Return...er, continuation in glory

Fr. Tom Blantz, CSC elevates the host in
the Chapel of St. Charles Borromeo


The Tridentine Mass is back...under a new name: Pope Benedict's "Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite."



Yes, the first official one since the 1960's returned to campus on Sunday, to make up for an otherwise dreary day in South Bend. The Alumni Hall Chapel was filled with close to about 150 people, mostly from the Notre Dame community. Fr. Tom Blantz, CSC offered the Mass in a new basilica vestment, made especially by the wonderful seamstress at the Basilica of the Sacred Heart.



The Mass took the form of a Missa Recitativa, permitted by Pope Pius XII, in which the congregation recites the parts of the altar boys along with them. Such a Mass was the Mass which the late Fr. Karol Wojtyla instituted in Krakow at St. Florian's Parish, where he was parochial vicar. The Mass drew many young people, who were interested in participating as fully as they could in the Mass. It is truly a beautiful form of the "full, active, and conscious participation" for which Sacrosanctum Concilium called for in Vatican II. If anybody telld me that this Mass does not allow for this kind of participation, I would point out that the congregation actually says more than it does in the Mass of Paul VI.



Either way, we are all happy that this form of the Mass is back on campus. It speaks of the great size of our faith, a Church which is able to fit many different things under the canopy of its umbrella. Pope Benedict has rightfully and thoughtfully requested that the Mass of the Extraordinary Form not be thrown out from under the umbrella, nor that it try to poke holes in the umbrella. It is where it belongs, because it shows that our Church believes in the "her,eneutic of continuity" of which Pope Benedict writes in his Motu Proprio. We have much to learn by humbly accepting his decisions, no matter which side of the liturgical wars we tend to sympathize more with. There is no doubt that the Extraordinary Form seeks to build gater unity--and it certainly has here on campus, except maybe among the liberal and never quite happy contingent of aging professors. When else have members of staff, faculty, and students from all clubs, majors, and extracurricular activities come together to worship as one Christian community? This Mass now offers a chance for the more tradition-minded orthodox Catholics to share something that they hold dear with the more "evangelical" and orthodox Catholics, and also a time for the more evangelical Catholics to show the traditional Catholics that action stems from the Liturgy. Indeed, it is the fount from which the activity of the Church flows.



Thus, rather than being a sign of contradiction or rupture, this Mass now provides a chance for all of the Notre Dame community to gather as one, and pray for and with the Church, partaking in the one Liturgy, which is Christ offering Himself to the Father in sacrifice out of love for us.