Q: You wrote in “Choir Dress for Deacons” of 22 August 2022: “Like you, I have witnessed priests in cassock and surplice putting on and taking off stoles at certain points of certain ceremonies. I have never found any rubric in any liturgical book to justify this. I also see no reference to choir dress for deacons. The CB presumes that they are at least wearing alb and stole.”
In “Choir Dress” of 30 April 2024 you wrote: “CB 81 permits a deacon in cassock and surplice, and I read that to mean that they are not carrying out the normal duties of a deacon during Mass, but only assisting a bishop who also wears choir dress.”
In “Concelebration for Good Friday” of 6 April 2026 you wrote: “Additional priests may assist wearing either alb and stole or choir dress. Only the presider wears a chasuble.”
In Ars Celebrandi (Liturgical Press, 2021, page 146) you wrote about Good Friday: “… the only one who wears a chasuble is the presider. If other priests are present, they may wear cassock and surplice with stole, or choir dress.”
However Ceremonial of Bishops 315 has items prepared for Good Friday: “c. In the sanctuary (chancel): … red stoles for the presbyters and deacons receiving communion;”
Therefore “other priests” do not wear the stole until communion. The same would apply if there are additional deacons in cassock and surplice, additional to the ones “wearing red vestments as for Mass” (Roman Missal, Good Friday, rubric 5). Do you agree?
Would the same apply at Mass? Would a priest in choir dress, with a seat in the sanctuary, as described in GIRM 310, put on a stole to receive communion?
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A: One may deduce from CB 315 that it is appropriate for non-presiding priests and for deacons not directly assisting the bishop or joining in the proclamation of the passion to wear choir dress, adding a red stole at communion.
Nonetheless, CB 315 literally refers to those clergy who “will be receiving communion,” and nowhere does it state explicitly when they are to put on the red stole. Even though 315 says the stoles are prepared in advance, it does not preclude having clergy wear them earlier. In places without deacons, for example, one or more priests may be involved in the proclamation of the Passion, for which a stole would arguably be appropriate. The CB is silent about the situation and the vesture.
Extrapolating from Good Friday with a bishop to a general expectation, again one may deduce that non-concelebrating priests wear a stole for communion, but the Missal gives no instructions for the practice.
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