Struggling with attending daily TLM

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PaulDT

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Hi all,

For this new school year I decided to take a step up in my spiritual life and to attend mass more often, because I study part time and am jobless otherwise. In total, mass at 7PM and getting to my parish takes about 2 hours. I want to keep a longer eucharistic fast to appreciate the immense benefit of daily communion, and that also strains me. Usually after 6PM my days consist exclusively in going to mass and then to sleep, whether I come to church back from work or from home.

Between mass attendance and study, I’ve just come to realize that I’ve not yet been able to finish sorting my room nor coming up with my prayer rule. I feel that I would find greater benefit in taking this extra time for the LOTH, slow rosary, mental prayer… And work. I hate to say this but while i thought receiving our Lord each day was the quickest and strongest habit to attain a holier life, it seems to do more harm than good in my circumstances.

Now where I live there’s a church every 500 meters, but only a few that do offer the traditional liturgy. As a “revert”, the beauty of the TLM had a huge role to play in my conversion and I have a very hard time with the new mass, usually I leave church with more anger and doubt about my faith than spiritual replenishment.

I’m going to meet a priest tomorrow for spiritual direction. Things should get much better. But I’m curious about what is your experience with daily mass and the scarcity of the TLM? How often do you go? What about when you can’t?
 
I have an affinity to the TLM myself, for several reasons. Sadly I get to attend one maybe 3-4 times a year. The nearest TLM for me is about an hour away, assuming traffic in the area is decent, which it never is on a Sunday. Driving 1-2 hours with 5 kids who will be hungry for lunch when we arrive isn’t conducive to a positive Mass experience for us, or those nearby. Luckily our local NO parish offers a reverent Mass that has incorporated ad orientem and a good bit of Latin. It may be beneficial to go that route, as both forms of Mass are entirely valid. In the meantime, I try to follow the FSSP Mass at http://livemass.net/
 
PaulDT said:
As a “revert”, the beauty of the TLM had a huge role to play in my conversion and I have a very hard time with the new mass, usually I leave church with more anger and doubt about my faith than spiritual replenishment.
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I know exactly what you are describing. In my experience, the feeling of discomfort will lessen but will never completely disappear. Anger however has no place in our hearts, not because it cannot be righteous but because we are often not virtuous enough to handle it without falling into sin. Some advice on what worked for me.

First: the TLM shows many things that are “predecessors” of the current Roman Rite, and as such you should try to see where the things of the modern Mass came from. It’s not something someone came up with in the 60s, it has deep roots.

Second: the new Roman Rite brings back some things that (a) existed before Trent and (b) are present in other Latin and Eastern Catholic rites. Ex: the sign of peace. Despite of their application (and there’s still room for growth and liturgical development) there are some important new elements in the current Roman Rite. Not having them in the TLM should lead you to appreciate them more when you have them.

Third: the Church has authority to change certain things. If the Council gave the Church a direction, and the Holy Father gave instructions based on that direction and approved the final result, that’s within their authority and we are in no position ever to argue with that. It’s a good practice of humility to subject ourselves to the will of our superiors even if we had a better idea than theirs, as most spiritual masters teach us. We can object to the way some things were implemented either by the Church or at a much more local level, and even call for something like a reform of the reform, but we have to accept what is the ordinary liturgical expression of the Roman Rite with humility and patience at least.

Fourth: the devil is the master of division, and this is a common thread in the neverending war between traditionalists and, well, others who don’t feel as strongly about the issues they’re upset about. Bypass his temptations by going to the heart of love itself: liturgy is liturgy, the public prayer of the Church. Praise God for we are blessed indeed to have it and pray for those who are persecuted and killed even today, not even for going to Mass, but just for having a Bible in their house.
 
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Do you have any idea how fortunate you are to be able to attend the TLM daily? It is very uncommon in most areas to have the TLM available anymore than once a week. Some people have to drive over 100 miles to go to the TLM. I am only able to get to the TLM a few times a year because my nearest TLM is two hours away and it is not easy for me, in my circumstances, to get away from home that often.
 
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Do you know how lucky you are with several churches every 500 metres? Where I live, 1 hour travel is common and there are those who have Mass once/month when the priest comes to visit their little town, that is if they don’t want to travel 4-6 hours on country roads to the parish church. Imagine that in winter with slippery roads and metres of snow.
 
HomeschoolDad said:
Do you have any idea how fortunate you are to be able to attend the TLM daily?
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HeDa said:
Do you know how lucky you are with several churches every 500 metres?
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No I don’t. I’m truly sorry if my post is coming across as entitled, it wasn’t voluntary. You’d be even more angry at me if you knew just how much nitpicky I am when it comes to liturgy. I know I need to work on these particular issues in my own journey.

I’m just asking to those who are in a similar situation, especially when it comes to evening mass which seems much harder to sustain as a habit than morning mass, with the necessity of fasting before communion.
Peeps said:
Are you interested in “the experience of the TLM” or “receiving Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament?”
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Why does there need to be a clear-cut separation between the benefit of the liturgy and the benefit of the communion? Allow me to take a goofy example, but would daily clown mass be beneficial to my spiritual growth even if I got to receive our Lord each time?

I hope I don’t come across as demeaning. The reality as I see it from talking to many young catholics with a similar journey to mine, is that external signs are just as necessary as the sacraments themselves in order to nourish the faith. Wherever I go to TLM I have a pretty clear expectation what I am going to get from the ceremony, the homily… And how all those things reflect the creed that I profess.

@lil_user thanks for the advice, it is very humbling. I’ll have to meditate on this.
 
PaulDT said:
No I don’t. I’m truly sorry if my post is coming across as entitled, it wasn’t voluntary. You’d be even more angry at me if you knew just how much nitpicky I am when it comes to liturgy. I know I need to work on these particular issues in my own journey.
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I’m not angry with you at all. I think it is a great thing for someone to have the daily TLM available to them.
PaulDT said:
Wherever I go to TLM I have a pretty clear expectation what I am going to get from the ceremony, the homily… And how all those things reflect the creed that I profess.
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Quite aside from a strong preference for the TLM liturgy, that is one thing I like about it — no surprises, you know precisely what it is going to be like each and every time. Whenever I am traveling and the OF is the only option available, I Google all of the churches in the area, read their websites, read their online bulletin (you can learn a lot about the general “vibe” of the parish by reading their bulletin), and pick the best one that I can reasonably get to. Otherwise, you don’t know if you’re going to get some sort of liberal, “hippie-dippy”, “we are Church” parish, or a solidly orthodox, liturgically reverent parish.
 
PaulDT said:
Why does there need to be a clear-cut separation between the benefit of the liturgy and the benefit of the communion? Allow me to take a goofy example, but would daily clown mass be beneficial to my spiritual growth even if I got to receive our Lord each time?
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That is the argument of a person demeaning the OF. There has never been such a stupid thing as a clown OF Mass. You may prefer the EF to the OF but you may not make irreverent comments about it. No you did not say OF but I don’t think anyone in this thread does not know you are referring to the OF.
The Church says they are both valid and reverent.
Please show humility for the Church position and show respect for the OF.
 
thistle said:
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PaulDT:
Why does there need to be a clear-cut separation between the benefit of the liturgy and the benefit of the communion? Allow me to take a goofy example, but would daily clown mass be beneficial to my spiritual growth even if I got to receive our Lord each time?
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That is the argument of a person demeaning the OF. There has never been such a stupid thing as a clown OF Mass. You may prefer the EF to the OF but you may not make irreverent comments about it. No you did not say OF but I don’t think anyone in this thread does not know you are referring to the OF.
The Church says they are both valid and reverent.
Please show humility for the Church position and show respect for the OF.
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May I ask what you mean when you say there never had been such a stupid thing as a clown OF mass?

OP, I can sort of understand your frustrations with a mass of you have a strong preference for the TLM. However, unless they are doing something totally irreverent, you could try to develop a more humble and accepting mindset. Or accept you only go to the TLM mass once a week. Or put up with the current situation which doesn’t seem so good for you.
 
But there have been many so-called Clown Masses. The OP has a valid point about them.(Please Note: This uploaded content is no longer available.)
 
Clown masses are scary because … clowns.

Seriously where did this term come from?
 
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Cruciferi makes a good point.

Exceptions are not the rule. There’s no “clown mass” the way there’s a “Latin mass”.

Also there are masses specifically for circus staff, there’s a pastoral for that. We may not like it, but if it’s licit it’s not for us to opine on.
 
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PaulDT said:
daily clown mass
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I am so tired of this reference.
This so-called “clown-mass” where was it? When was it? Has anyone experienced it first-hand?

I have been to all sorts of OF Masses, some more reverent than others, but never have I seen a “clown Mass” or any of the other stange things EF officiando’s seem to think happen at OF Masses.

The Great Divider is still hard at work, I see.
 
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Was this a Mass for the Circus performers?
There definitely needs to be some context here.
 
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I have also seen the term clown mass also in reference to the OF mass.

It’s no secret that some EF fans refer to the OF mass when saying clown mass.
 
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So, based on this article, they were part of a ministry that was quite popular.
The city I grew up in had a troupe of clowns who considered what they did “ministry”- visiting the sick, visiting nursing homes, just being present to people and loving them. If a priest decided to have a Mass with these people, to honor and bless them in their ministry, how is that a bad thing?
 
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Most of the “clown mass” references and claims of photos or videos have been debunked ages ago as some Episcopalian group in (South America?) that isn’t Catholic at all, yet people will do what they can to lead you down their deceptive path. :roll_eyes:😠
 
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