I'm all in favour of making the Catholic Church Catholic again. I just doubt a return to the Latin Mass will cure all our ills.
The Latin mass revival might cure my problems with the church I left so long ago --impossible to go "back" to a strange place with strange and tacky rituals that seem as profound as a Kiwanis meeting. I never was devout. I never even really believed in God, not in my Catholic schools and universities. But the idea of praying in Latin along with millions of others seemed powerful, mystical, and connected to whatever it is that goes on creating the universe when we're not looking.
"I just doubt a return to the Latin Mass will cure all our ills."
Nothing every cures all our ills, but it's still worth doing.
It won't. But, what it will do is put the worship aspect of Mass in focus and put the emphasis back on Christ and the Sacrifice of the Mass. That may not seen all that important in a world where administrative problems are pressing and grab headlines, but it's actually vital.
One of the myriad of problems right now (which has manifested in the form of things like lack of celebacy in the clergy) is a lack of faith or a shallowness of faith that has been, not caused, but helped along by shallow worship. The touchy-feely stuff is plain and simply shallow. If the major administrative problems are going to be fixed, the faith of the members of the church must be fixed first. Making Mass a Godly experience is a start. There is nothing like hearing Gregorian Chant a cappella by a seminarian choir to make one want to glimpse Heaven. That is what we are supposed to see in Mass and in the modern way the NO is said, most of the time, it's just not there.
Latin is not a panecea, but it does solve the problem of translation. I have a bunch of old missals and the ones from the 70's even have language that is much less watered down than what we hear today. Particularly in the lectionary. The readings should probably stay in the vernacular, for obvious reasons, but there is no reason why at least the Kyrie, Gloria, Sanctus and Agnus Dei can't be in Latin. The Canon would be nice, but I'm not holding my breath.
Abortion is a separate issue from liturgy. I represented without fee 1100 people arrested in militant sit ins to shut down abortion mills. I would have done it one way or another whether I was attending Novus Ordo or Tridentine Masses. In fact, one week before the worst incident of mass arrests and brutality against my clients, I was attending a Latin Novus Ordo Mass, reverently said daily at a retreat house. The heroism of the clients did not end all abortion in the USA but Planned Parenthood conceded that many scheduled abortions interrupted by sit-ins would not be rescheduled. The ten or fifteen kids who lived and were saved on that brutal day will live an average of 75 years or so. They will get to exercise free will. They will be able to do good or ill. They will not have been murdered in the womb. Not a perfect solution to everything but better done than not.
If I say only one prayer to God this week, I do not create a prayerful world or even a thoroughly prayerful me but the prayer is worth saying. Better done than not. Maybe next week it will be two prayers and eventually a rosary a day. better done than not at every step along the way.