A Latin Mass

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My sister and I accompanied our mother to a Latin High Mass this evening. She and my dad belong to an "Anglican use" Roman Catholic parish a few blocks away from their house on the outskirts of San Antonio. The pastor is a dynamic former Episcopal priest, married with five kids; he’s done an amazing job in growing the parish and its school (with a high school under construction) since founding them in 1987.

Here are a few observations:

The priests and deacons wore birettas while processing to the altar, doffing them in unison as they entered the sanctuary.
A deacon preached the sermon from a old-fashioned raised pulpit about eight or ten feet off the ground on the wall of the Gospel side.
The nave was full; my former usher-captain’s eye estimated about 180 to 200 people.
There were a surprising number of young people there. I half expected most of the congregation to be old enough to recite the Latin responses from memory, but that proved not to be the case.
There was lots of incense (that’s why Dad wasn’t there: he has serious allergies).
Only men were in the sanctuary — male priests, of course, and deacons, but also male acolytes. The parish bulletin invited men and boys who were interested in being acolytes to sign up for training.
Three male choristers nicely sang various Latin chants, and also led the congregation in what sounded like modern tunes with Latin words.
I’ve met the pastor several times, and have heard him preach on various occasions. He seems more Catholic than the Pope; I guess there’s no fervor like that of a convert.
The overall gestalt was very much like what I remember from the pre-Vatican II era: The pastor is indisputably the boss, with the parishioners seeming to be quite deferential.

A couple of editorial comments:

Both the Roman Catholic Church, and the Church of England before that, made a mistake by abandoning Latin.
- There’s a lot to be said for being able to walk into a church anywhere in the world and fully participate in the liturgy; it makes you feel you’re among family.
- A better approach would have been to keep the Latin and train the people to understand it as one of the hallmarks of membership in the Church Universal, much the way most Jews learn at least enough liturgical Hebrew to get by.
The Latin Mass was a trip down memory lane, but it definitely reminded me of some of the reasons I drifted away from the Church as a teen-ager.

Comments

6 responses to “A Latin Mass”

2005-01-03

Mumcat

There are also any number of exquisite settings for the Latin mass in the classical repertoire – stuff you aren’t likely to hear on Sunday but which would make a lovely change from much of the contemporary drek.

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2005-01-04

bls

Sounds like high Anglo-Catholic – except for the Latin, of course. I’ve seen a few birettas tipped in my day, too.
I wonder if English isn’t performing the same function as Latin these days, everywhere – it’s as close to a “universal language” as anything is. But I like hearing Latin, so I’d be in favor of your idea; it’s absolutely contrary, though, to the origins of the Book of Common Prayer, so I wonder if they’d ever do it.

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2005-01-06

MTW

The music sung by the 3-voice choir is sung (in Latin and English) by our Episcopal Church at the 11 am Rite One service. Anglican church music is spectacular, and borrows freely from the best of the Roman Catholic and Lutheran church music.

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2005-01-07

roland

Having grown up in a fundamentalist church, I fell head over heels in love with the Anglo-Catholic High Mass the first time I attended my current parish. The incense, bells, pipe organ, beautiful liturgy….and some Latin here and there. Never experienced anything like it, and I was immediately hooked. I agree that English is probably the better language to use overall, though. Oh, and our parish is also “affirming” with regard to women and gay/lesbian people, so I think in that sense represents both ‘traditional’ and ‘progressive’ aspects of the Christian faith. I wonder how many parishes there are that have these qualities?

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2005-01-09

bls

Yeah, thinking about it again, I agree with you, Roland: English is better. It’s very versatile, and of course we have so much great literature in English; the BCP is beautiful as well as useful. And that really was the whole reason for the BCP in the first place: to put the mass in the vernacular so that ordinary people could understand it.
“Hooked” is the right word, too. I feel the same way – I’m really an incense junky these days. My own parish doesn’t use it, so I have to go A-C every now and then to get my fix.
😉
Most, if not all, of the A-C parishes in New York are “affirming,” BTW. I can’t think of one that’s not, anyway.
And MTW, I totally agree about Anglican Church music. It’s gorgeous, truly.

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2008-01-14

Bp Joseph Violet

I read your page, you got a nice product. Thanks for the information on the Dogmatic Topic of Intercommunion. I studied at an Orthodox-Anglican Monastery in Greece for some time before going to graduate school at Oxford, so I got a special place in my heart for Eastern Monasticism with a little Latin touch, of course! However, now I am a High Anglican Bishop (we celebrate a Tridentine Style Liturgy), who has valid lines from the Orthodox Churches. I am very moved by your page, and I recently got the book a certain Deacon Br. Andre Marie (from the Brazilian-Bishop Costa Old Catholic Lineage directing the St. Benedict Center of NH) mentioned (thanks for the referral) a very Hot! Roman Catholic Theology Book, that is troubling my current position called “Communicatio in Sacris: The Roman Catholic Church against Intercommunion with non-Catholics.”
http://www.lulu.com/content/1753466
I am thinking of converting over to the Traditional Latin Roman Catholic Church (maybe help Wizard-Scholars Bishop Jason Spadafore and Bros. Michael and Peter Dimond?) and now I am in negotiations with a Bishop in France (a personal friend of Bishop Richard Williamson of the SSPX, and who I heard got the book and maybe leaving the “Una Cum” SSPX to join the Reverend Anthony Cekada?) who gave this book of Dr. DeTucci “Two thumbs up!” I must confess I am very close to joining Prime Minister Tony Blair in his voyage from Anglicanism to Roman Catholicism (who I actually met once at the Canterbury Abbey of St. Augustine in England):
http://www.oxford.anglican.org/files/blairs_500.jpg
I personally give Dr. DeTucci TWO THUMBS WAY UP for his Patristic and Dogmatic Scholarship! Indifferentism is a Major Problem, and it has caused the Mass Murder and Holocaust of Abortion today, sadly to say.
I would love to review any Mainstream Periodical (e.g. Bishop Timothy Henneberry’s Moral Theology Magazine “Our Lady of Sorrows”) that has read through DeTucci’s Book, but I may write my own yet. I love to read first more established Scholars, you seem to be a top notch scholarly periodical online. Any degrees? I studied at Oxford, and thank God, I realized the Main Anglican Succession is invalid. That’s why I had communion with the Eastern Orthodox Church, but I am rethinking my Economy of Sacramental Grace thanks to Doctor DeTucci (who I heard studied at the Lateran in Rome).
And thank you!
Sincerely in Christ Our Lord,
+ Most Reverend Bishop Dr. Joseph John Violet of St. Vitus, M.A., D.D., Ph.D.
London, England
P.S. Doctor-Master (are you Irish?), I meant to ask you, if you had any Communication with the so-called “Latin Tridentine Church” headed by Bishop Michael Cox in Ireland? I had the pleasure of meeting the famous Hollywood Personality, that is, the priestess-Bishop Sinead O’Connor (better known as the Hollywood Pop Singer from Ireland):
http://images.ireland.com/newspaper/ireland/0499/thumb/o_connor.jpg
She celebrates an Intercommunion Service of the Latin Tridentine Mass, and I am not sure if Bishop Clarence Kelly, the Scholar-Bishop of Oyster Bay, New York, has written a review of her lineage? I heard she comes from the controversial lineage of the late Archbishop Ngo Dinh Thuc of Vietnam (the same line that Bishops Daniel Dolan and Donald Sanborn claim their fame to). Any insights?

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