Apologetics for Latin

[seremina]

Justin SP,

No, no, no, its okay. It happens. Probably what happened is that a space was needed before you put in the reply. There’s just one thing to keep in mind. “How you see it is how its put in.” except the code won’t be there.

Thank you Justin SP and Emseguin. You helped me explain what we experience and you know what I am talking about. I was getting worried I didn’t know how to explain it adequately!

 

[excubitor]

seremina;5778838:

So? How much the laity get to say is not relevant. The Mass is for our Lord. It is not an entertainment nor “I want” venue.

The strict interpretation removes the ability to abuse the liturgy, at least with the words. When you ask a Priest about why he’s more reverent during a Latin Mass than he was when he was doing the English Mass, he’ll tell you the Latin made him stop… think… and realise the raw truth about the Mass and our Lord. Have you ever repeated anything in English and found it doesn’t make you think? If you have to repeat something in a different language, it makes you think because of the translation in your head or the other side of the missal you read is being read.

I know this “phenomena” is not easily understood, but it shows the importance of language being used for the universality and sacredness of religion. If you go/watch a Latin Mass (easy to do on EWTN, they save their Latin Masses) and then watch an English Mass at thedailymass.com/mass/mass.asp

I agree 100%!! The priest sets aside his own personality and becomes totally absorbed into Christ.I use to attend the new Mass but now the latin Mass. The difference is incredible.I have found in my own experience that sometimes it is better to not follow the text in Mass,and just let the your heart be led by the Lord.Worship is not in the understanding of the texts,but in lifting your heart to God.Did not our wonderful Lady at the foot of the cross worship Him as She should have.Did She have to respond to prayers to do this.How about St. John. The centurion was there also.Though worshipping our Lord in different ways,they were united to Him by His Supreme Offering.So when the priest offers our Lord in a unbloody manner in a different language whether we understand it or not,we are truly “participating”.
I come from a bias which favours the vernacular. This bias is based on nothing less than scripture which says from the very words of the apostle.

1 Corinthians 14:19 Yet in the church I had rather speak five words with my understanding, that by my voice I might teach others also, than ten thousand words in an unknown tongue

However I went to a Latin TLM and was sold. Everything else seems crass to me now, I have been spoilt forever by the TLM. Surely the TLM is the pearl of great price that a man sold all that he had to obtain it. I have to drive an hour across town for the TLM but that is a small price to pay. For me its like when CD’s first came out how wonderful they were. Why would you listen to tape after hearing CD. But this is my own personal preference speaking here and is not designed to condemn those who prefer the mass in the vernacular.

As many posters have previously said, the Latin is not really an unknown tongue. Many of the words are recognisable by us English speakers and we also have the translation into English in the missal so there is no reason whatsoever to not understand what is going on unless you cannot read. So anyway that is how I reconcile Paul to the TLM.

 

[Frankk]

So? How much the laity get to say is not relevant. The Mass is for our Lord. It is not an entertainment nor “I want” venue.

you will find a huge difference in reverence levels. I’m not trying to prove anything, but I am hoping you might notice what I’m talking about. I don’t know of any Catholic who’s attended/seen the Latin Mass and hadn’t noticed this. Generally, they want to attend it again, over and over.

So??? The reality of the Mass is that it should be a SHARED meal to celebrate the mystery of Our Lord’s life, death and resurrection. The laity is VERY relevant - in fact ‘wherever two or three are gathered in My Name…’ The Mass and the very purpose of liturgical prayer is that it is the shared expression of the common faith of the community.

You do know such a Catholic now. For the first 18 years of my life I was brought up with the Latin Mass - and I still attend occasionally now. There is certainly a place for the Latin Mass in the Church - but I firmly believe that the ‘modern’ Mass is a more accurate reflection of the Mass of the Early Church.

 

[seremina]

That’s quite the drive. I try to walk everywhere I go, otherwise, I’m pretty shut-in at home. I live in the middle of the boonies. I only know of one Church here that does the TLM. All the others do the English Mass (and I’ve seen that one or two do other languages as well), but I can’t go to any of them. I pretty much have to settle for attending Mass online, whether TLM or Franciscan Mass or English Mass. You’re very fortunate.

Catholicism isn’t doing well in Canada. There’s no vocations, and a lot of Churches have closed. I’m certainly praying for this to improve.

 

[seremina]

So??? The reality of the Mass is that it should be a SHARED meal to celebrate the mystery of Our Lord’s life, death and resurrection. The laity is VERY relevant - in fact ‘wherever two or three are gathered in My Name…’ The Mass and the very purpose of liturgical prayer is that it is the shared expression of the common faith of the community.

You do know such a Catholic now. For the first 18 years of my life I was brought up with the Latin Mass - and I still attend occasionally now. There is certainly a place for the Latin Mass in the Church - but I firmly believe that the ‘modern’ Mass is a more accurate reflection of the Mass of the Early Church.

I never said the laity is not irrelevant. I said what they get to say is not relevant. You can participate in a Latin Mass, too. You make it sound like you cannot. There is no excuse to sit there in a Latin Mass and pay no attention and be nothing more than a couch potato junkie in front of a TV. You get this same problem with certain people no matter which Mass is attended.

Thank you for sharing your opinions and feelings. They’re as valid as anybody else’s. With all due respect, we don’t know how the Early Church celebrated Mass. At least, not the specifics. As each Apostle was gifted with a tongue, it suggests the Mass might’ve been said in the vernacular. Personally, I find its easier to stick to a universal language for Mass. Once that’s removed, a Catholic traveler is lost during Mass. I know what that’s like, and VERY keenly, because I’m deaf; so I empathise with those who can’t find a Latin Mass or who are frustrated with the abuses that throw the missal out of whack.

Sure, when I physically attend Mass, as long as I have the missal, I can read the readings, I can try to time my reading of the missal with the live Mass, I can guess what’s being said, I can watch the gestures and hear the bells… but I almost don’t hear anything. The homily is never given in the missal, so I completely miss out on that. Signed Masses are rare and I’ve never seen the homily signed. So what am I forced to do? Do a Chaplet of Divine Mercy or a Rosary during the homily period, all while faking a face that says I understand everything that’s being said. Other Deaf Catholics were doing the same thing, so it really isn’t fair to pick on any of us for that.

Of course, whole different story when I attend English Mass online. Sometimes I don’t understand when its online, just because its more than amplification; its the need to understand the syllables being spoken and there’s no captioning; but its more comprehension for me. If its a Latin Mass, I have nothing to worry about, as I know from the missal what will be said, though I have the same issue with the homily being understood or not. Attending it on TV, which has captioning, works as well. I can participate fully on TV and not have to do any devotions to cover anything; its 100% comprehension, no matter which Mass it is, though the English Mass still gets me a little lost because they don’t tell you which option they’re doing and the readings might change, but the captioning captions these parts too, so I don’t miss out.

Whew. Boy, its rough trying to explain what you experience, isn’t it?

 

[Frankk]

With all due respect, we don’t know how the Early Church celebrated Mass. At least, not the specifics. As each Apostle was gifted with a tongue, it suggests the Mass might’ve been said in the vernacular. Personally, I find its easier to stick to a universal language for Mass.

This information [or a very good idea of it] can be found in the writings of the Early Church Fathers such as Clement, Tertullian, Justin and so on. Jaroslav Pelikan’s book 'The Emergence of Catholic Tradition (100-600) also contains information on early worship.

And, of course the Latin Mass we talk about today didn’t exist prior to 1570 when Pius V published a detailed Order of Mass for Catholics to follow. I’m sure this didn’t result in a sudden upsurge in reverence which had previously been absent.

It was Dom Prosper Gueranger (1805-1875) with some others who rediscovered the original forms of ancient rituals and music. Their hope was to make the liturgy more intelligible and more beautiful. And, of course, it wasn’t just Vatican II when all the changes were implemented. In the 1950s, the Holy Week services were restored to their ancient pattern.

Perhaps one of the big ‘plus points’ for the Novo Ordo is the much richer use of God’s word. Mind you, if you attend every Sunday of the 3 yr cycle you’ll still only hear about 14% of the Bible. If you attend every weekday Mass of the 2yr cycle you’ll hear about another 14%. So c.30% of the Bible isn’t a huge amount but it is massively more than we used to get when the Latin Mass was the norm.

 

[Geremia]

How would you explain/defend the use of a “dead” language (Latin) to worship God to a Protestant?

I would tell them what the [Baltimore Catechism (http://www.u.arizona.edu/~aversa/baltimore_catechism.pdf) says about Latin: Q. 566. Why does the Church use the Latin language instead of the national language of its children?
A. The Church uses the Latin language instead of the national language of its children:
To avoid the danger of changing any part of its teaching in using different languages;
That all its rulers may be perfectly united and understood in their communications;
To show that the Church is not an institute of any particular nation, but the guide of all nations.
If they want more information, have them read this chapter from

• Fr. Nikolaus Gihr’s [The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass (The holy sacrifice of the mass; dogmatically, liturgically and ascetically explained : Gihr, Nikolaus, 1839-1924 : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive): “The Language Used in the Celebration of the Holy Mass”

 

[laszlo]

Jesus brought the Roman Empire to its knees. There are thus sound theological reasons for the church using the language of the Empire.

There were also practical reasons for having a standardised language of learning. To write in English is to write in sand, since within a few hundred years the meaning of the words will have changed significantly. Latin authors didn’t have this problem. Also, there is a need for an international language. Nowadays English fits the bill, a couple of hundred years ago it would have been French. In the Middle Ages, it was Latin.

The Latin changes as fast as the English until it was living language (till Christ time, and after the 4th Century until the 16th Centuries)

Being dead language has the advantage that it changes only artificially, but it had a big disadvantage: it is unable to express new concepts, so related to them everyone bring his own version and makes chaos.

The Church and the Liturgy shall be living, not petrified.

 

[Geremia]

1 Corinthians 14:19 Yet in the church I had rather speak five words with my understanding, that by my voice I might teach others also, than ten thousand words in an unknown tongue.

Yes, Pope Paul VI quoted that verse in his General Audience, November 26, 1969, on CHANGES IN MASS FOR GREATER APOSTOLATE, but I think St. Paul is speaking of preaching in the churches.

Bp. Challoner comments:

The use or abuse of strange tongues, of which the apostle here speaks, does not regard the public liturgy of the Church, (in which strange tongues were never used) but certain conferences of the faithful, (v. 26. &c.) in which, meeting together, they discovered to one another their various miraculous gifts of the Spirit, common in those primitive times; amongst which the apostle prefers that of prophesying before that of speaking strange tongues, because it was more to the public edification. Where also note, that the Latin, used in our liturgy, is so far from being a strange or unknown tongue, that it is perhaps the best known tongue in the world.

 

[ConstantineTG]

On October 23, 1962, the council held its fifth General Session in which the discussion concerned the liturgical language. At the very end of the meeting, the patriarch was given the opportunity to speak. In a strong and confident voice the patriarch gave his first address to the council in French. He affirmed that Latin is a dead language, but the Church is living and should speak the living language of its faithful today. Some said, “A bomb has been hurled at St. Peter’s.” The Fathers of the Council were introduced to this noble elder, who did not fear to say what he thought simply and courageously. Many bishops ran to shake his hand at the end of the meeting, thanking him for daring to say what many thought inwardly. Through this historic discourse, it was said by some, Patriarch Maximos had put an end to the “myth of Latin.” The cause of living languages in the liturgy had been won.

Christ indeed spoke the language of His contemporaries. It was also in the language understood by His listeners, Aramaic, that He offered the first Eucharistic sacrifice. The Apostles and disciples did likewise. The idea never occurred to them that in a Christian assembly the celebrant could have the scriptural pericopes read, or the psalms sung, or could preach or break the bread while using a language other than that of those who were assembled.

Besides, the Roman Church itself, at least until the middle of the third century, used Greek in its liturgy, because it was the language spoken by its faithful at that time. And when, at that date, it began to abandon Greek in order to use Latin, it was precisely because in the meantime Latin had become the language spoken by its faithful. Why should it nowadays cease to apply the same principle?

Every language is, in fact, liturgical, for in the words of the psalmist: “Praise the Lord, all nations;”

The Latin language is dead, but the Church remains alive. The language, vehicle of grace and of the Holy Spirit, should also be living, for it is for men and not for angels. No language should be immune to change.

Maximos IV Sayegh, Patriarch of the Melkite Greek Catholic Church

 

[ProVobis]

From Vatican II

1. §1. Linguae latinae usus, salvo particulari iure, in Ritibus latinis servetur.
2. 1. Particular law remaining in force, the use of the Latin language is to be preserved in the Latin rites.

Note the period at the end.

 

[InquisitorMax]

This information [or a very good idea of it] can be found in the writings of the Early Church Fathers such as Clement, Tertullian, Justin and so on. Jaroslav Pelikan’s book 'The Emergence of Catholic Tradition (100-600) also contains information on early worship.

And, of course the Latin Mass we talk about today didn’t exist prior to 1570 when Pius V published a detailed Order of Mass for Catholics to follow. I’m sure this didn’t result in a sudden upsurge in reverence which had previously been absent.

So, from a ‘very good idea’ of what an early Mass may have been like we decided to dump a perfectly good, tried and tested one, hundreds of years in development, dating from the earliest centuries of the Church.

Like, AD 800 - 1960 is not important, compared to getting back to modern ideas of what the Mass of AD 100 - 500 might have been like.

The Roman Rite existed well before Pius V. He simply codified it, I understand.

In time, the swingeing revisions of the past decades and the bureaucratic-populist way they were done will be seen as an error. Despite the huge influence he has had on our religion, there are no calls to canonise Cardinal Bugnini.

 

[Frankk]

The Roman Rite existed well before Pius V. He simply codified it, I understand.

Your understanding is incorrect. The Roman Mass underwent 1500 years of unbroken development prior to the Reformation. This development has been described as a river with arbitrary meanderings to one side or another. The Missal of Pius V brought all this to a halt and was declared binding everywhere. The price paid for this was the possibility of further evolution was channeled into a very inadequate devotional life instead of gathering strength for new forms of liturgical expression.

If you want to fully understand the development of the Mass you could try reading Missarum Sollemnia (The Mass of the Roman Rite) by Joseph Jungmann SJ. Another useful resource is ‘The Shape of the Liturgy’ by Dom Gregory Dix.

we decided to dump a perfectly good, tried and tested one, hundreds of years in development, dating from the earliest centuries of the Church.

But it wasn’t was it? The Mass was a service in which only the priest and his assistants had an active role, the faithful following the divine action only from a distance. Why do you think there’s a Canon Law requiring the faithful to take Communion at least once a year? Because for centuries they never took Communion at all. The elevation of the Eucharist became the high point for the people. In towns they would rush from one church to another immediately after to try and be present at another elevation.

Those of us old enough to remember will recall mothers and grandmothers reciting the Rosary during Mass to try and participate in some way.

It was for this reason, to try and include the people more, that Pius X introduced the missa dialogata or missa recitata.

He also defined the ‘age of reason’ for taking First Holy Communion as 7yrs old to encourage people to take Communion more frequently. Of course, this created the problem of celebrating the Sacraments in the wrong order, with Confirmation coming after 1st Communion - a problem the Church has still not resolved.

Clearly, the ‘tried and tested’ Mass wasn’t ‘perfectly good’ at all, especially if the intention of the Mass is for all the People of God to participate in the sacred meal of Our Lord’s Supper.

 

[ProVobis]

The Roman Mass underwent 1500 years of unbroken development prior to the Reformation. This development has been described as a river with arbitrary meanderings to one side or another. The Missal of Pius V brought all this to a halt and was declared binding everywhere. The price paid for this was the possibility of further evolution was channeled into a very inadequate devotional life instead of gathering strength for new forms of liturgical expression.

So were there massive protests to this? Were people leaving in droves once they got the liturgy right? Do you really think Quo Primum was even necessary when the Council of Trent pretty much stated what needed to be defined as Catholic doctrine?

The Mass was a service in which only the priest and his assistants had an active role, the faithful following the divine action only from a distance. Why do you think there’s a Canon Law requiring the faithful to take Communion at least once a year? Because for centuries they never took Communion at all.

Never mind that SPIRITUAL communion was encouraged; yet that didn’t keep people away from Mass, did it?

 

[PiousTemplar]

You guys relize the thread is 5 years old?

 

[Frankk]

the Council of Trent pretty much stated what needed to be defined as Catholic doctrine?

And the reason was twofold: The challenges resulting from Luther and the widespread differences and abuses in the liturgy.

Never mind that SPIRITUAL communion was encouraged; yet that didn’t keep people away from Mass, did it?

But the problem was the complete lack of participation in the Mass - which is why the elevation of the Eucharist became THE reason for the Mass in people’s minds.

You should give reading Jungmann a try. If its two volumes are too daunting you can get an understanding of what was happening in Duffy’s ‘The Stripping of the Altars’.

 

[grotto]

---

.The years go by but the gift of the Latin Mass is the same as described above. My sadness that it has been robbed from me has never lessened. All these years indeed. Why?

Thanks seremina for putting my same feelings with yours.

 

[ProVobis]

And the reason was twofold: The challenges resulting from Luther and the widespread differences and abuses in the liturgy.

Not just Luther and the liturgy. There were indulgences and other acts of simony which were levelled against the Church. Many of the abuses in the liturgy arose because of unapproved translations.

But the problem was the complete lack of participation in the Mass - which is why the elevation of the Eucharist became THE reason for the Mass in people’s minds.

One can participate by just following the actions. Not only the elevation as you have stated, but bowing and genuflecting, standing, Gospel side, Epistle side, low tones, etc. You’re making it sound like people saw the Mass as a sort of magic show. If so, perhaps that still continues? You can quote all the books you want about what was wrong with the Mass back then but there is no evidence that the modern reforms fixed any of them.

 

[Frankk]

Provobis:

One can participate by just following the actions. Not only the elevation as you have stated, but bowing and genuflecting, standing, Gospel side, Epistle side, low tones, etc. You’re making it sound like people saw the Mass as a sort of magic show. If so, perhaps that still continues? You can quote all the books you want about what was wrong with the Mass back then but there is no evidence that the modern reforms fixed any of them.

This is utter nonsense. What you are saying is that you have no idea, other than your opinion derived from no sources other than your own interpretation, about what actually happened. What are your sources about bowing, genuflecting, etc.?? Jungmann and Dix are acknowledged as (probably) the leading Liturgists of the 20th Century. Can you cite any evidence that this went on in the Middle Ages? Of course you can’t!

You say I can quote all the books I want. But these are experts in their field. What is your opinion based on? Subjective opinion, bias, etc… Or not? Please advise what your opinion is based on.

But you know better (apparently?!?). Get real!

I notice you ignore the changes introduced by Pius X. Do you think he did it as a whim or was he trying to resolve a problem?

What do you mean there is no evidence that modern reforms fixed any of them? Astonishing! Do not the people participate more fully? Do they not hear more of the Word of God in the readings? Do they not take Communion more frequently?

Jesus said, ‘DO this in memory of me’. It was a call to action. A call to participation. He didn’t say, ‘Watch a presbyterate do this in memory of me’. He called all his people to
DO this…

 

[Frankk]

Not just Luther and the liturgy. There were indulgences and other acts of simony which were levelled against the Church. Many of the abuses in the liturgy arose because of unapproved translations. .

Yes. you’re just repeating what I said. Indulgences and simony were a major (and justified) criticism of the 16th century Church by Luther.

The unapproved translations of what? The Missal? There wasn’t a single Rite of the Mass at the time. Liturgical abuses were running wild. Much of it was about interpretation of what should be happening (Votive Masses going on at the same time a Mass, for example).

If you’re not prepared to do the research then your posts can only be viewed as your own (uninformed) opinion based on prejudice and personal bias.

If you can cite official or acknowledged experts in the field of Liturgy then I’d be interested to read them