This Sunday I went to a very reverently celebrated Novus Ordo Mass in Latin. I wish I could assist at such a Mass more often, but it just isn't practical for me to do so regularly in my location. Anyway, it was great, and the parish I went to has been having this Mass every Sunday for some time, but it is going to be replaced in a couple of months, after the motu proprio Summorum Pontificum goes into effect, with a Mass according to the 1962 Missal. I certainly can't critique this particular decision, particularly since I am not part of the parish and thus do not even know the background and circumstances of the change. It may well be a good thing. However, it does bring to mind something that has worried me a bit about possible unintended consequences of Summorum Pontificum.

Don't get me wrong, I think Summorum Pontificum is a great thing for the Church. However, I do have some concern about the possible consequences for traditionally grounded celebrations of the Novus Ordo, the "ordinary use." Pope Benedict obviously hopes for a fruitful mutual influence between the ordinary and extraordinary use, which one would hope would mean more appreciation for the importance of reverence, tradition, the vertical dimension, etc., in the concrete celebrations of the Novus Ordo. The Pope would certainly seem to have sound reasons for such a hope, particularly in the long term. It is noteworthy in this context these two uses are not as far apart as some have tried to make them. If the Novus Ordo is celebrated in Latin, ad orientem, it can look very similar to Mass according to the '62 Missal. (Anyone following the media coverage of the motu proprio will have noticed that the Latin language and the ad orientem direction of the priest are overwhelmingly the two things most commonly cited as differences in the '62 Missal from the Novus Ordo--and of course they are two things that absolutely need not be different in the Novus Ordo at all.) Broadly speaking, then, I'm thrilled at the possible fruits of the Summorum Pontificum, even though I have little or no interest in regularly attending Mass according to the '62 Missal myself.

However, is it possible that, if people do not approach this opportunity in the right way, the opposite could happen? What if the wider availability of Mass according to the '62 Missal leads instead to an even greater split? To even less listening in average parishes to calls, whether from the lay faithful or from the Pope, for more reverence in the liturgy and adherence to liturgical rubrics, let alone a serious grounding in the Roman Catholic tradition of liturgy and liturgical music, and the incorporation of Latin and Gregorian chant in the ordinary use of the Mass? It is not difficult for me to imagine that ultimately in some places, lay faithful who express a desire for such things would simply be told in effect "Why don't you go to the Trid Mass down the street and leave us alone to hold hands and sing 'Glory and Praise'?" In some areas there have been perhaps previously very few Novus Ordo Masses celebrated in a reverent and traditional manner, resembling more what Vatican II's Sacrosanctum Concilium seems to have actually envisioned in a liturgical reform than the average celebration of the ordinary use Mass today does. What if some of those now transition to extraordinary use Masses ... and are replaced with nothing in terms of faithful celebrations of the ordinary use? This would perhaps leave more Catholics than before in the position where they attend the extraordinary use primarily because they cannot find or simply have no experience of the ordinary use being celebrated faithfully and well. In this situation, it seems to me that traditionally minded Catholics would be even more completely ghettoized within the Church. It would be a much larger ghetto, of course, but still a ghetto, and as such ill-fitted to form the liturgical tradition of the Latin Rite as a whole. Of course, there would also (somewhat ironically perhaps) be an issue of justice here to Catholics attached to the ordinary use. Moreover, any authentic development of the liturgical tradition at this point must take account of the reality that the new Mass, that of Paul VI and John Paul II, is now the latest part of that tradition. There is no way around that. Pope Benedict obviously understands this as well as anyone today, which is one reason why this Mass remains the ordinary use, and the Pope hopes for a mutual influence between the two uses.

Obviously, I can have no basis at this point for saying anything beyond merely throwing these questions out there. However, I do not think such risks are imaginary. I hope that priests and bishops, particularly those who have a particular interest in traditional liturgy, will be conscious in looking at the motu proprio that the Holy Father is not just allowing for more open availability of the extraordinary use. He is also, with this motu proprio with its accompanying letter and throughout his teachings and writings on the liturgy, trying to do something (in my humble opinion even more important), in leading the Church towards more faithful and traditionally rooted celebrations of the ordinary use.