Posted on 09/29/2020 8:32:06 PM PDT by MurphsLaw
My friend. Thanks for writing. Here is my simple and uncomplicated answer.
The Latin Mass is marvelous, a gift of God and the form of the Mass for over a thousand years, and one that Benedict XVI thankfully brought back into wide usage.
The whole Church should be grateful and make full use of this liturgical form. I prefer the ad orientem posture of the priest in the Latin Mass, facing east.
However, the Novus Ordo Mass is also beautiful and marvelous when celebrated correctly and reverently. They are both valid and beautiful gifts from God.
The Latin Mass was not the original Mass of the Church. Jesus celebrated the Eucharist in Aramaic/Hebrew. The early Church then developed the Mass using the universal Greek language. Later it was developed in the West using Latin. Latin does not make it the original Mass as some may think.
The problem arises when some people that love the Latin Mass go a bit too far. Some of these good-intentioned folks end up disparaging and rejecting the Novus Ordo. This is not all by any means. Most of those who love the Latin Mass have a perfectly clear understanding of the Mass in both forms. But some then go on to the extreme and reject Vatican II and even recent popes since Vatican II. These few also often judge other’s spirituality and orthodox Catholicism by whether they go or don’t go to the Latin Mass.
These are sometimes referred to as Rad Trads (not traditionalists, which I consider myself, but Radical Traditionalists) and you should avoid them at all cost. Those who follow this course cannot talk about anything else (like playing one key on a piano) and they have no joy.
I’m far less concerned about Latin than I am about a South American Jesuit Communist.
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