"Why I love the Traditional Latin Mass"

I’m home!  As you may have noted, I spent the weekend with a group of AWESOME people, doing AWESOME things, like going to daily Mass, listening to wonderful talks, and taking beer and brat cruises.  More on that another time.  It pertains to this post, but is not the subject of it. 

The subject of this post is “Why I love the Traditional Latin Mass.” Oh, you noticed that from the title?  Ok than.  I was working on this post before I left, but never got it finished.  Truth told, I don’t know if I could ever finish such a subject.  So I decided to recruit a little help.  I asked my friends from Sursum Corda to write down, in a short paragraph, why they love the Traditional Latin Mass, a.k.a. the Tridentine Mass, a.k.a. the Extraordinary Form of the Mass, a.k.a. the TLM.  Here are there replies (along with their ages, to forever dispel the myth that the TLM is for old people, nostalgic for their youth.) 

“There are so many things I love about the Traditional Mass that it is difficult to cut it short, but I'll try!  I'll just chose one thing. One of the many things I love about the Tridentine Mass is that it is timeless.  When I am at this Mass, I know that the words that are being said by the priest are the same as those that were once used by all of Christendom.  They were used by St. Thomas Aquinas, St John Vianney, St. Edmund Campion, and Pope St. Pius XII.  As G. K. Chesterton says, "It is of new things that men tire – of fashions and improvements and change.  It is the old things that startle and intoxicate. It is the old things that are young."” --Audrey, 20

“I love the extraordinary form of the Mass because of the reverence it inspires and the way it leads you to a more internal experience of the Holy Mass.  The music, the language, and the rituals point you to the deeper reality of what is really going on during the Mass of Christ’s Sacrifice for our salvation.” -- Joanna, 26

“It is comforting to go to. I feel closer to God.  Definitely I am in love with the reverence and beauty.”  -- Ruthanne, 18

“To know the Latin Mass is to know the history of Western Civilization.  The liturgy is the hope of our time, as it has been for the ages.  The Latin Mass is Home.” -- Petra, 21

“Love the reverence and solemnity that lift up your heart to Him.  Embracing both the sensible and the spiritual sides of our human existence, the Extraordinary Form of the Mass excels at using the more sensible things like art and music to take you to the higher, less physically sensible things of God.” -- Fabian, 25

“One of my favorite things about the Latin Mass is its universality.  It isn’t for one place or another...it is for the whole world.” -- Maddie, 24

I know I cannot say it better than these, but I will add my own.  I love the Extraordinary form because it is extraordinary.  It is beyond the ordinary.  It transcends both time and place.  It is capable of inspiring awe, reverence, and contemplation.  I think one of the things I love the most, that I do not find in the Ordinary form, is the silence.  The silence holds the words sacred, as never using God’s name aloud kept it sacred for the Jews.  The silence allows me to focus on lifting my mind and heart and sacrifices to God, along with Christ’s sacrifice of the Cross. -- Rae, 26

Please, share why you love the Tridentine Mass. You don’t have to add your age, but I think it does help to show that the appeal of the TLM is not confined to any one age group.  God Bless! 

Reflections on Adoration

  If we were able to truly comprehend the Eucharist, we would be unable to do those which we are commissioned, by God, to do. We would desire to never leave His presence, to never stop adoring, as is right and just.  Yet this is a privilege reserved for Heaven.  We know by faith that Christ is present, Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity.  We know we are in the presence of our Creator.  We know that He is all good, all powerful - He is everything.  We know that He loves us so much that He not only suffered and died for us - He humbled Himself to the point of allowing Himself to appear as a piece of bread.  Not only was He once a defenseless child, He now carries the form of an inanimate and defenseless piece of bread.  He wanted us to be able to receive Him, that He may receive us into His Mystical Body.  We know it all, by faith, but we do not understand it.  We cannot feel it.  Only once in a great while are we allowed that feeling, that brief glimmer of understanding.  

    We see the saints who knew this wonder intimately, and we wonder, “Why can I not have that faith!  Why can’t I see?” But what then would you do?  You, as they did, would spend hours adoring.  What of your responsibilities?  Your children?  Your work?  God gives each of us a task to complete here on earth.  Most of us will never know what that task is until we reach eternity.  For some, the job is to adore Christ and to pray.  A world without our cloistered nuns and monks would be lacking so many graces!  But for most, our job is in the world.  Essentially, we are to create new souls for Christ.  For some, this work is to convert those around us by our example.  Yet much of the work is in the family, and in the home.  I recently read a comment, I don’t remember where, that it used to be that the household produced most of its own needs.  Then, things became more specialized and the work moved outside the home, but it was still to provide for the needs of the home, and of the family.  What now is the purpose of our work?  We work to raise money to buy the things our family needs, yes.  But if you ask why we need more jobs, the answer is not “because it is good for the family” it is “it is good for the economy.”  What in the world is the economy?  And why should we care about it?  Have we perhaps lost perspective a bit?  I think so.  We have lost perspective because we can no longer see why the work that we do is a vocation from God.  It is our marching orders.  And it has a purpose in His quest for souls.  

   We cannot, must not, neglect prayer, especially prayer in the presence of Christ in the Eucharist.  No, we can’t understand its importance.  We can’t feel His presence.  But it is not because we are lacking, and it certainly isn’t because He isn’t there.  He hides Himself because He must.  He has work for us to do.  We go to Him for our marching orders, and for the provisions of grace that we need to complete those tasks.  And He is always waiting for us, always glad to see us, even when He is silent.  He is even more glad to see us when we come only on faith, and not from an emotional desire, because it is then that we prove our faith.  Someday we will see, and we will know, beyond faith, His presence; and we will have eternity to enjoy it.