The original questions was:

Dear Rev. Know-It-All,

My pastor is planning to reintroduce the old Latin Mass.  Thank God he is not going to replace any of the current Masses, but will add a Latin.  This is a tragedy.  I see the church, which has made a little progress toward inclusion, sliding back down into the morass of the dark ages and my lunatic pastor is leading the charge. 

The revived “old ” will be mumbled in Latin without any amplification.  The priest will have his back to the congregation so that any interaction or participation will be impossible.  I have heard that he is even going to put up the little rope that blocks the altar off from the community.  No women will be allowed to exercise their ministries of communion minister, altar server or lector.  (I myself am a leader of liturgical dance.)  Women won’t even be singing in the choir.  It will be nothing more than a men’s club!  It simply should not be allowed! 

Please comment.

Juana Stoppet

Please allow me to continue our conversation of last week. 

You may have been shocked to hear me say that there has never been a feminist movement.  The last few decades have been consumed by a masculinist movement.  Men have not learned the virtues of women.  Women have learned the vices of men.  Just look at the statistics for heart attack and lung cancer deaths among women. 

The traditional Catholic liturgy was a ceremony that recognized the uniqueness and power of women.  Traditional societies have always segregated men and women in certain sacred activities.  From the jungles of the Amazon to the peaks of Mount Athos, there are places where men may not go and there are places where women may not go. 

You may think that this proves your point:  traditional Catholicism belongs in the jungle with all other things primitive and savage.  Perhaps you think that this modern age is more civilized than times past. 

If you are dumb enough to believe that, I refer you to the egalitarian and secularist philosophies of the 20th century.  Read the “Black Book of Communism,” compiled by French Marxists.  The death toll will stagger you.  Russia 25 million, China 65 million, Cambodia 2 million.  Who knows about Cuba, Nicaragua and elsewhere.  Add that to the other horrors of the 20th century and perhaps you will be happy to join me back in the jungle. 

Excuse the tirade, but my point is that it is foolish to believe in modernity. 

People who lived before us were as human as we, and their insights into humanity are not as old fashioned as you think.  Perhaps men and women are different!  The Tridentine, oops, the traditional Mass recognizes this very clearly.  A woman may not enter the sanctuary when Mass is taking place. How awful! 

Well, “A” man may not enter it either. 

When a man presides at the traditional liturgy he stops being himself.  He becomes Adam, He becomes Christ.  Individual creativity is completely forbidden.  The priest faces the wall.  He hold his hands in just a certain way.  For most of the Mass you don’t even hear his voice.  If he says the Mass properly, he ceases to be himself.  Creativity is not discouraged, it is absolutely forbidden. 

The traditional Mass is by man for woman.  It is Christ offering himself for His bride.

“What hoo ha!” I can hear you saying. 

Well it was 1600 years of powerful men denying their creativity and powerful women denying themselves access to the sanctuary.  It was a humbling of both.  Not even kings could enter the sanctuary.  They stayed out in the congregation with the common folk. 

Now of course, in our enlightened and democratic times, our aristocracy, the politicians, get up and preach regularly at Mass, just go down to St. Sabina’s when Rev. Sharpton or Rev. Farakhan are in the pulpit.  This is certainly better than the old days before democracy reached the liturgy.  How grand it is to live in these enlightened times. 

If you go to a traditional Mass you will see a little bit of cloth around the celebrant’s left wrist.  It is called a maniple.  You can’t say a traditional Mass without one.  It may appear to be just a little bit of fancy archaic fluff, but it isn't.  It symbolizes the cords that bound Jesus at his suffering and death.  The priest takes it off and lays it on the missal when he leaves the altar to preach.  It means that, for the duration of the sermon, he is no longer an icon of Christ.  When he preaches, he is just Father so-and-so, not Christ and perhaps he should be taken with a grain of salt.  He is less, not more than the celebrant of the Mass when he preaches. 

During Mass on Feb. 9th 2003, when the Rev. Sharpton went to the ostensibly Catholic pulpit of St. Sabina’s on the south side of Chicago, to preach about a woman’s right to abortion, he made no such fine distinction.  He took off no maniple to let you know that he was less than Christ and his support for the abortion industry was just his opinion.  In the court of the King we are all less, you see, if that king is Christ.  Less that is, until He lifts you up to be seated on the throne with His heavenly Father.

The traditional Mass is an affront to our democratic sensibilities.  Herein Juana, lies your distress.  You cannot go up to the altar.  You cannot always hear what is being said. 

Have you ever been to a synagogue service?  It is fascinating.  There are long periods when only the cantor sings.  There are long periods of silent prayer.  The traditional Catholic Mass has more in common with the synagogue service than it does with a Protestant service. 

That commonality is even more obvious when you think about the temple service of the first century where the Acts of the Apostles tells us that Christian worship had its origins. (Acts2:46) 

I heard the most curious statement by a lecturer that the first Christians had a very fluid liturgy because, after all, they were doing this for the first time.  I bet they didn't think that.  They were Jews and they knew how to conduct a liturgy.  The first Masses were developments of what they had always done.  They used songs and  gestures that they had always used in synagogue and temple, added to and given full meaning by Jesus the Messiah.  They had received a tradition and were fulfilling it, they were not inventing a new religion. 

The temple was hardly a democratic place.  All people could go into the outer court.  All Jews could go into the next court.  All Jewish MEN, heaven forbid, could go into the next court.  Only Jewish priests, who were all men descended from Aaron the priest and none other, could go into the next court where sacrifice was actually offered.  Finally, only the high priest, descended from one particular branch of that exclusive priestly family and then only one a year, could go into to the innermost court, the Holy of Holies and then only once a year.  There he spoke the unspeakable name of God out of the hearing of all others.  The traditional Mass reflects this. 

The new style of Mass reflects a different dimension of the faith, not a better one nor a worse one.  It reminds us that we are the family of God, adopted by sacrifice.  Both dimensions of the mystery are true and the pope has chosen to allow the emphasis of both dimensions, whereas many modern American liturgists are not very happy about it. 

One petulant expert reminded people that the pope is not a trained liturgist.  No, but he is the pope.  I constantly ask myself why there is such hatred for  the traditional Mass.  A friend of mine, a remarkable scholar, explained it to me.  The traditional Mass kept Catholics from being fully American.  Latin itself was the enemy. 

The old Mass is nothing if not undemocratic.  A whole generation or two of the children of immigrants so wanted to be loved by this wealthy and sophisticated society.  I remember as a child not being allowed into certain homes because I was Catholic.  It hurt. 

As long as we were slaves to that class of priests and their mumbo jumbo, we would never be modern.  We would be opposed to all the wonderful freedoms modern American life has brought us, like birth control and abortion on demand and gay marriage and our children’s right to pornography in the public libraries, our rights to gas guzzling SUVs, cell phones, cheap, gaudy clothing, color television and provocative swim wear and on and on and on.

No, the mumbo jumbo of incense and Latin and prayers mumbled by faceless old men would forever keep us out of the country club and in the dark ages. 

I love the new Mass.  It is the same as the old Mass.  It is the real presence of Christ in the world.  If I really understand the new Mass, I will realize that like the old Mass, it forbids my ever being fully a member of this brave new world which has lost its way.

Think about it, Juana

Rev. Know-It-All
 

Editorial Note:
don't forget to read Part 1 of this Q&A
Why bring back the Old Mass? - Part 1 of 2
as published on Sept. 2, 2007