The Narthex

Pope Francis recently placed excessive restrictions on the Traditional Latin Mass (TLM) with a motu proprio called Traditionis Custodes. TLM communities were shocked, to say the least. The traditionalist website OnePeterFive now features a three-part series by Peter Kwasniewski -- many of whose books have been reviewed in our pages…

David, now a seminary professor and the father of a large family, was among the very best of my students. He introduced our family to what Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI would later term the Extraordinary Rite. My wife and I were already receptive. We had grown up with the Latin…

In order to appreciate what's at stake in the current Church-wide controversy surrounding restrictions on the traditional Latin Mass (TLM), data on Latin Mass attendees is key. A post at LitugyGuy.com, a blog by Fr. Donald Kloster of Norwalk, Connecticut, shows results of a unique national survey of Latin Mass-goers…

Cardinal Ratzinger, the future Pope Benedict XVI, wrote in the Foreword to U.M. Lang's Turning Towards the Lord: Orientation in Liturgical Prayer that the Vatican Council did not require the “disappearance of Latin.” In support of this statement, the cardinal quoted Section 1 of Paragraph 36 of the Constitution on…

I begin this installment by stating my love for the Latin language. I studied it in high school and graduate school. I drew on my knowledge of the language to write my master’s thesis, Aquinas on Marriage. I recently taught Latin for five years to grade schoolers on Saturday mornings.…

The first Mass in English in the United States was celebrated on August 24, 1964, by Father Frederick R. McManus in St. Louis. A New York Times article, “Catholics Hear Mass in English Today for First Time in the U.S.” (Aug. 24, 1964), describes the translation as “hurried”; I am perplexed…