Latin Mass Tonight

From Adam Ryback, a Marquette alum who struggled (unsuccessfully) to get a Latin mass celebrated on the Marquette campus.

Come celebrate the New Evangelization and experience the beauty and mystery of the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite. A Missa Cantata in the Extraordinary Form will be celebrated by Rev. Canon Benoit Jayr on
December 11, 2013 at 6:30 p.m. at the
National Shrine of Mary, Help of Christians (Upper Church) 1525 Carmel Road Hubertus, WI 53033
This event is sponsored by Franciscum, a lay association of the faithful dedicated to participating in the New Evangelization through the promotion of traditional Catholic liturgical practices.
For more information, call 262-490-3844 or email mnoone77@sbcglobal.net.

Ryback adds more information in an e-mail:

The mass will have Advent music in preparation for Christmas. This means: Ave Maria by Schubert, O Sanctissima, Alma Redemptoris Mater, Panis Angelicus and more! The mass will be sung using Missa de Angelis (Mass of the Angels), whose style is Gregorian Chant, which the Second Vatican Council said should take “pride of place” in liturgical music.

Being Protestant, we have no special affinity for the Latin Mass, but unlike some of the more liberal and secular-leaning Catholics, we have no hostility to it either. Our view of worship is (within reason) “whatever floats your boat.” If some traditionalist Catholics feel moved and inspired by the traditional form of the mass, good for them.

But Marquette’s Campus Ministry, which has impeded attempts to celebrate the Latin Mass on campus at every turn, doesn’t seem to feel that way.

It doesn’t seem to be about any theological principle, or coherent philosophy of worship. It seems to be about cultural antipathy.

Vatican Expands Opportunities for Latin Mass

From Christian Century:

VATICAN CITY (RNS) The Vatican on Friday (May 13) broadened access to the old Latin Mass with a new rule that gives the Vatican the power to overrule bishops who fail to make the rite available in their dioceses.

The Vatican also said that Catholics who request celebrations of the old Latin Mass must not support or belong to groups that challenge either the pope’s authority or the “validity or legitimacy” of the newer Mass.

The announcement comes nearly four years after Pope Benedict XVI lifted most restrictions on the old Latin liturgy, also known as the Tridentine Mass, which had largely fallen out of use in favor of worship in local languages.

Celebrations of the older liturgy remain relatively rare. Few priests are qualified to celebrate its rites, and many bishops view the Latin Mass as a symbol of resistance to the church’s liberalizing reforms of the 1960s.

The Vatican on Friday said bishops should permit use of the old Mass for even small groups that request it, and said pastors should receive such requests in a “spirit of generous welcome.”

Bishops are also asked to offer instruction in the old liturgy to priests and seminarians, thus expanding the ranks of qualified celebrants.

“That really is basic to the pope’s thinking,” said the Rev. Joseph Kramer, a member of one such group, the Fraternal Society of Saint Peter, an order dedicated to celebrating the old Latin Mass. “He would like the old rite to take its place alongside the new rite in the mainstream of the church.”

Kramer called it an “important step,” that Catholics may now contest bishops’ decisions regarding the old rite before a Vatican commission, with the possibility of appealing to the Apostolic Signatura, the Vatican’s supreme court.

On the Marquette campus, the St. Robert Bellarmine Society has fought for more than a year to get the Latin Mass celebrated on a regular basis on campus, to little avail.

The Campus Ministry, which would have to approve any such masses, has stonewalled, invoking a rather narrow reading of guidelines from the Milwaukee Archdiocese.

In reality, the Campus Ministry has been in the forefront of political correctness on campus, actively pushing a gay political agenda and even sponsoring demonstrations at the School of the Americas in Georgia.

So the problem seems to be the cultural ambiance of the Latin Mass, firmly at odds with the trendy and liberal outlook of the campus clerical bureaucrats.

This action of the Vatican straightens the hand of the Bellarmine Society, but resisting what the Pope wants and has clearly endorsed is an old tradition among liberal Catholics.

The On-Again/Off-Again French/Latin Mass

We have heard for several days that the French Honor Society would be sponsoring a mass tomorrow night. It would be the “Latin Mass” we were told, but with parts in French.

It was to be led by Rev. Canon Olivier Meney, who is the “go to” guy for the Latin Mass in southeastern Wisconsin.

Indeed, just a few minutes ago we got the flyer for the event.

But now it has been cancelled. We confirmed that with Rev. Meney’s secretary, and with Emily Schumacher-Novak in Campus Ministry.

According to Schumacher-Novak, “the student organization wasn’t able to get the proper confirmations on the event in time to do it.” They were unable to get the proper information from Fr. Meney, and they didn’t have confirmation from the Office of Student Development. Further, “we thought let’s push it back a little bit so they can get the publicity out in time and do it correctly rather than haphazardly.”

More critically, Schumacher-Novak explained “I needed to check with Fr. Meney as to which form of the mass he was doing.” She explained that “we don’t have permission on the campus to do the Extraordinary Form [Latin Mass] at this point in time.”

But Meney’s secretary confirmed that part of the mass would indeed have been in Latin.

A student organization, the Robert Bellarmine Society, has been trying to get the Latin mass established on campus for most of this academic year, and has faced the resistance of the Campus Ministry.

No doubt, a narrow reading of the guidelines put forth by the Archdiocese of Milwaukee supports their refusal. But of course, if they really wanted too allow the Latin Mass, permission would not be hard to obtain.

What we appear to have from the Campus Ministry is a cultural aversion to the Extraordinary Form.

Latin Mass Tonight

St. Robert Bellarmine Society will be sponsoring a Latin Mass tonight, at the Joan of Arc Chapel at 7:00 p.m.

The mass will be led by Reverend Canon Olivier Meney, Rector of St. Stanislaus Oratory in Milwaukee.