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Hi, Teresa —
Thanks for the question.
The Tridentine Mass was the Liturgy,
which Catholics in the Roman or Western
Rite of the Church, celebrated starting
from the Council Of Trent, four centuries
or so ago.
Pope Paul VI, after the Second Vatican Council, introduced the current
form of the Liturgy to the Western
Rite. The changes included the use
of common languages rather than Latin.
Now I keep stressing Western Rite,
or Latin Rite, for a reason. People,
who claim the Tridentine Mass offered
in Latin is the only true Mass, know
just enough Catholicism to be dangerous.
These people are usually hung up
on Latin as well, but they forget
that the Eastern Catholic Church
includes several liturgical rites:
- Melkite
- Syriac
- Coptic, and
- Ukrainian, just to name a few.
These Catholics never, ever used
Latin. These Masses were, and are,
offered in:
- Arabic
- Aramaic
- Greek, or
- whatever the local language is.
Their Liturgies predate the Tridentine
Mass and they were, and are, just
as valid as any Mass ever offered
in the Western Church.
Now your average traditionalist doesn't
know these Catholics even exist,
let alone the fact that they never
used Latin.
The point I'm trying to make
is that even before the reform of
the Liturgy in the 1960s,
the Catholic Church had many liturgies,
all of them valid, all of them equal.
So too, the current form of the Mass
is just as valid as the Tridentine liturgy.
The Tridentine is a beautiful Mass,
but there is nothing more Catholic
about it.
The bottom line Teresa, is to follow
the Pope. Christ promised the Church
that the gates of Hell would not
prevail against it. That means the
Pope will not lead us into error;
he will not institute liturgies that
are not valid.
It's one thing to have a preference
for:
- Latin
- altar rails
- pipe organs
- incense, and
- the Tridentine Liturgy
- it is another to think one is more
Catholic than the Holy Father.
Hope this helps,
John DiMascio
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