition of Anglicanism, and in certain Lutheran churches. A comparable service, with a wholly different ritual form and texts, exists in the Eastern Orthodox and Eastern Catholic churches as well as some Methodist churches.[1]

The Mass and its settings draw their name from the introit of the liturgy, which begins with the words Requiem aeternam dona eis, Domine (Latin for "Eternal rest grant them, O Lord"), which is cited from 2 Esdras—requiem is the accusative singular form of the Latin noun requies, "rest, repose".[2] The Roman Missal as revised in 1970 employs this phrase as the first entrance antiphon among the formulas for Masses for the dead, and it remains in use to this day.

  1. ^ Fahlbusch, Erwin (2005). The Encyclopedia Of Christianity, Volume 4. Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing. ISBN 978-0802824165. Retrieved 3 November 2012. The possibility of a funeral Eucharist is provided in North American Lutheran, Episcopal/Anglican, and United Methodist worship books.
  2. ^ 2 Esdras 2:35 (4 Esdras in Vulgate).