Bishop Martin,
As a member of the Diocese of Charlotte, I have been amazed at the transformation of the character of our Diocese over the last year. What once felt vibrant and full of life now feels cowed, disjointed, and fearful. Entire congregations of faithful Catholics feel like they are losing their home, and they rightfully feel marginalized and ghettoized—reading the remarks you’ve made against the traditions of the faith, particularly behind closed doors where you’re unconcerned with public image, makes your disgust for the traditional evident and would make anyone feel as though they are intentionally being pushed aside for a more preferred populace to replace them.
In your letter “Go In Peace, Glorifying The Lord By Your Life” [sic], you stated things like: “I find it disturbing that so many pastors and celebrants are inclined to force an unknown language [Latin] on their congregation,” “So many of our faithful simply wake up away when they don’t understand the language,” “I cannot comprehend why a vocal minority of the faithful who themselves admit to not understanding Latin would advocate a revival of the Latin language within our diocese, rendering the liturgy unintelligible for all but a few of our people,” “All these parts are rendered less engaging by the use of Latin,” “the first [unacceptable tendency] is a rejection of the Novus Order Missae,” “Second, pastoral leaders who use Latin in the liturgy are creating within their own communities a divide between the haves and have nots,” “This fosters a clericalism that is unacceptable,” “To instruct the faithful that kneeling is more reverent than standing is simply absurd,” “This reminds me of what my Novice Master taught us years ago: ‘Don’t try to be holier than Holy Mother Church’,” “overly ornate vestments that put more focus on the ministers than the Eucharist,” “Latin responses and Mass parts are not to be utilized in parish churches during regular celebrations since they hinder people’s participation. Retaining the use of Masses celebrated in Latin is not opportune in our present reality since the faithful are not accustomed to it. Even in places where they have become used to it by more recent practice, this becomes problematic for visitors and/or new parishioners or those coming to the faith for the first time.”
There has been plenty of ink spilled about the contents of this letter from a sacramental, theological, or canonical standpoint, and I do not need to rehash those points made by people more educated than myself. I want to focus on the character of the letter, because you make it quite obvious by your choice of phrasing what you think of people who prefer tradition: you call us disturbing, you accuse us of driving people away, you call us uneducated and vocally opinionated, you accuse us of disobedience to the Church, you accuse us of being divisive, you call our practices unacceptable on multiple occasions, and that our piety is absurd, you accuse us of trying to be “holier than Mother Church” and imply strongly that we have a false piety, and label us a stumbling block for visitors and converts.
I am an adult convert who came to the Catholic faith after being raised and spending years searching for truth in Protestant denominations. As someone who found his way into the faith, one of the converts whom you insist is pushed away by traditional behavior, the use of Latin, and the attitudes of people who prefer traditional worship, perhaps you’ll find my conversion experience and perspectives helpful.
When I was first brought to a Mass, it was a Mass in the Ordinary Form in the Diocese of Charlotte. The parish I attended was a well appointed parish, with art, statues, altar rails, the whole nine yards—it reminded me of something you would see in a movie depicting a church in Europe. I was frankly stunned, I had spent most of my life in charismatic leaning churches with rock and roll praise and worship, colored lights, and projectors. I had been to Baptist churches and Presbyterian churches, and I had seen the “liturgical” spectrum from rock and roll to piano and American hymns; but, I had never seen what I witnessed that day. The intentionality of the priest, the impressive vestments, the beautiful altar, it spoke to me of something more timeless than the constantly changing series of trends and fads that had always been my church experience. There was something here that endured, and that something kept drawing me back, not every week, but frequently, as I grappled with what I believed to be my issues with Catholic doctrine.
It was not long before I found my way into Latin liturgy, and I was simply awed by what I witnessed. If what I had seen previously seemed enduring, then what I witnessed that day could only be described as transcendent. At that point, I did not know Latin, but on that day I resolved that I would learn it as best as I could, because something in my soul wanted to be more fully immersed in the beauty of that experience. My impression as a newcomer to the faith was that the deliberate intentionality of the celebrants spoke of a deep love, because no one puts that much thought and effort into every action unless he cares very deeply about the subject of what he is doing. The care with which the Eucharist was handled, and the veils used on the tabernacle and vessels spoke of something unspeakably precious—a treasure which should take one’s breath to lay eyes on, and an unspeakable privilege to partake of—and it was this impression that also helped me to understand the veils on the women as well, as something else which is regarded with immense dignity and a treasure worth protecting. The Latin language brought me something I had not previously considered in worship: communion. Not simply communion with the people in the room with me, but communion with the Church. The Church throughout the world, as her own nation with her own tongue, but communion with the Church through the ages—billions of Christians, throughout thousands of years, singing and praying aloud in the same voice and same tongue, the same prayers that were now on my own lips, and it gave immense weight to Christ’s words, “when two or three are gathered in My name,” that two or three now numbered innumerably, and I was counted amongst them in a tangible way.
The high altar took my mind back to images I had seen of the Temple of the Old Covenant, and the impression I had of the priest’s posture, facing the altar with his back to us, reminded me of Moses leading Israel from Egypt, following the pillar of fire—except this time it was to a new Promised Land, and the glory of that altar evoked for me the imagery in Revelation of the throne of the King of Kings and Lord of Lords, the final and true Promised Land to which we all sojourn, and the priest approached that throne as I followed. I yearned for when I could join that communion, and after many months when I was confirmed, as I approached that altar rail and knelt, the Priest who I now fully understood to be in persona Christi, came down from the Altar of Grace with the true and eternal Sacrifice that I was now included in, it brought tears to my eyes that the God who sits a throne more magnificent than that altar would also come in the person of His minister and in the form of that bread to unite with me in Sacrament and truth. The majesty of the altar contrasted with the humility of simple bread is burned in my mind, and makes tears begin to well up even now as I remember it.
I have always felt that ornate dressings for the altar and vestments for the priest are fitting—it was a problem I had as a Protestant that there was so little reverence given to worship and the objects used for it—because in the Old Testament, God Himself had spent so much time detailing with precision how the altar should be built, and how the priests should be vested. In the Sacramental reality of the New Covenant, how much more poignant should this be? Far from creating a distance between myself and God, it is as though I can feel Him, calling to me from His eternal throne, and giving me a glimpse of both the eternity which I journey toward and the intimacy of which the Sacrament hints. It spoke deeply to me how the Mass embodies both the communal nature of our worship, and also the deeply personal and intimate reach of the infinite God who reaches into time to touch each of us individually and personally. This is the majesty and mystery which kept me returning until I doctrinally had my head right and received the grace of understanding, and this is the worship which is so uniquely Catholic and did not permit me to continue in other churches, and eventually drew me home.
When I was first questioning what this draw was, I spoke to a former pastor of mine, who said something which unintentionally spoke more for the Catholic Church than anything I had seen to that point, he said, “One thing I will give the Catholics, when something gets challenging, they don’t water it down, they expect you to step up.” I had had enough watered down “relationship-not-religion,” I had had enough trends and hype, I had had enough teaspoon deep “theology,” and my heart yearned for the depth and mystery of the Infinite, the glory of the Majesty of Majesties, and the promise of a true home beyond this valley of tears—the Mass, and all the ornamentation that came with it, spoke that to my soul, and lit in me a fire that refused to be quenched.
It is disheartening, on the back end of these experiences and this journey I have taken, now to be told that, somehow, it was all “wrong.” That I should not have felt as I did or had the experiences I had. That I need to change my paradigm because I was wrong to have been called home like this, and perhaps this should not be my home after all. If there is anything that is pushing me away from the Church at this time, Bishop Martin, it is men like you who strongly imply that the Protestants had it right, and I was wrong to leave, and instead we should be more like them. If it were not for the liturgy I experienced, I would likely have not had the motivation to push through my doctrinal scruples and come to the deeper understanding of the faith that led me home, and if I had first encountered a Catholic parish which practiced the things your letter prescribes, I’d have likely chalked it up to another Baptist-adjacent experience and never thought of the Catholic Church again.
You can’t attract Protestants by being more like them, because if what they want is Protestantism, they aren’t going to become Catholic to get more of the same. We become Catholic because the Church offers something ancient, something timeless, something simultaneously majestic and humble—something which draws us out of ourselves and calls us to something higher. We come to find the King of Kings who is also a babe in a manger, and in the Mass we find precisely that contrast, and that is why the traditions of the Church have endured through millennia, and why men will endure persecution and martyrdom for such things.
Duc In Altum,
A Convert in the Diocese of Charlotte