AS A sensitive and intelligent adolescent, Stephen Heiner discovered that something was deeply amiss with the Church of Vatican II. In this essay, he recounts how he went from the mainstream to the catacombs:

But as I flipped through the Missal, it wasn’t the semi-familiar Canon that reduced me to tears.  It was what came before, which was the Offertory.  I remember gaping, at the verge of tears, the first time my eyes read these words:

Suscipe, Sancte Pater, omnipotens et aeterne Deus, hanc immaculatam hostiam, quam ego indignus  famulus tuus offero tibi Deo meo vivo et vero, pro innumerabilibus peccatis, et offensionibus, et negligentiis meis, et pro omnibus fidelibus christianis vivis atque defunctis: ut mihi et illis proficiat ad salutem in vitam aeternam.  Amen.

I knew the Latin, as I had been taking Latin since I was 10, but I still read the English for full effect:

Receive, O Holy Father, almighty and eternal God, this spotless host, which I, thy unworthy servant offer unto Thee, my living and true God, for mine own countless sins, offenses and negligences, and for all here present; as also for all faithful Christians living and dead, that it may avail both for my own and their salvation unto everlasting life.  Amen.

This was, as St. Thomas said, the entirety of the doctrine of the Mass and the Eucharist, right there.  In later years, I would often say that prayer to myself as a way to remind myself of the majesty of Mass and the importance of what we as Catholics died to protect throughout millennia.  And I wept for shame at having presumed to stick out my dirty, unworthy hands to receive Him.  I wept too at His resignation to my ignorance, and his condescending to still dwell in my heart and vivify my life with the ex opere operantisgraces that were supplied even when doubtful sacraments robbed me of the ex opere operato graces.  These amazing offertory prayers had been suppressed in the New Mass (and, not coincidentally, in the first iteration of the Lutheran Communion Service) and their absence had deprived me of a proper understanding of the Holy Sacrifice.

After some time I insisted to my father that we attend the local “Indult” Mass, as I found out it was called.  It was said by a priest ordained pre-Vatican II, and in preparation for that Sunday I read the unchanging parts of the Missal over 30 times.  When I showed up for Mass at St. Mary’s by the Sea, I couldn’t contain my excitement.  I asked to serve.  Father assumed that someone who would present himself to serve must have served it before (but I never had), and so I attended my first Traditional Mass at the Gospel side, attending as an altarboy.  I knew all the responses by heart, and while my service was not nearly as crisp and paced as I wanted it to be, I was absolutely thrilled.  I knew I was home, and I knew I could never really “go back.”

See more here.

By the way, many people are misinformed as to why Catholics treasure the Latin language.

Here is an essay by Fr. Joseph Faa Di Bruno, D.D., in 1884 explaining why Latin is not only one of the most expressive and beautiful of tongues, but is essential to the unity of the Church:

In this way the Church unites in one universal tongue to implore the mercy and sing the praises of God. This beautiful and sublime harmony of nations in one faith, with one voice, in the one fold of the one Shepherd, is worthy of the Church of Christ and of the unity which is her grand characteristic.

The Mass is a sacrifice offered directly to God, and it is not necessary for the people to follow in Latin the words of the priest. When the Catholic priest stands at the altar, though there may be persons present from every clime, as soon as he pronounces aloud any part of the service, all understand, and take an intelligent part in his ministration, a fact which reminds one of the preaching of the apostles on the Day of Pentecost, when all from every nation heard St. Peter, each in his own tongue. (Acts ii. 6.)

The Church speaks Latin, therefore, not only because she is apostolic, unchangeable, and Catholic, but also because she is one.

The abandonment of Latin is only one of the profound changes incorporated into the New Mass.

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