Obviously I am biased in favor of the original church tradition of having mass in the language of the people. Nothing wrong with that. After serving hundreds of Latin masses as a young person, having mass in my own sacred language of English was like an opening of the heavens. The Latin masses I served were always hurried, mumbled and truly lacked the reverance that is so apparent in the Novus ordo masses. It was incredible to have the vertical sacrificial dimension restored to the mass along with communal nature of the meal that Jesus instituted at the Last supper and I could actually understand it!
First, it is important to understand that the original language of the Roman Rite was not latin but was koine (common) Greek. This was the “lingua franca” of the common people around the mediterrian basin and in Rome. Latin was the language of the governing class. Since Christianity was originally a religion of the lower classes it was natural to say mass in kione Greek. This is the beginning of the our Christian tradition of saying mass in the language of the people (well actually the Last Supper is the real start of this tradition). It is wonderful that the sign of this tradition is still in the mass. After all, the “Kyrie” is not Latin but Greek and dates back to when the people of the Roman rite worshiped in Greek.
Later, Latin became more widely spoken by the common people. It was at this time that the Roman rite adopted Latin and the Vulgate Bible was translated by St. Jerome. Again, as the name “Vulgate” implies this was to address the needs of the people to read the Bible and participate in the Divine Liturgy in their own language. I might add that all around the Christian world the various rites, all used the language of the people.
When the capital of the empire was moved by Constantine to Constantinople, Rome became somewhat of a backwater. The Germanic migrations surged into the western empire. These were later followed by the migrations of the Slavs, the Maygars and other tribes. There was a real cachophany of new languages. Clearly the Church had a difficult time adjusting to this incredible linguistic diversity. To make matters even more complicated the Latin of the provinces started to diverge and gave rise to the modern languages of French, Spanish, Portugese and Romanian. The Church in Rome tried to adjust, but it simply no longer had the resources.
It was during this time that latin played a key role in maintaining what was left of western civilization. It became the language that held the various western people together. It was the language of the educated elite (the small number who could actually read). It also served as a common liturgical language, though it did not totally supplant all other language such as Celtic. But the Church was aware that the needs of the people were not being served by only the latin liturgy, which was understood by very few people at this point. I would now like to talk about a real watershed event in the history of the Church, the mission of Sts. Cyril and Methoius to the Slavs. These are two of the greatest missionaries who ever lived. Their mission started when a prince in present day Slovakia sent a letter to the Pope and a copy to the Emperor in Constantiople asking to send someone to teach his people so that they could understand the Gospels in their own language. The emperor literally decided to send his two best men, Cyril and Methodius, truly holy men, who had an outstanding knowledge of languages. First they developed a new alphabet, the precurser to modern day Cyrillic. Next they translated a good part of the Bible into the Slavic language. Then surprisingly they translated not the Byzantine mass into Slavic but the Roman Rite. Wanting to do it right, Cyril and Methodius traveled to Rome and presented their work to the Pope who appoved it and blessed it. Let me repeat that, in circa 860 AD, the vernacular language was approved for the Roman Rite. Cyril and Methodius were naturally, very succesful because people were learning the Gospels and attending the mass in their own language. Cyril and Methodius made many converts. They were so successful that they started to run afoul of other missionaries who were using latin in the mass. These missionaries complained that Cyril and Methodius’ Slavic Roman Rite mass was not really accurate and was heretical. Sounds familar here, doesn’t it? Back to Rome, our heroes went. There was another Pope now. He reviewed their work and gave the same stamp of approval. Unfortunately Cyril died in Rome. The Pope made Methodius the archbishop of the region known as Great Moravia. Quess what happened? When he went back, the latinist missionaries put their new archbishop in jail. It literally took two years of effort by the Pope to finally get Methodius released. When Methodius died, his priests were driven from the area. They went out and converted the Bulgars, the Ukrainians and the Russians, et al. But get this. They no longer used the Roman Rite. They switched to the Byzantine rite. These great countries became part of the eastern church and left the Catholic Church in 1054 AD in the Great Schism. The vernacular languages in the liturgy were suppressed more and more and latin began to predominate . This became a real issue and was one of the main complaints of people during the Protestant reformation. Many, individuals with great justification, believed that mass should be returned to the people. When the Roman rite denied this, the people went where they could go to mass in a language they understood. Unfortunately, this helped break the Church apart and introduced heresies which in many instances completely denied the real Presence at mass. God guides the Church, but people still make great mistakes. Not addressing the need of people to go to mass in a language they understood was one of those mistakes. God Bless!
