Four years ago today, Pope Francis renewed the restrictions on the Latin Mass. Since he passed away almost three months ago and can no longer issue edicts regarding this, maybe it’s a good time to evaluate Traditionis Custodes.
First off, it’s very important to understand the reasonoing. The problem isn’t the Latin Mass per se. The problem is the Traditionalist mentality that effectively rejects the Second Vatican Council’s reforms.
Traditionalists — probably the vast majority of them American — decried it. With that, we see the typical American problem of thinking the whole world revolves around them.
Latin Mass communities became breeding grounds for those types of Traditionalists, and that threatened the unity of the Church and the progress that Bishops have been trying to make for the last sixty years. Vatican II brought on so much good.
Is Latin Mass the be all end all form of liturgy? No. The millennial-Traditionalist loves John Paul II and Benedict XVI. But you know what? Neither celebrated the Latin Mass at any time when they were pope. They didn’t even use it for the really big and important Masses. If the Latin Mass really were the highest form of liturgy, you’d think that the conservative Benedict XVI would have celebrated his Inaugural Mass with it, but he didn’t. He also didn’t use it to celebrate his final Mass as Pope before resigning. If the Latin Mass really were so supreme, you’d think he would have celebrated his historic final Mass with it, but no.
Instead, both John Paul II and Benedict XVI worked on beautifying the Novus Ordo. John Paul II’s appointees to liturgical positions sought to enhance the Mass to show the universality and multiculturality of the Church. You’d see that especially stressed when John Paul II opened the Jubilee of 2000 – people of different cultures showed their indigenous ways of reverencing the Holy Door while oriental music was played. It was a beautiful expression of the Church of the Third Millennium already having gone to all four corners of the earth, and all people came together to celebrate the two thousandth year since the Coming of Christ. Benedict XVI, for his part, tried to stress beauty and solemnity of the Mass, the meditative nature of it, the grand liturgical act alongside the human person’s intimacy with God in the Mass. They did not say we should celebrate the Latin Mass – they said we should celebrate the Novus Ordo better.
I’m not saying I agree with the decision to restrict the Latin Mass. I’m just saying I understand the reasoning. If anything, I think the restrictions were heavy-handed – too far and too fast.
Instead, Pope Francis should have said, “I’m restricting the Latin Mass, but let’s on making the Novus Ordo better. Pope Francis’ mistake was that he merely banned the Latin Mass without a significant strategy to improve the Novus Ordo Mass. He did not particularly promote liturgy, he did not advocate for more solemnity in the Mass, he did not start a movement for beautification of churches, he did not champion better music.
The restrictions just left a gaping hole that people did not find fulfilled with the typical Novus Ordo Mass. And can you blame them? Mass is often mundane. Guitars and drums should not be the norm. The music shouldn’t try to sound like the music you hear in megachurches. Parishes look drab. One wonders if even Jesus Himself would be bored by it.
Now we have Pope Leo XIV. His stances on liturgy, if he even has one, remain to be seen. But even absent any push from him, the Church can still work toward a better Mass. Bishops Conferences can make a coordinated effort for it. Even if not, individual bishops can work on that in their own dioceses. Absent that, individual parishes can move in that direction.