By Anthony Barich
The Traditional Latin Mass community in Perth is a sign of the unity and diversity of the Catholic Church, Perth Archbishop Barry Hickey said.
“The Church is Catholic, therefore there has always been variety in the worship of the Church,” Archbishop Hickey said after celebrating the ‘second opening’ of St Anne’s Church in Belmont on 25 July, the new home of Perth’s Traditional Latin Mass community since it moved from St John’s Pro-Cathedral in Perth city.
“And while the Mass is the same, it has taken different forms. Different rites of the Church show that the Church is universal as well as one, and this is just another example of unity and diversity.”
Archbishop Hickey told the congregation in his homily that he would like the community to be like a parish – to support the priest and the upkeep of the church and liaise with the diocese just as every parish does … “though it’s not a territorial parish, but in a way it’s a personal parish – people choose to go there”, he said after celebrating a Pontifical High Mass at St Anne’s Church.
He later told The Record that he wants it to be “a spiritual community of brothers and sisters who worship God, especially through the very historic and traditional ceremonies in the Church that have served her for many, many centuries”.
The church – which its Rector Fr Michael Rowe said is open to all Catholics, not just those attracted to the Latin Mass – was opened after months of renovations by the Latin Mass community on 17 March, St Patrick’s Day. Last Sunday’s Mass was a Pontifical High Mass celebrated the day before the feast of St Anne and used the texts of the Mass of St Anne, which is understood to be over 1,000 years old.
St Anne was the mother of the Virgin Mary. Archbishop Hickey said that the ‘Proto’-Gospel of St James – not part of the official canon of Scripture but from which the Church derived much of its understanding of the early life of Mary – revealed that St Anne and her husband St Joachim were unable to have children, so Joachim went out into the desert to pray and Anne went to the temple.
God told them to reunite as the ability to conceive had been returned, and Mary was born.
St Anne’s community in Belmont uses the traditional Latin liturgy of the Church as requested by Pope Benedict XVI in his 2007 document released Motu Proprio (“on his own impulse”), Summorum Pontificum (“Of the Supreme Pontiffs”).
While the Mass that the Traditional Latin Mass community celebrates is referred to as the 1962 Missal – issued by Pope John XXIII – the text was, Fr Rowe said, codified at the Council of Trent (1545-1563), while much of the Mass itself dates back to ancient Rome when it was Christianised.
This form of worship – celebrating the Faith of our Fathers as the hymn goes – is experiencing a surge of interest among youth across Australia, which Fr Rowe says is due to the attraction of “the Mass of the saints”.
The appeal, Fr Rowe said, is both worldly and spiritual.
“It’s part of the patrimony and history of the Church that they find very appealing. When you’re attending a traditional Latin Mass, you’re attending something which was celebrated by the saints throughout the ages – even modern ones like St John Vianney and St Padre Pio,” Fr Rowe said.
“Young people find the prayers of this Mass very prayerful and helpful to come close to God, which is why we come to church. They find traditional forms of Church liturgy very uplifting and prayerful. The Catechism of the Catholic Church says prayer is raising the mind and heart to God, and that’s what this Mass does.
“For young people today, they see a reverence and a beauty in the liturgy – in an old Mass for a new generation. It’s new for them in the sense that most young people didn’t grow up with it, so they’re discovering the beauty of the Church’s liturgy as it’s been celebrated over the centuries. At the same time, we’re trying to find stability in a world that’s very unstable. This Mass gives people stability in their prayer life and, as we know, God is unchanging; and they find the liturgy helping them in growing closer to God. After all, the Church believes that the Mass is the foretaste of heaven.”
The Traditional Latin Mass or “Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite” (sometimes shortened to “Extraordinary Rite”), is often referred to as the “Tridentine” Mass.