When we discuss the Mass in these pages, we
must note that it is the traditional Catholic Mass to which we refer—the Mass
given to the Apostles at the Last Supper and handed down to us by his
successors, essentially unchanged. More
specifically our references are to the Roman rite of that Mass, although their
application to the Divine Liturgies of the various Eastern rites would have
been equally appropriate.
Many of us still attend this traditional
Latin Mass in spite of the devil's attempts to rob us of its graces.
Others today no longer have access to the traditional Mass, but the older
ones will no doubt remember it, uneasily aware that what they see going on in
their local church today is far removed from the Mass of their youth.
Others are too young to know anything at all about the traditional Mass,
and for them it is as foreign as the language in which it is celebrated. Others
still are too corrupted by the endless barrage of modernist propaganda to even
care there was a break between the Catholic Mass and the new Protestant-style
service in their churches today. But no
matter who you are, if you say the Rosary, you are being drawn, whether you
realize it or not, whether you like
it or not, to the wealth of graces contained only in the traditional Holy
Apostolic Mass, that most essential gift our divine Savior left us immediately before
he died for our sins: "Who on the night he was betrayed, took bread
into his sacred hands..."
This Mass is our inheritance and our
birthright, and no one has the right to deny it to us. Christ our Saviour
commanded his apostles: “Do this in remembrance of me!” Do this,
not any manufactured substitute devised by man.
Our Lord's parting gift was passed down intact by the apostles and their
successors, until in 1969 it was suddenly abolished by Paul VI. And yet this
traditional Apostolic Mass continues through the perseverance of those
Catholics who are now referred to, often with contempt, as "traditionalists."
Who are these traditionalists? Just a group of old-fashioned reactionaries
on the right-wing fringe of the Church, clinging to the ancient ways out of
nostalgia? Or is there more to it than that? In truth, the Church should
not be divided into right- and left-wing factions. The Church has no
divisions, she is One, united in her beliefs and worship of God. She is
also Holy, Catholic and (let's not forget) Apostolic. We inherit our
beliefs and our form of worship from the apostles.
The word “tradition” comes from the Latin
word traditio, which means the
passing down of something from one person or generation to another. To be a “traditionalist” therefore means that
we accept the FAITH passed down to us from the apostles to whom God revealed
it, as well as the form of WORSHIP he commanded them to continue “in
remembrance of me.” Moreover, it means that we must continue passing on that
Faith and Worship to the generations that succeed us. “Therefore,
brethren, stand fast, and hold the traditions which ye have been taught.”[1]
Without tradition, we are not Catholic.
Without it the Catholic Church would never have survived.
