How to bring the Tridentine Mass to local parishes?

[una_fides]

I love the Traditional Latin Mass (TLM), but I have to drive about 30-45 minutes every Sunday to attend one. There are tons of churches around me but very very few TLM’s. And to my knowledge, there are not any TLMs offered daily anywhere in my entire state!

I’m about to engage in a mail campaign to try to get daily TLM’s at the very few churches that offer it on Sundays as well as try to bring it to other nearby parishes. I’ve read up on the Una Voce website and have gotten their recommendations and will be calling local chapters soon in my area. unavoce.org/articles/2007/SP_Advice.html

I’m wondering if anyone on here has had any experiences or successes in trying to bring the TLM to nearby parishes and can offer any advice.

Your prayers are also welcome!

 

[Kearney]

It’s kind of hard to do unless you have the support and/or interest of your parish priest. One can have a stable group of faithful to attend a TLM but it’s no dice without the priest help in the matter.
Before you do anything, I’d make sure that your pastor is “on board” with the idea (even if he doesn’t want to say the mass himself). If he is supportive but not willing to learn/say the mass then ask if you could bring in a priest who does the TLM and arrange for a trial mass and then, if it’d’s successful, then try to arrange a weekly or monthly TLM at a time that is convenient to the parish.

Hope this helps.

 

[Joannm]

It’s kind of hard to do unless you have the support and/or interest of your parish priest. One can have a stable group of faithful to attend a TLM but it’s no dice without the priest help in the matter.
Before you do anything, I’d make sure that your pastor is “on board” with the idea (even if he doesn’t want to say the mass himself). If he is supportive but not willing to learn/say the mass then ask if you could bring in a priest who does the TLM and arrange for a trial mass and then, if it’d’s successful, then try to arrange a weekly or monthly TLM at a time that is convenient to the parish.

Hope this helps.

The problem with bringing in an outside priest however, is that the parish has to pay him for celebrating the Mass. If those who attend are willing to put in extra money in their weekly envelope to compensate him then there should be no problem. Our Sunday visiting priests get about $100 per mass. That adds up over the course of a year. Of course if you have a nice size group that might only mean a few extra dollars a week.

 

[bkovacs]

I’m in the same boat as you. But trying to get local parishes to offer a TLM is a dead end street (Thanks to V2). So my home now is a local Orthodox Church (10 min away). Very beautiful and reverent worship!.

 

[bkovacs]

I love the Traditional Latin Mass (TLM), but I have to drive about 30-45 minutes every Sunday to attend one. There are tons of churches around me but very very few TLM’s. And to my knowledge, there are not any TLMs offered daily anywhere in my entire state!

I’m about to engage in a mail campaign to try to get daily TLM’s at the very few churches that offer it on Sundays as well as try to bring it to other nearby parishes. I’ve read up on the Una Voce website and have gotten their recommendations and will be calling local chapters soon in my area. unavoce.org/articles/2007/SP_Advice.html

I’m wondering if anyone on here has had any experiences or successes in trying to bring the TLM to nearby parishes and can offer any advice.

Your prayers are also welcome!

This is the battle we up against. Check this article out. rorate-caeli.blogspot.com/
Entitled:
“They have no respect for the dead.”

 

[una_fides]

This is the battle we up against. Check this article out. rorate-caeli.blogspot.com/
Entitled:
“They have no respect for the dead.”

That article is disturbing, and I definitely know it to be true. In one beautiful old parish nearby, the priest has repeatedly denied requests for the TLM, and is reported to have told one set of parishioners, “Not on my watch.” I have no idea why these priests are opposing this Mass other than that they have warped liberal and modernist theologies and are opposed to the way the Church was prior to Vatican II. It appears that they have cast their lots with the protestants in protesting how the Catholic Church was explicitly Catholic in name, teaching, and practice. This false sense of “ecumenism” is also to blame, as people would rather have Jews go to hell than pray for their conversion, but then again according to their liberal and modernist theologies no one goes to hell anyway.

whew, venting frustrations…

It feels like we are approaching how it was in St. Athansius’ day when he was fighting the Arian heresy and said, “Even if Catholics faithful to Tradition are reduced to a handful, they are the ones who are the true Church of Jesus Christ.”

 

[Patrick2340]

First, I would recommend that you assemble a group of people who feel the same way you do. Numbers speak louder than anything (other than money). Even I would agree that one person does not really constitute a “stable group”. Check with Una Voce about forming a local Una Voce chapter. Post fliers, put ads in the paper (usually you can put announcements in the paper for free), advertise on sites like this, and just generally talk to people. If you can organize even a small group, you’ll have more hands to carry the load.

Second, do a little research and see if you can find a local priest who is friendly to your idea. Perhaps he won’t be your parish priest. Maybe he’s the chaplain at your local hospital, or at the local nursing home, or at a nearby college. Maybe he’s retired, but interested in helping you. He doesn’t even have to know how to celebrate the EF, he just has to be supportive of your endeavors. This priest can provide guidance and maybe even contacts at the diocesan level to help you.

Third, you’ll have to find a proper venue for the Mass. If your group is small enough, you might only have to find a chapel. Maybe it will be at your local parish. Maybe it will be at your local Catholic hospital. Maybe it will be at your local Catholic college.

Fourth, your group should start to raise funds. Assuming you are able to secure a chapel, you will need to have money to do the following:

1. Buy all the necessary items for an EF Mass:
   a. altar cards
   b. Missale Romanum
   c. Candlesticks & candles.
   d. censor
   e. incense
   f. etc, etc, etc
2. Pay or supply room and board for a priest. Pay any travel expenses. Even the ICRSS and FSSP have expenses. They cannot afford to travel to a distant diocese to celebrate the EF for free.

Finally, you should contact one of the traditional orders, e.g. the Fraternity of St. Peter or the Institute of Christ the King to see if they can supply a priest on an ongoing basis.

There really is quite a lot to getting an EF establish, even after Summorum Pontificum. But the two most important things are to have a good number of people willing to do the work, and getting enough money on an ongoing basis to support it.

 

[una_fides]

First, I would recommend that you assemble a group of people who feel the same way you do. Numbers speak louder than anything (other than money). Even I would agree that one person does not really constitute a “stable group”. Check with Una Voce about forming a local Una Voce chapter. Post fliers, put ads in the paper (usually you can put announcements in the paper for free), advertise on sites like this, and just generally talk to people. If you can organize even a small group, you’ll have more hands to carry the load.

Second, do a little research and see if you can find a local priest who is friendly to your idea. Perhaps he won’t be your parish priest. Maybe he’s the chaplain at your local hospital, or at the local nursing home, or at a nearby college. Maybe he’s retired, but interested in helping you. He doesn’t even have to know how to celebrate the EF, he just has to be supportive of your endeavors. This priest can provide guidance and maybe even contacts at the diocesan level to help you.

Third, you’ll have to find a proper venue for the Mass. If your group is small enough, you might only have to find a chapel. Maybe it will be at your local parish. Maybe it will be at your local Catholic hospital. Maybe it will be at your local Catholic college.

Fourth, your group should start to raise funds. Assuming you are able to secure a chapel, you will need to have money to do the following:

1. Buy all the necessary items for an EF Mass:
   a. altar cards
   b. Missale Romanum
   c. Candlesticks & candles.
   d. censor
   e. incense
   f. etc, etc, etc
2. Pay or supply room and board for a priest. Pay any travel expenses. Even the ICRSS and FSSP have expenses. They cannot afford to travel to a distant diocese to celebrate the EF for free.

Finally, you should contact one of the traditional orders, e.g. the Fraternity of St. Peter or the Institute of Christ the King to see if they can supply a priest on an ongoing basis.

There really is quite a lot to getting an EF establish, even after Summorum Pontificum. But the two most important things are to have a good number of people willing to do the work, and getting enough money on an ongoing basis to support it.

Patrick,

Your comments have been most helpful. Were you involved in this process before?

I have several people interested and started making contacts with others. We were going to start formulating a group when a priest who actually occasionally performed a TLM told us that the Pope was about to issue a clarification on Summorum Pontificum and that the document was on his desk. That was about three months ago, however. Unfortunately, he wasn’t able to do the Mass for us because he was about to move away, but he did tell us of another priest who he thought might possibly be interested.

I was thinking about first sending out some letters to local parishes and seeing where that got me. Your comments have prompted me to work more on building a larger group. From the work we’ve done so far in building a group, I suspect very many people would be interested. I know that if priests would just promote it and make announcements at Masses that they were starting it up that there would be no doubt that many people would come to check it out. Unfortunately, given the preponderance of modernist priests and the minority of traditional ones, what would be a simple task seems to be an impossibility in virtually all the local parishes in my area.

I try to offer ever day in my rosary intentions for the future of the TLM. We can’t trust on our own power here. Our Lady wants the TLM much more than we do. We just need to keep asking her intercession and confidently trusting in God to grant us what our souls are longing for.