It is well known that fools rush in where angels fear to tread. Still, if St. Paul didn’t mind “speaking like a fool,” who am I to hesitate to follow in his footsteps?
Alright, here goes.
It is no secret – except possibly to some indigenous tribe lost in the Amazon jungle that has contrived to keep itself free from online discussions – that there is a liturgy war going on in the Catholic Church. There are those who accept the changes to the liturgy after Vatican II and there are those who deeply regret them and who strongly prefer the liturgy, especially the Mass, as it was before 1963. This group of Latin Mass lovers comprises two sub-groups: those who simply love the Latin Mass, and those who object to the Novus Ordo on doctrinal grounds.
I grew up before Vatican II, and I remember the Mass as it was back in the 1950s and early 1960s. I remember both the High Masses and the low Masses. A Latin High Mass is a glorious event, and I can perfectly understand that there are Catholics who find it uplifting and spiritually supportive. These Catholics miss the Latin Mass even though they know that the Mass as a sacrament is the same in both forms of the Roman Rite, both the Ordinary Form, which is the Novus Ordo Mass, and the Extraordinary Form, which is the traditional Latin Mass.
For myself, not being either a theologian or a liturgist, I am not addressing those who object to the Novus Ordo Mass for doctrinal reasons. But for those who have no doctrinal objections and who simply prefer the pre-1963 liturgy, who just love what they experience at those Masses, I am willing to step out onto the ice and risk slipping and falling flat on my face:
So, why not petition Rome to establish a Tridentine Ordinariate as it established the Anglican Ordinariate? As far as I understand it, the Anglican Ordinariate was established because those Anglicans who believe what the Catholic Church teaches and who wanted to become Catholic missed the Anglican liturgy in which they had lived. “Members of the Ordinariate are fully Roman Catholic, while retaining elements of Anglican heritage in their celebration of Mass and in the hospitality and ministries of their Catholic parishes.”[i]
The Anglican Ordinariate is a distinct jurisdiction within the Roman Rite. “The Ordinariate exists entirely within the context of the Roman Catholic Church. Its worship, while distinctive, is a form of the Roman Rite. Ordinariate parishes celebrate Mass using Divine Worship: The Missal, a definitive book of liturgical texts promulgated by the Vatican in Advent 2015. This missal uses Prayer Book English — language derived from the classic books of the Anglican liturgical tradition — that is fully Catholic in content and expression.”
To me, as someone who has no training in either canon law or liturgy, this sounds like a valid framework for those who fully believe what the Catholic Church teaches and who prefer the Tridentine liturgy.
The website of the Anglican Ordinariate states that “The establishment of the Ordinariate of the Chair of Saint Peter was the Vatican’s pastoral response to repeated and persistent inquiries made by Anglican individuals and groups in the United States and Canada who, over time, have come to identify the Catholic Church as their home. Those joining the Ordinariate have discerned they are truly Catholic in what they believe and desire full membership in the Catholic Church.” Please note the phrase “repeated and persistent inquiries”. “Ask and you shall receive, seek and you shall find, knock and the door will be opened to you.”
So, why don’t Tridentine “individuals and groups in the United States” and elsewhere petition Rome for the Tridentine Ordinariate? There may be valid reasons that I in my ignorance have missed, but if there aren’t any such reasons, then why squabble over the liturgy when you can ask Rome and, hopefully like the Anglicans, get what you want?
I have put my suggestion out there. Go ahead and shoot it down!
Note
[i] https://ordinariate.net/q-a all quotes about the Anglican Ordinariate are taken from the same webpage.
Image: “At the foot of the altar” (CC BY-NC 2.0) by Lawrence OP
Sr. Gabriela of the Incarnation, O.C.D. (Sr. Gabriela Hicks) was born in the Sierra Nevada Mountains, in the Gold Rush country of California, which she remembers as heaven on earth for a child! She lived a number of years in Europe, and then entered the Discalced Carmelite Monastery in Flemington, New Jersey, where she has been a member for forty years. www.flemingtoncarmel.org.
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