Latin in DC

The National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, in Washington, DC, has announced that it will host the celebration of a Pontifical High Mass in the Extraordinary Form (Traditional Latin) of the Roman liturgy.  The Mass will be celebrated by Dario Cardinal Castrillón Hoyos, President Emeritus of the papal commission for the Tridentine liturgy and those who celebrate it. The event will be the first time that the Tridentine Mass has been celebrated at the high altar of the National Shrine in some 40 years. The Mass will be offered on Saturday, April 24, at 1 p.m. in honor of the fifth anniversary of the Holy Father's enthronement upon the Chair of Peter.



So what does it all mean?  The story hasn't gotten the mainstream media's attention like the Holy Father's general indult for the Tridentine Mass, or like that received by the Holy Father's establishment of a new way for Anglicans to return to the Catholic Church en masse.

This sort of thing is what I predicted in 2006 when the indult was given for any Roman Rite priest to celebrate the Tridentine (Old Latin) Mass. There will be no bum-rush of Tridentine Masses.  The desire for revolution or reform in the Church is much smaller than it was in the 1960s, or at least directed by much  wiser heads.  Instead of throwing everything out that's come since the 1969-71 Mass of Paul VI, what we are going to see is a gradual reintroduction of the Tridentine Mass.  It will appear in the big, beautiful churches, and the more conservative-minded or traditional dioceses and parishes, and it will appear sporadically, for special occasions.  It will become more common until at last it stands alongside the vernacular use of the Paul VI Mass, which is all anybody under 40 or 45 years old has ever known, really.  The Tridentine will be the Mass of the more traditionally minded.  The Paul VI will be more of a "people's Mass," and used for catechetical purposes, as an introduction to liturgy, and for common worship among Catholics of varying liturgical backgrounds.  The Mass of Paul VI will, by its analogy to the Tridentine Mass, help those who attend the Tridentine Mass to understand and appreciate it better.  The Tridentine Mass, by its analogy to the Mass of Paul VI, will help those who attend Paul VI's Mass to understand it better.  At least, those are the desires of the Holy Father as he articulated them in The Spirit of the Liturgy, published in 2000.

Something Beautiful to Start off Advent

This is the "Missa Orbis Factor," a Latin setting for the Mass whose title means 'Maker of the World' Mass. I found it at the Catholic Key blog. Every mention of it I find on the web says that it is Gregorian chant. All of these sources are amateurish, though - bloggers like me. It strikes me as simpler than Gregorian, though. It sounds more like Sarum to me. This theory strikes me as likely because it seems to be an old English chant, or at least is making its appearance through Anglican parishes. Except, well, that could just be because they like beautiful things (may they bring them with them when they come)! But then, I am amateurish - just a blogger. The biggest piece of counter-evidence to my theory is that the chanting in the YouTube video I have enclosed is actually performed by a Milanese Gregorian schola. One would think they would know... except maybe they like to branch out. Plus, it's not like Gregorian and Sarum are worlds apart... not to my amateurish ears, anyway. Anyone out there know more?

Some Stuff I Bet You Didn't Know About Mass...

In With the Old

Archbishop Raymond Burke is the head of the Apostolic Signatura, the Church's highest court, subject in law only to the Holy Father himself. On last Sunday, Oct 18, 2009, he sang the Tridentine Mass according to the 1962 Missal of Bl. John XXIII in St. Peter's Basilica in Rome. It was the first time the High Tridentine Mass was sung in Latin in St. Peter's for forty years.

In her blog, Mary Ann Kreitzer points out that forty might not be a coincidence. In biblical thought, it is the number signifying penance, conversion, and waiting for God. Forty is the number of days of rain in Noah's day; of days spent sitting in the ark waiting for the world to dry; of years wandered in the desert; of days til Nineveh be overthrown; of days our Lord spent fasting and praying. The thought is hers, and I got the beautiful picture (at right) from her as well.

I will not go nearly so far as to say that the Church has been in exile away from the true Mass, and now we've got it back. That's all bosh. Where the bishop is, there is the Church (according to St. Ignatius of Antioch); when the Pope speaks, Peter has spoken (according to St. Augustine of Hippo). The Church has given us a new liturgy, the Liturgy of 1971 of Paul VI. According to our Holy Father, that is and will remain the ordinary ritual for the Mass in the Latin ("Roman") church.

But I will go this far: I think the Church is waking up. I think we are finally starting to wander out of the desert of our own denseness. I think those who are daily deciding to stick with her come what may, have counted the cost, are counting the cost, and have a better sense of what we are doing. Fewer and fewer remain who do so only because everybody else is doing so. Just a couple generations ago, so many Catholics had memorized answers that they did not understand, felt they mustn't question or probe, and were mostly content not to do so. The faith of those who remain is harder won, and we may yet be made to fight harder still to continue in the race of faith. Sincere seekers are asking questions with an openness to answers, and they are being answered by knowledgeable Christians who are open to questions. I do not dare say that the Church has been chastened, but I think it is clear that we are being chastened. And we are waking up.

Click the picture for thoughts about Rev. Mr. Fernando Saenz' first mass as deacon

We will bring that wakeful alertness with us wherever we go. We will bring those questions, and those answers, to the world. We will bring our understanding with us when we go out, because God is giving us a new heart for Him. And we will understand what God is doing even when we do not understand the language of the liturgy in which He is doing it. From October 6 to 15, while traveling in Italy and Germany, I had occasion to attend Mass twice in English, once in Italian, and twice in German. The German sounded a LOT like English, and phrases here and there had refreshingly similar sounds, but I understood hardly any of it. I know more Italian than German, but the Italian sounded even stranger - singsongy and light. At one English-language Mass the microphones were turned down a bit low, so I missed most of it. "Why not Latin?" I thought, "Just as easy to understand!" The other English-language Mass was beautiful, quiet, with an air densely packed by prayer; that was the Mass in which my newly-ordained friend preached for the first time. Seven or eight of us filled up half the chapel. Several Italians, mostly young and presumably understanding only a little, popped in to take up the empty pews. They didn't know it was the day after Fernando's ordination. They didn't know English. We did not know Italian. But somehow, in that place, praying privately together, publicly as a community of new acquaintances and strangers except for Christ, we knew exactly what we were doing. The Mass is the Mass is the Mass, the same in every language and in every place. We knew exactly what we were doing. We were awake.

Somehow, I sense that the growing urge within the Church for the Tridentine liturgy, even if we experience it only periodically, is a sign that we are coming awake.

I Just Met the Coolest People

Bl. Valentin Paquay	Bl. Lodovico Pavoni	Bl. Eusebia Palomino Yenes
Belgium	Italy	Spain

I recently finished writing three articles for an encyclopedia, each about one of the blessed Christians pictured above. When I applied to contribute biographies of new saints and beati to the publication, I had hoped to receive the names of VIP saints. That was all my ego doing the hoping. In the course of doing my research, I got to speak with a kind librarian, dig around in CUA's library, and dust off my Latin. The final product was three brief articles and a lesson from each of them.

• The lesson I received from Bl. Valentin is this: the simple love of Jesus goes a long way.

• Bl. Lodovico taught me that big things begin small, and that noble people are not do not feel themselves to be stooping when they attend to them.

• Bl. Eusebia taught me that small is beautiful and that we will be happiest if we entrust our littleness to Jesus.

The lesson I learned from all three of them was really more of a reminder: Jesus has given me my britches and I shouldn't try to be too big for them.

I really enjoyed the learning about them, and hope you will too. Each one of them speaks to me from across the generations in a different way, but like all the saints, they say the same thing, only in their own way: "Do whatever He tells you," (Jn 2:5). Click their names beneath their portraits to read the Vatican's bio of each my new favorite pals.

Laetare Sunday (a bit late)

This past Sunday was the fourth of Lent, called Laetare Sunday, named as many Sundays are, for the first word of that Mass, which comes from the opening antiphon:

"Laetare, Ierusalem, et conventum facite, omnes qui diligitis eam."

Or, for the less Latinly inclined,

"Rejoice, Jerusalem! Be glad because of her, all you who love her."

Normally, as a sign of joy, the dark and somber purple of the priest's vestments is relieved by a giddy pink. It's like the Church lurches forward with excitement and anticipation when She notes that she has rounded the corner and Lent is over half-done. While usually the priest is the only man gutsy enough to wear pink on Laetare Sunday, my sister and neice thought it appropriate that they should as well. How can a little cutie-pie like that NOT make someone smile from ear to ear?

In the Washington, D.C. area, our famed Cherry Blossoms are about to start blooming - first fruits of the spring, as if Nature and Fauna themselves are rejoicing that their King will soon rise from the dead. How wise of Mother Church to give us, her weak little boys and girls, a reprieve from our Lenten disciplines.

But alas, it's Tuesday now, and so we are back into Lent.