Mass Nostalgia

The Catholic Church had good and rational reasons for adopting a vernacular Mass, a popularly intelligible and flexible service far more accessible than the rumbling, mysterious Latin that sometimes seemed more like glossolalia on the lips of a hurried priest. But many traditionalists who understood the Latin Mass regarded its translation as equivalent to redesigning Chartres or Notre Dame along the lines of a functional Manhattan office building. The Latin version, with a patina of centuries, had a majestic ritual quality that the vernacular often turns into a godforsaken flatness.

Perhaps it is part of the current fashion of nostalgia, but when Assumption Church on the West Side of Chicago celebrates its one Mass in Latin every Sunday, worshipers jam in from as far away as Wisconsin. Many young couples come to Assumption to marry, specifically requesting a Nuptial Mass in Latin. The majority of Catholics may or may not prefer the vernacular as a more vital medium. But it is clear that some harbor a suspicion that modernity is overrated and favor Latin phrases as dark and cool and articulate as cathedral stones.

The sentiment for Latin turned up as well in a recent letter to the London Times, signed by 80 international figures, including Poet Laureate Cecil Day-Lewis, Author Graham Greene, Violinist Yehudi Menuhin and Opera Singer Joan Sutherland. The Latin rite, they argued, "belongs to universal culture as well as to churchmen and formal Christians."

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