Expert in Church law dies, had helped revise liturgy in 1960s

Boston, Mass., Dec 5, 2005 / 22:00 pm

A retired dean of canon law at Catholic University of America, who helped revise the Roman Catholic liturgy at the Second Vatican Council, has died.  Msgr. Frederick McManus died Nov. 27 at the age of 82.

Msgr. McManus served as expert to the U.S. bishops who attended the council from 1962 to 1965. For his assistance with the draft of the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy he was given the honor of celebrating the first official English-language Mass in the United States, in St. Louis in 1964. He wrote extensively on liturgy and canon law and taught generations of Church lawyers.
 
In 1983, he contributed to the revision of the Code of Canon Law and was an organizer of the International Commission on English in the Liturgy until the late 1990s. He was a Church representative in the ecumenical dialogues opened by Pope John Paul II with the Anglican and Eastern Orthodox churches.

Msgr. McManus was born in Lynn, Mass., and was ordained in 1947. He received his doctor of canon law degree at Catholic University in 1954. He taught at Catholic University as a professor of canon law from 1958 to 1993.