NASHVILLE, Tennessee (LifeSiteNews) — Daily Wire commentator Matt Walsh said that the latest Responsa from the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments (CDW) restricting the Latin Mass and traditional sacraments will only further divide the Catholic Church.
“The rationales provided are dishonest at best,” Walsh said, “because we’re told that this is all about unity in the church and that’s why — we don’t want divisions in the church,” he said, explaining the Vatican’s reasoning behind the new instructions and restrictions.
But the new rules will create more division, Walsh continued. He gave the example of how a diocesan priest cannot celebrate a Latin Mass and Novus Ordo, or “New Mass,” on the same day. “While they say that [the restrictions are] about unity and not division, they’re actually creating more division.”
The purpose, according to the Daily Wire commentator, is to “marginalize” the Latin Mass so that it eventually won’t exist anymore.
He said the restrictions are “an effort to send the Latin Mass more to the sidelines [and] marginalize it.” The goal is to “make it harder and harder to keep it going so that there’s really no place for it to go, and if you want to celebrate the Latin Mass you’re not going to be able to find anywhere to do it, and then to get rid of it.”
He called it a “divide and conquer strategy” released under the guise of “unity.”
Walsh noted the interest in the Latin Mass is high among young Catholics.
“There are many Catholics … the Latin Mass is crucial to them [and] is very important to them and their spiritual life,” Walsh said. “So trying to take it away and in doing so treating them like an enemy will have a profound impact.”
“But the large theme here is that … the larger point is that the Latin Mass appeals greatly to young Catholics especially. This is something those of us who have been to Latin Mass … can’t help but notice,” he said.
“When you go into a Latin Mass, you go into a church that celebrates the Latin Mass, what do you find? Young families, young, large families, inside these churches,” Walsh, a father of four, said.
One reason the Latin Mass attracts young people and young families is that Millennials and members of Gen Z have grown up in a more secular society than their parents, Walsh theorized.
“Young people growing up in this decaying, empty, secular society are just hunger[ing] for something real and true and mystical,” Walsh said. “They’ve been deprived of it and they find that in the Latin Mass and it’s bringing people in and they’re finding spiritual nourishment.”
He said Pope Francis and his allies “see that as a … problem, in fact they would rather get rid of all those young younger people if getting rid of Latin Mass means alienating those younger families and scaring them away is fine with him,” Walsh argued. “Because this is a war on tradition when it comes down to it, really pretty horrifying.”
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