Quattuor Abhinc Annos
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Quattuor Abhinc Annos was a document issued on 3 October 1984 by the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments granting diocesan bishops the faculty to allow specified priests and groups to celebrate Mass using the 1962 editio typica of the Roman Missal.
The document was in the form of a circular letter sent to the Presidents of Episcopal Conferences.
Bishops were to give the permission only to groups that requested it and that showed clearly and publicly that they did not question the legitimacy and doctrinal exactitude of the Roman Missal promulgated by Pope Paul VI. The permitted Mass must be in full accord with the 1962 Missal and in Latin.
In his motu proprio Ecclesia Dei of 2 July 1988, deploring the action of Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre in consecrating, two days before, four bishops against the express prohibition of the Holy See (see Ecône consecrations), Pope John Paul II called for "wide and generous application" of the Quattuor Abhinc Annos directives.
With his motu proprio Summorum Pontificum of 7 July 2007 Pope Benedict XVI revoked these directives and replaced them with new norms.
