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From New Advent, under Latin literature in early Christianity. The most ancient Latin document emanating from the Roman Church is the correspondence of its clergy with Carthage during the vacancy of the Apostolic See following on the death of Pope Fabian (20 January, 250). One of the letters is the work of Novatian, the first Christian writer to use the Latin language at Rome. But even at this epoch, Greek is still the official language: the original epitaphs of the popes are still composed in Greek. We have those of Anterus, of Fabian, of Lucius, of Gaius, and the series brings us down to 296. That of Cornelius, which is in Latin, seems to be later than the third century.

One of my points last night, was that Latin was promoted to where it finally became dominant right after the Bible canon was put together.

Are you saying that the church began saying mass in Latin so more people could understand it?

Much of the theology that is singular to the West came out of Africa: Tertullian, Cyprian, Augustine--colonials all. In the West, Latin, the language of the Romans,became in the West, closely associated with Roman culture. The German conquest may have preserved Latin ascendency in the West by politically/culturally disconnecting the West from the Greek-speaking east.

While reading some of our ministers answers to questions asked on the Church Website, I ran across this one and thought it interesting, since this subject was pretty well covered recently on our forum.

Question
Hi Hank, My son is 12 years old, and new to his youth group and church also.We just started attending church this year, so many questions arise. Tonight he asked me how it is that if God sent Jesus to us as the son of God, then how is Jesus God in human form? I read from the book of John (ch.10:30) that

Answer
Water is good illustration from nature. Under 32 degrees - a solid; between 32 degrees and 212 degrees - a liquid; and above 212 degrees - a gas. Yet the chemical composition is the same. H2O. One God who exists as three distinct and separate persons.

I don't have any disagreement with the first part of your post.

One of my points last night, was that Latin was promoted to where it finally became dominant right after the Bible canon was put together.

The two were roughly co-incident. Of course, the rise of latin as the common language probably took a couple centuries (then again, maybe it could be argued that the canon did too).

Are you saying that the church began saying mass in Latin so more people could understand it?

Seems right to me. Seriously, does there have to be a underhanded reason? It can certainly be argued that at some point (certainly prior to Vatican II) Latin ceased to be the common language but reamined the Church's language. The decision on the back end is more open to discussion than pretending that Rome forced Latin on the people so that only the clergy would understand. I'm not sure that the mass went to latin at the same time the Vulgate was translated. I was under the impression that that was a more gradual process. What do the Orthodox do?