The so-called Latin Mass, the norm for Roman Catholics until 1970, will return to at least one Charlotte Catholic church this month. Starting May 31, St. Ann Catholic Church, 3635 Park Road, will offer the ancient rite every Saturday at 8 a.m.
The Rev. Timothy Reid, the church's pastor, will not only celebrate the liturgy in the Latin language, he and those in the pews will also follow certain rules or “rubrics” that most U.S. Catholic churches abandoned nearly 40 years ago.
The priest will face the altar, not the people. He'll place the Communion wafer on worshippers' tongues, not in their hands. And priest and congregation will do more bowing, kneeling and making the sign of the cross.
St. Ann will offer a training session Wednesdayat 7 p.m. Besides walking through the rituals, the church will offer anyone interested a refresher on the Latin phrases central to the Mass.
For example, when the priest says, “Dominus vobiscum” (the Lord be with you), worshippers respond with “Et cum spiritu tuo” (And with your spirit).
‘Beauty and transcendence'Widespread use of what's more properly called the Tridentine Mass – named for Trent, the city in Italy where a church council met in the 1500s – ended in the wake of the Second Vatican Council – another, more reform-minded church council held in the 1960s.
Priests began celebrating the Mass in parishioners' native language, and faced them during the liturgy. Those in the pews could better understand what the priest was saying.
But some traditionalist Catholics have longed for a return of the Latin Mass, with its chants and rituals. “They found something in the beauty and transcendence of the service that made it easier for them to pray,” says Reid. “It speaks to people on a different level: They become immersed in the mystery of God.”
Last July, Pope Benedict XVI said it was OK for parishes to add the Tridentine Mass to its regular schedule of Masses in English and Spanish.
The problem: Only one priest in the 46-county Diocese of Charlotte, the Rev. James Hawker, had ever celebrated the Mass in Latin. And he was retiring.
So Reid and 13 other diocesan priests underwent five days of training.
“I took Latin 15 years ago, for a semester, at Catholic University of America,” says Reid, who's 38. “As a priest, you use it from time to time. But I was pulling out my Latin dictionary … And I'm still learning.”
Keep in mind: When there is a sermon, it will still be in English or Spanish, just as it was pre-Vatican II.
St. Ann will be the first Catholic church in Charlotte to offer a Latin Mass. But it won't be the first in North Carolina – or in the Diocese of Charlotte.
In January, Bishop Michael Burbidge, who presides over Catholic Diocese of Raleigh, gave the homily, or sermon, at a Latin Mass at Sacred Heart Cathedral in Raleigh.
Among the other local Catholic churches that have already begun offering the new-old version: St. Michael in Gastonia.
Don't expect all Charlotte Catholic churches to add a Latin Mass to their lineup. In fact, the two biggest – St. Matthew in Ballantyne and St. Gabriel on Providence Road – have no such plans.
But for those Catholics who want to celebrate Mass the way their ancestors did, the pope wants to accommodate them.
“In the history of the liturgy, there is growth and progress, but no rupture,” he said in his 2007 apostolic letter. “What earlier generations held as sacred remains sacred.”
