The Traditional Mass

This work attends to the organic process by which the Roman rite was built up from its foundations into a magnificent structure, marked by the accumulated riches of each age through which it passed, and characterized by order, beauty, and piety in its texts, gestures, rubrics, chants, and calendar-from the major elements to minute details.

Everything Needed to Understand and Appreciate the Traditional Latin Mass! Extremely informative, yet very easy to read! This book explains prayer by prayer, what happens at the Latin Mass and why. Why is the Mass in Latin, the use of silence, bells, specific colors, etc.---and how we participate. Reviews are very enthusiastic! Ties in beautifully with Pope Benedict XVI's motu proprio opening the door to the universal celebration of the Latin Mass.

The Traditional Latin Mass is more elaborate and prayed in an ancient language, so those coming to it for the first time can find it hard to navigate. Derya Little has provided a simple presentation with just enough information about the sequence, content, and meaning of its parts that anyone, adult or child, can follow and pray more easily.

The Great Bishop of Poitiers, Mgr. Pie, in his funeral Oration on our Father, Dom. Guéranger, said: “You have long been feasting at a royal board, where you were daily regaled with the most delicate and varied food. Those Conferences on the Christian Life and Virtues, and that incomparable Commentary on your Rule, - you have no right to keep them to yourselves.” Aeterna Press

An anthology of 70 essays and articles by prelates and pastors, theologians and canonists, philosophers and cultural figures-including: Cardinal Walter Brandmüller • Cardinal Raymond Leo Burke • Cardinal Gerhard Müller • Cardinal Robert Sarah • Cardinal Joseph Zen • Archbishop Thomas Gullickson • Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò • Bishop Rob Mutsaerts • Bishop Athanasius Schneider • Msgr. Charles Pope • Dom Alcuin Reid • Abbé Claude Barthe • Fr. John Hunwicke • Michael Brendan Dougherty • Ross Douthat • Edward Feser • Michael Fiedrowicz • Peter A. Kwasniewski • Phil Lawler • Martin Mosebach • George Neumayr • Joseph Shaw • and many others Already on July 16, 2021, the reactions to Pope Francis's severe restrictions on the traditional Latin Mass in Traditionis Custodes were like a river in full flood: articles, essays, interviews, podcasts-everywhere and from every point of view. An emotional, spiritual, intellectual dam had broken and the waters of discourse poured forth across the world. The sheer volume of writing occasioned by Traditionis Custodes is unlike anything seen in the history of papal documents-testimony to a neuralgic subject on which arguments proliferate and passions run high. The two-month period following the release of the motu proprio gave proof that the traditionalist movement was no fringe phenomenon, but something that had gained significant strength and sympathy during the relatively peaceful years from 2007 to 2021 (the "Pax Benedictina" to which the book's title refers). The purpose of this volume is to gather in one convenient place some of the finest and most appreciated essays and articles published in the period from mid-July through September of this fateful year, 2021-not only from America and England (although these predominate), but also from other nations: France, Germany, Switzerland, the Netherlands, Italy, Spain, Argentina, Poland, Kazakhstan, and China. This book is not, and makes no pretense of being, a presentation of "both sides of the argument." It offers a variety of critiques of this profoundly unwise and unpastoral decree, which suffers from incoherent doctrinal foundations, grave moral and juridical defects, and impossible ecclesiological implications.

At the crest of volatile years of experimentation, a new rite of Mass was introduced in 1969—no mere cosmetic treatment but a radical reconstruction of the Church’s central act of worship. A minority of the faithful continued to hold fast to the traditional rite, which John Paul II and Benedict XVI gradually freed from restrictions. The steady growth of this “traditionalist” movement inevitably prompts questions in the minds of more and more people. What is it that Catholic laity, clergy, and religious are discovering and falling in love with? Could you—should you—be among them? In this engaging book, Peter Kwasniewski draws on decades of experience and, presuming no specialized knowledge, explains why the traditional Mass operates the way it does, what its distinctive features and benefits are, and how it still captures hearts with a beauty deeply rooted and perennially green. Every reader—whether already a lover of the Mass of Ages or a complete newbie, whether committed or curious, perplexed or skeptical, sitting on the fence or bouncing back and forth between old and new—will find life-changing insights in these pages.