Posted on 08/10/2006 11:15:52 AM PDT by Pyro7480
'Packed House' Welcomes Latin Mass to Front Royal
By Gretchen R. Crowe
HERALD Staff Writer
(From the Issue of 8/10/06)
The choir loft at St. John the Baptist Church in Front Royal offered the best view of the delicate black and white head coverings, the newly installed Communion rail, and the tall candles on the ornately adorned altar. Each served as a telling sign that the parish’s first Latin Mass was no ordinary eucharistic celebration.
A large group of altar boys assisted Father Ed Hathaway, pastor, in celebrating the Mass last Sunday. Attending in choir were Fathers Paul deLadurantaye, director of the Office of Sacred Liturgy; Chris Pollard, parochial vicar; and Jerome Fasano, pastor of St. Andrew the Apostle Church in Clifton. Eager parishioners and curious visitors filled the pews and flooded out the back of the church into the vestibule.
“It was a packed house,” said Father Hathaway, who said the Latin Mass is “an expression of our tradition that fills in a piece of our heritage.”
While the Latin Mass was familiar to older parishioners, it was the first introduction for many younger ones. Following the Mass, Ellen Kelly signed a “thank you scroll” for Arlington Bishop Paul S. Loverde, who expanded the option for the Latin Mass to be celebrated in the diocese in March. The Latin Mass also is celebrated every Sunday at St. Lawrence Church in Alexandria.
Holding son, Peter, 1, Kelly said that she and her husband enjoyed “teaching our boys what a truly reverent Mass can be like.”
They weren’t the only ones teaching their children the older traditions of the Church. Bayard and Kimberly Keller filled up the vestibule with their 10 children. The family is moving to Front Royal from Westminster, Md., where they currently attend the Latin Mass in Baltimore.
“It’s something that we’ve evolved into,” Bayard said, as he continuously adjusted the white veil on top of his 4-year-old daughter’s head.
Celebrating the Latin Mass is “more reverent and pleasing to God,” said Therese DeClue, 17. DeClue said she used to attend a Latin Mass with her family in Michigan.
Catherine Jerge, sitting in the front row with daughter Emma on her lap and daughter Jessica by her side, said she used to attend the Latin Mass as a child.
“I love it,” she said. “It’s just a good experience.”
“‘Lord it is good for us to be here,’” said Father Fasano, echoing the day’s Gospel reading of the Transfiguration in his homily. “Some of us have waited 37 years to be able to say this. It is good for us to be at this Mass that we love so much.” The one language “reminds us of the universality of the Church.”
Kurt Poterack, director of Christendom College’s choir and adjunct professor, played the organ and led a schola in the Latin chants, which served as a guide for the congregation that tried its best to keep up with the unfamiliarity of the service.
Regina Hines, a parishioner from Sacred Heart Parish in Winchester, said the two-hour Mass was “a lot longer, a lot grander, a lot more solemn” than what she was used to. She particularly was touched by the reverence given to the Eucharist through kneeling while receiving Communion.
“It’s not a Mass that I would want to go to every Sunday,” she said, but added that it was valuable “to get hold of the old tradition, to reach back into what used to be.” She said she might make the 30-minute drive from Winchester once a month.
Not every Sunday’s Latin Mass will be two hours long, said Father Hathaway. The high sung Mass, which was celebrated last Sunday, will be held on the first Sunday of the month, with a low Latin Mass to be celebrated every other week.
Parishioner Michelle Catellan said she hopes that she and her family will attend the Mass regularly. “It really draws your mind and your heart into heaven.”
Gretchen R. Crowe can be reached at gcrowe@catholicherald.com.
Could be...Front Royal first came to my attention YEARS ago, when National Review magazine profiled Christendom College, and I got the idea that it was a pretty orthodox school surrounded by a pretty orthodox population.
I love the idea of homeschooling, but I admit that it might not be right for our family, as I am noticably short in the patience department (sadly). A traditional Catholic school would be a dream come true for us.
My oldest boy has his heart set on Annapolis, but if that doesn't pan out, I've already begun touting Christendom. I mean, he's ALREADY in the fifth grade! LOL (You don't think that's too soon, do you?)
Regards,
Our Latin Mass lasts 1 hour and 20 minutes mostly because it takes so long to give out Holy Communion....takes about 15-18 minutes.
Yeah, it took a long time for Holy Communion at this first Mass in Front Royal as well, but it was really worth it. The schola sang chant, including "Pange Lingua Gloriosi."
Here are the "real Catholic colleges" recommended by an orthodox priest. (Note no Jesuits, the mighty are falling.)
Recommended Catholic Undergraduate Liberal Arts Colleges
Christendom College www.christendom.edu
134 Christendom Drive (800) 877-5456
Front Royal, VA 22630 (540) 636-2900
Franciscan University of Steubenville www.franciscan.edu
1235 University Blvd (800) 783-6220
Steubenville, OH 43952 (740) 283-3771
Redeemer Pacific College www.rpcollege.bc.ca
7600 Glover Road Langley (877) 477-7212
British Columbia, Canada V2Y 1Y1 (604) 882-8048
Thomas Aquinas College www.thomasaquinas.edu
10000 N. Ojai Road (800) 634-9797
Santa Paula, CA 93060 (805) 525-4417
The Thomas More College www.thomasmorecollege.edu
Six Manchester Street (603) 880-8308
Merrimack, NH 03054
University of Dallas www.udallas.edu
1845 E. Northgate Drive (972) 721-5000
Irving, TX 75062
Wyoming Catholic College www.wyomingcatholiccollege.edu
(New! First Class forming for 2007)
P.O. Box 750 - 163 Leedy Dr. (877) 332-2930
Lander, WY 82520 (307) 332-2930
Don't forget Ave Maria in Florida.
There is also another good one in Eastern Canada that is associated with Steubenville in some way. Name escapes me at the moment.
Thank you! I'm bookmarking this!
Regards,
Are you kidding? The Diocese of Richmond, I must humbly submit, is home to to not one but two all traditional parishes, St. Joseph's in Richmond and St. Benedict's in Chesapeake, Both have Mass every day, several times on the weekend, catechism, all sacraments, etc. St. Benedict's is staffed by the FSSP's Fr. Kevin Willis and St, Joseph's has a Benedictine priest.
While Richmond was very liberal under Bp. Sullivan, he was gracious enough to give us these two great parishes in the diocese. Arlington has (and continues to be) way behind with only one Mass on Sunday in a shared church.
And now, as of this past Sunday, two Masses on Sunday in two shared parishes.
Sorry that is what I meant. It was the once a wekk and shared part I was trying to emphasize!
I once went to a Coptic church in Ohio. I asked one guy where he was from. He said he makes the weekly trip from southern Illinois!
Another Catholic University is John Paul the Great Catholic University in San Diego. It is opening this fall.
www.JPCatholic.com
10174 Old Grove Road, Suite 200
San Diego, CA 92131
(858)653.6740
Yeah, and what is interesting about JP the Great is that it is really a business, technology and communications college. It's goal is, I guess, to influence the business world in the future by turning out Catholics who are business savy but well educated in the faith.
Thanks for the recommendation. The Spirit is moving in Front Royal.
I am so jealous!
When the NO was being crammed down our unwilling throats, my aged Irish grandmother was confronted at 11 AM Sunday Mass by the stereotype young priest enthusiast for all things NEW!!!! He stopped at the end of her pew while patrolling the aisles for such miscreants as my grandmother who were attached to the old ways. He found her (gasp!) saying her rosary. He wagged a disapproving finger at those rosary beads and at my 80+ year old grandmother and said with all the authority of his 28 years or so: "There, there, now dear, that's all over with now. This is the NEW Mass and we must all participate." He picked on the wrong woman. She stood up in place (5'10 and shoulders like a barn door/tough peasant broad from the County and City of Cork who landed in Boston as a child in 1895), turned to him, kicking aside the kneeler, and said (in a voice audible throughout the church): "Look, you, I was saying my rosary at Mass before you were a gleam in your father's eye. I'll be saying the rosary at Mass until I die. Leave me alone and mind your own business." The congregation gave her a standing ovation. The priest (now an ex-priest of 40 years standing) is now on the board of "Catholics" for a Free Choice (pro-abort phonies). Pray for him.
Six of twelve siblings in the ex-priest's family entered the religious life. One, a priest, was beheaded by Ho Chi Minh's thugs as he instructed Catholic children in the faith during the evacuation of North Vietnamese Catholics in 1954 or thereabouts. The ex-priest was also a considerably slower celebrant of Mass than the sainted Fr. Keely and, ummmm, my friend and weighlifting associate for a while. He did not know she was my grandmother. Again, pray for him, lest Lucifer have all too much fun with what remains of him after death. Pray for him. Have a Mass said for him while he still has time to repent.
Going and going but apparently in verrrrrry slooooooow motion! God bless you and yours.
*I was recently in Bar Harbor, Maine. After Mass I introduced my beautiful Auburn-Haired daughter to the young, and exceptional, Irish Priest, and noted her Grandmother's family was from County Cork.
""Ah...Corkies...bunch of radicals," he said as he flashed his mischevious smile.
You come from good stock, BE
BTW, Msgr. Nolan would have completed his 6:45 a.m. Mass and I would be down at the local bakery buying Jelly-Sticks BEFORE your priest completed the Consecration :)
Nice little town. You will enjoy it...
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