Posted on 03/10/2025 11:24:54 AM PDT by Governor Dinwiddie
A British cardinal seen as the Pope’s “enforcer” in cracking down on the use of the traditional Latin Mass in Catholic churches has said it is an “overly elaborate” form of worship, in a rare comment on the controversy.
Cardinal Arthur Roche, 75, who was born in West Yorkshire, has been prefect of the Dicastery for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments since 2021, placing him in charge of policing the restrictions reintroduced by the Pope on the use of the Tridentine or traditional Latin Mass.
He said that his critics may be surprised to learn that he celebrated Mass in Latin every day.
Solemn Mass of Welcome at Westminster Cathedral. A Mass at Westminster Cathedral in London JOSHUA BRATT FOR THE TIMES However, he explained that he did so using the modern form of liturgy called the Novus Ordo and not the traditional Latin Mass, which had been used by Catholic priests around the world for centuries until its use was controversially restricted by the Second Vatican Council in 1962.
That council, known as Vatican II, gave Catholics the freedom to celebrate Mass in their local language and encouraged priests to face towards rather than away from their congregations, who were given a greater participatory role during the service.
In the six decades since, traditionalists have clamoured in defence of the traditional Latin Mass, including in a letter to The Times in 1971. The Pope at the time, Paul VI, was reported to have been so impressed to see Agatha Christie’s name among the signatories that he decided against banning the old Latin Mass entirely.
Pope Benedict XVI restored the status of the traditional Latin Mass in 2007 to allow for its wider use, but his successor, Francis, took the opposite view, warning that it had been weaponised by traditionalists with an axe to grind against his more liberal agenda. He said it was “being used in an ideological way” and reintroduced restrictions in 2021.
With the Pope’s health in the balance during his prolonged stay in hospital, it remains to be seen whether the next Pope will relax or reinforce restrictions on the old Latin Mass.
Asked about suggestions that young people were particularly attracted to the traditional Latin Mass, Roche told the Catholic Herald that there was “nothing wrong with attending the Mass” using the old Latin form, but said Francis had declared that it “was not the norm”.
He said: “For very good reasons, the Church … decided to move away from what had become an overly elaborate form of celebrating the Mass.”
Referring to campaigners who saw the traditional Latin Mass as a more reverent form of worship and wanted it brought back, he said: “The numbers devoted to the traditional Latin Mass are, in reality, quite small, but some of the groups are quite clamorous.”
Pope Francis leading Holy Mass in St. Peter's Basilica. The Pope GIUSEPPE LAMI/EPA He said that celebrating Holy Communion “in whichever missal you are using should be very noble and marked by noble simplicity” and warned opponents of the traditional Latin Mass who got “hot under the collar about others celebrating” it.
He said he used the traditional Latin Mass while training as an altar boy up to the age of 20 and said it was not the use of the Latin language that posed a problem. He added: “I often hear people say: ‘Cardinal Roche is against the Latin Mass’. Well, if they only knew that most days I celebrate Mass in Latin because it is the common language for all of us here [in Rome]. It is the Novus Ordo Mass in Latin.”
I know little about Catholicism but I have attended a full blown Catholic wedding......thank goodness there was an elaborate reception afterwards complete with open bar......that ceremony was a workout!
LOL
I’m all for elaborate wedding receptions with open bar. We need more of those!
My TLM monsignor would heartily agree with you!
Trust me......I EARNED IT. 😏
Seems the Latin Mass should be elaborate. It is a celebration of the most elaborate ceremony known to mankind; “The Transubstantiation”.
Reason #236 why I'm a Catholic.
Amen! If we could get even a minimal glimpse of the multitude of angels celebrating bread becoming the body of Christ along with us we would die not of fright, but of overwhelming joy.
Anything that adds weigh to this miracle on our part should be celebrated,
I’ve been hearing about this from older relatives and parents since I was a kid. Many of them grew up going to Latin Mass. Unless it is something other than just a language issue, I don’t understand why there is such opposition to it. Otherwise, what’s the big deal if a church does it and people want to go?
While I have attended many traditional Tridentine Masses, I had never seen a Novus Ordo mass, in Latin, in the USA. I didn't know such a thing existed, until I was traveling in Germany a few years ago. While in the Koln area, I did an internet search on nearby Catholic Churches and Latin mass - and that's where it sent me.
Who died and made him pope?
Once when I was in San Francisco for a conference I found that a nearby church had a Novus Ordo Latin Mass so I went to it. That was many years ago. It was done reverently and the Latin was pronounced correctly but still not the same as the Tridentine Latin Mass.
I looked into the ultra-trad movement many years ago and found out that in some places, the priests who did not like it were vilified and re-assigned to tiny parishes in the middle on nowhere as punishment for their views.
Some of the modernized were really horrible about it. They criticized the pre-V2 church as pray, pay, and obey, and then took that to new levels.
This is kind of the background as to why it is “such a big deal.”
You’re right...the stand up...sit down...kneel down...stand up...should simply stop...I think it’s to keep you awake.
I’m still trying to figure out which kind of Latin Mass Jesus performed. I want the authentic one.
This yutz is going to make mass a drive through...
Would you like absolution and fries with that? F, S, & HS, Amen.. 2nd window, please..
My sister married an orthodox Greek and that was one amazing ceremony.
I have friends who are Chaldean Catholics and I went to one wedding and the reception was really off the hook.
“Francis, took the opposite view, warning that it had been weaponised by traditionalists with an axe to grind against his more liberal agenda. He said it was “being used in an ideological way” and reintroduced restrictions in 2021.”
So..... the commie pope actually admitted that he had a liberal agenda. The arrogance. As a rep or spokesman for God he is not supposed to have an agenda, liberal or otherwise, other than converting people to Christianity and following and spreading God’s word.
Not true. While Vatican II did give some limited freedom to priests to occasionally use the vernacular, it was not intended to be a wholesale abandonment of the Latin language. And the Council said NOTHING about facing the people. BTW, when the priest says Mass ad orientem, he is not "facing away from the people." He is symbolically facing East, in anticipation of the Lord's second coming.
It's really not about the Latin language. It's almost an entirely different Mass. The new Mass is so stripped down that it's almost unrecognizable as being connected to the Traditional Latin Mass. I attend Mass in all three forms of the Latin rite: 1) the Traditional Latin Mass (TLM), 2) the Ordinariate form of the Mass, and 3) the Novus Ordo, which is what is celebrated in 99% of the parishes in this country. The Novus Ordo, even when celebrated with reverence and beauty, leaves so much out. Everyone I know who attends the TLM says that the language has nothing to do with why they attend. It's the reverence, mystery, and beauty of the Mass, as compared to the Novus Ordo.
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