Cardinal suggests opening door for traditional Latin Mass

Cardinal Kurt Koch, Prefect of the Dicastery for Promoting Christian Unity, told the kath.net website: “Personally, I would appreciate it if we could find a good way forward here.

“Pope Benedict XVI has shown a helpful way by believing that something that has been practised for centuries cannot simply be banned,” Cardinal Koch said on August 5.

“That convinced me. Pope Francis has chosen a very restrictive path in this regard. It would certainly be desirable to open the now-closed door more again.”

Pope Francis issued sweeping restrictions on the traditional Latin Mass in July 2021, through his apostolic letter Traditionis Custodes, which effectively reversed Benedict XVI’s broader permissions laid out in Summorum Pontificum (2007). The restrictions were later reinforced by Cardinal Arthur Roche, Prefect of the Dicastery for Divine Worship.

Cardinal Koch, who has led the Vatican’s ecumenical relations since 2010, previously suggested that a synthesis of the Novus Ordo and the traditional rite might emerge in the future. In a 2020 interview with GermanVatican News, he proposed that “in the future there will be a reconciliation of the two forms, so that at some point we will have only one form as a synthesis instead of two different ones”.

In an interview earlier this year, Cardinal Roche said: “There is nothing wrong with attending the Mass celebrated with the 1962 missal. That has been accepted since the time of Pope St John Paul II, Pope Benedict, and now Pope Francis.”

“What Pope Francis said in Traditionis Custodes is that it is not the norm. For very good reasons, the Church, through conciliar legislation, decided to move away from what had become an overly elaborate form of celebrating the Mass.”

He added: “I often hear people say, ‘Cardinal Roche is against the Latin Mass.’ Well, if they only knew that most days I celebrate Mass in Latin because it is the common language for all of us here. It is the Novus Ordo Mass in Latin. I was trained as an altar boy until the age of 20, serving the Tridentine Form.”

Although Pope Leo XIV has remained largely silent on the traditional Latin Mass since his election earlier this year, his tone and early actions is said to have offered some encouragement to those who favour this Mass.

FULL STORY

Cardinal Koch describes ‘desirable’ direction for Pope Leo on Latin Mass (By Niwa Limbu/Catholic Herald)

Does ‘Traditionis custodes’ have a future? – by Luke Coppen (The Pillar)