Traditional Catholicism nostalgia

The Tridentine Mass

There is a movement within the Catholic Church that really believes that the reforms of Vatican II were inspired by Satan himself. They miss the Latin mass and the old liturgy. They miss the Golden Age of Catholicism in America, the two post war decades.

How can I forget the TV eyes of Bishop Fulton J. Sheen?

Bishop Fulton J. Sheen

I myself recall the Sunday masses at St. Paul's Church in the 1950s and early 60s. Pop always arrived about 10 minutes late to 11 o'clock mass- with at least five of his nine kids. There was standing room only back then at the late Sunday morning mass.

Any sensitive kid quickly absorbed the whole mesmerizing mystique of Roman Catholicism by the time of his First Communion. All those Baltimore Catechism images of  Hell Fire,and Purgatory, and Christ on the Cross; and  Christ Resurrected, and guardian angels, Holy water, the Last Judgment; Our Lady of Fatima, Pray the Rosary; Holy God We Praise Thy Name; Lazarus raised from the dead; the Pope blessing the multitudes of the faithful in St. Peter's Square; the dreaded confessional on Saturday; "Bless me father for I have sinned", Extreme Unction, the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass; Tuna fish sandwiches on Friday; Happy Easter baskets; Catholic school uniforms; St.Jude medals and St. Christopher medals; Holy candles glowing in a dark room before statue of St. Anthony in a glass dome; plastic, greenish-yellow glow in the dark Jesus statuettes. Finding a rosary in Pop's suit jacket, a solace for the father of nine. Father Halloran visiting and blessing our California Ave. house. Pop reading "The Cardinal" and a biography of Padre Pio. Grandma taking my brother Ricky and I to early summer morning mass at Holy Ghost Church on Federal Hill. Grandma at night reading her Italian Missal on the second floor of 62 Gesler St. And little pamphlets on the kitchen table: "Give to the Missions" on the cover.

Richard Cardinal Cushing at
JFK's Funeral in 1963

The pure sensuousness of the spiritual and
the mystical. The Catholic funeral mass of JFK in late November 1963. The melancholy, Boston Irish voice of his friend, Richard Cardinal Cushing.

One day in 1968 on the cover of Time Magazine: "IS GOD DEAD? " Nothing can bring back the pre-Vatican II Church. From a purely psychological point of view I think it was an error to end the beautiful Latin liturgy. The language of the Roman Empire was the tie that binded Catholics together for centuries. I still study Latin, now and then browsing  St. Augustine's "City of God." That God intoxicated saint! Only an Age of Faith could have produced an Augustine or a Thomas Aquinas.

Today the only way for me to get the FEELING of old time Catholicism is listening to unchanged Gregorian Chant or the solemn high masses of Beethoven, Mozart, and Bach. I don't ask anymore how TRUE is a mere FEELING, or unconscious longing for the Eternal and the Absolute. A hint of cosmic GOODNESS.

I do believe very much in modern science. But is that all there is? Is that ALL there is? I'll get the song on You Tube. Sung just right by Peggy Lee.