Liturgical diversity enriches the church – including the Traditional Latin Mass

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The leak could be strategic: For years, only the very negative feedback from the French Bishops' Conference on the survey of the then Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith on the Traditional Latin Mass - completely in line with Francis. No sooner is a new pope in office than he repeatedly revives traditions abandoned by his predecessor - from the Corpus Christi procession to the the handing over of the pallia to new archbishops to the traditional holiday resort - a new picture is being painted.

Francis had justified his restriction of the Traditional Latin Mass with the results of the survey he commissioned. If the official summary of the results now published by Vatican journalist Diane Montagna is genuine, he has emphasised the negative in a one-sided way: most bishops do not seem to have found fault with Benedict's liberalisation. Even the German Bishops' Conference, which is not suspected of traditionalism, is said to have spoken out in favour of maintaining the coexistence of the ordinary (post-conciliar) and extraordinary (pre-conciliar) forms. The leak at a favourable time could therefore now either prepare or attempt to promote a new change to the liturgical status quo by Pope Leo XIV, depending on its origin.

Would it be so bad to correct Francis' reform, for example by going back to the rules of Benedict XVI? Almost exactly four years ago, the Motu proprio Traditionis custodes was publishedwith which Francis turned the friends of the Traditional Latin Mass against him. After these four years, the effects are becoming apparent: The hope expressed by the Pope at the time for a pacification of conflicts has not materialised. The fronts have hardened - not least due to the the petty and small-scale implementation regulations from the liturgical dicastery: Rome has even regulated whether Traditional Latin Masses may appear in the parish newsletter. And it should have been recognised from the outset that a ban from the parish churches would not reduce divisions.

Today it is clear: Traditionis custodes has failed, and not the pastorally clever solution of Summorum Pontificum - and in view of the feedback from back then, this could have been known beforehand. Fear of liturgical variants is unfounded. What divides is not diversity, but marginalisation. In fact, the one Roman rite propagated by Francis already has many different forms: the old variants of the Milanese and the Mozarabic rite stand alongside the new, inculturated forms of mass in the Congo, in Australia and Mexico. Liturgical diversity enriches the church. Old and new liturgy can fertilise each other. The leak could now be the impetus for Pope Leo XIV, who is open to tradition, to make a new attempt at liturgical peace.