Traditional Catholic Teaching

Frequently Asked Questions

Going to Mass

Q. Although I am not a Catholic I sometimes go to Mass with my wife. I am used to the minister greeting people as they arrive and generally having a lively chat. I often wonder why the priests I see at Church don't do this. They are chatty afterwards, so why not before?

A. I think your observation would apply to most traditional Catholic priests. There are probably many angles but I will mention just a couple. Remember, Catholic tradition goes back a long way. To begin with, attending Mass was seen as a moral obligation of those who became Christians in a culture which tried everything it could imagine to crush Christianity. Greeting the celebrant beforehand was a courtesy, but only if the occasion happened to arise. Everyone, clergy and lay members of the Church alike, were focussed on the big event – the Mass. Anything else was light-weight!

Don't forget that for us, the celebration of Holy Mass is in fact an earthly rendering of a heavenly reality: our Lord's offering of his life to the Father for our salvation. For this celebration our priests spend much time in prayerful preparation beforehand. When it is time for them to leave their place of preparation, they do so in a state of continued prayer – remaining recollected and spiritually focussed to perform their sacred duty. They will meet and greet their parishioners or visitors if the love of God requires it. Otherwise they will usually remain in prayerful mode, ready to enter the sanctuary and approach the altar.

Q. Talking of the sanctuary and altar – Can you explain why the place where the priest carries out his role is separated from the lay people by a very distinct barrier!

A. A good question! But have you noticed two things – first, that there are lay people performing functions within the sanctuary area, usually boys or young men as altar servers – and secondly that not everything done by the priest occurs within the sanctuary. For instance, the priest normally steps out of the sanctuary to preach the homily (sermon).

Anyway – the main point you seem to be raising is that the altar rail is a barrier between the congregation and the priests; and lots of modern churches, especially Protestant ones, have removed any sense of distinction.

I am interested in the position you have taken on this. You seem to see the altar rail as a barrier, a divider – something separating you from the priest. Traditional Catholics see it as exactly the opposite!
Recall what I said earlier about the Holy Mass being an earthly rendering of the Heavenly Liturgy. What takes place within the sanctuary upon and before the altar is the most awesome and spectacular of events. Heaven itself is joined to this sacred place. We, as Catholic Christians, consider our presence before this spectacle as the most gracious of privileges. The altar rail, far from separating us from this great spiritual celebration is in fact the very seam which joins Heaven and earth and unites us with the heavenly host who welcome us into the Holy of Holies.

Q. I can see that our Christian cultures are indeed very different and actually further apart than I had ever realised. However there is something about your service of Mass which I find really quite odd. And I mean no disrespect by this. But it is something a Protestant has to ask. I'm sure you cannot appreciate how very strange I find it when the service begins and continues with the priest turning his back to the people almost all of the time except when he is preaching. You have to admit surely, that it is a rather unusual thing to do!

A. Yes, you are right there – it is "rather unusual", and you may find it "very strange", but I am delighted to be able to explain to you that it is certainly not "odd". On the contrary it is a powerful, striking and unmistakable declaration of our unbending belief in the promised return of our Lord in glory. For this, he taught us to keep watch, to obey his every command including the celebration of the Holy Eucharist until he returns. The universal (Catholic) practice of the Church carrying out his commands in this way is therefore the strongest, most emphatic of statements we could make in response to the spiritually hostile and unbelieving world about us.

Your question will be of interest even to some Catholics who attend the "New Mass" where the priest faces the people as in Protestant worship. To help you and them understand the historic development of our worship, we attach an Appendix – Facing East for further (very interesting) reading on this topic. In this excellent article, a priest from the London Oratory explains that statements about the traditional Mass which assert the priest has "his back to the people" miss the point. He provides compelling reasons for the long Christian custom of facing east: i.e. priest and people having a common direction of liturgical prayer (in this instance – at Mass).

Note: For your reference, in the last paragraph of our Appendix, Cardinal Ratzinger, (now Pope Benedict XVI) talks about participation in the:

"Liturgy of the Word" – First part of Mass which focuses principally of the Scripture readings and instruction about them.
"Liturgy of the Eucharist" – Second part of the Mass comprising Offertory, Canon / Consecration and Communion.

Q. I know you get asked this question a lot – why is the traditional Mass said in Latin? I am not a Catholic, and find it hard to understand why you don't translate the service into local languages.

A. There are many answers available in books and on Internet web sites. I will therefore be very brief.

Catholics today have the choice of worshipping in their own local language, or, as you say, in Latin. In layman's language there are several good reasons for retaining Latin in the "Latin Rite" that part of the Church which grew principally in the Roman Empire.

The Latin Mass embodies and enshrines for us, a whole culture and psyche. Ancient Rome did everything possible to crush what they saw as a fanatical, crazed sect whose values threatened their control and use of power. The early Christians responded heroically and would not yield to the cruelty and tyrannical behaviour of the Emperors. Eventually their patience and virtues won over the Romans and as a result the Church came to not only convert them but to inherit their legacy of administration government, law and education.

The Church came to use market-place Latin since it was the then universal language. For traditional Catholics, nothing has changed to warrant abandoning this unique heritage, despite the development of related languages over the past 1500 years.

During the Latin Mass, as it is usually carried out everything said within the sanctuary is contained in the Roman Missal – the altar Mass Book. All of the Scriptures, hymns or sequences, antiphons and prayers have been very carefully put in place over the two millennia to reflect the organic links between earthly and heavenly worship of God.

As members of the congregation traditional Catholics can participate in the Mass in a number of ways. To some people, we may appear not to be "doing" anything – just sitting or kneeling. Most people have a copy of the Missal and follow the prayers at the altar. This is easy, even if you don't know a single work of Latin. For us, it is an advantage to know exactly what is "going on" in the sanctuary. This allows the most amazing freedom to enter into a spirit of prayer and adoration which other worship formats or styles not only don't encourage but actually prevent.

Traditional Catholics never need to leave the Church after Mass "disappointed with the service": a comment often heard at religious services where the sermon is the main item. For us, the essential elements of the Mass never vary, and we are therefore always spiritually refreshed by our attendance.

Appendix: "Facing East"