Why the Ban on the Latin Mass?

 

Paul VI

Why did Pope Francis, or for that matter, Pope Paul before him, ban the Latin mass? 

With its many liturgies, in many nations, the mass is offered in any language you can think of, ancient and modern. Except in Latin, the traditional and official language of the church. How can that make sense?

Francis himself suggested that the Latin mass represented defiance of his authority; it was schismatic. But this is tautological: if he allowed the Latin mass, it would not be. He bans it because he bans it.

It is no challenge to the work of Vatican II: Vatican II never mandated mass in the vernacular. It expected Latin to remain the language of the mass. It was bishops’ conferences who took this step. It forms no part of the magisterium, no part of church doctrine.

Someone has said Francis’s ban came from the Italian bishops. They were alarmed that new priests all wanted to learn and serve the Latin mass. They foresaw, or saw, a shortage of priests for the standard “Novus Ordo.”

This sounds plausible. From the beginning, the “new mass” was not popular with the faithful in the pews. Popes John Paul II and Benedict opened it up again, and the problem recurred: faithful and lower clergy were abandoning the Novus Ordo and flocking to the Latin mass.

If the purpose of the church is to evangelize, if its mission is pastoral, if it listens to the works of the Holy Spirit, this should actually argue for encouraging the use of the Latin mass.

But Vatican II and the hierarchy introduced the Novus Ordo precisely for pastoral reasons: to make mass more popular, more accessible to the people. To admit the Latin Mass is still more popular is to admit failure.

Regardless of the motives of those who attend, in their own minds, the growth and spread of the Latin mass makes them look like fools. Fools and sellouts, shepherds following the sheep.

The hierarchy under Francis, or perhaps just Francis, have let their own interests supersede the interests of the church, of Jesus, and of suffering humanity.

I say this even though I am not, personally, drawn to the Latin Mass.