Farewell, Pope Benedict: official statement of the LMS

From Wikipedia Commons.

Statement on the death of Pope Benedict XVI


The Latin Mass Society learns with deep sorrow of the death of the Pontiff Emeritus, Benedict XVI, Joseph Ratzinger.

As a theologian, as Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, and as Pope, he made an outstanding contribution to the life of the Church, in ways which will continue to be felt far into the future.

Catholics attached to the Traditional Mass have a particular motive for gratitude towards him. In his writings before his election as Pope he laid indispensable foundations for the rehabilitation of the Church’s ancient Mass, which had been banished to a precarious existence on the periphery of the Church’s life, its supporters treated—as he himself expressed it—like ‘lepers’. As Pope, his Apostolic Letter Summorum Pontificum, which declared that the older Missal has never been abrogated, transformed attitudes towards it, and brought it back into the heart of the Church. For a generation of priests and laity, Pope Benedict’s action remains the decisive influence on how they see the question.

Pope Benedict’s public actions reflected a great sensitivity to the liturgy, a comprehensive mastery of theology, and an intellectual honesty and courage based on profound humility.

The Latin Mass Society will be organising a Requiem of suitable solemnity for Pope Benedict in due course.

Requiem æternam dona eis, Domine, et lux perpetua luceat eis.

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Latin Mass Society: position open for Communications Officer

After six years in the job, our lovely Publicist Clare is moving on. Who would like do this job for the Latin Mass Society? From our website.

We have a vacancy for a Communications Officer

As a consequence of the impending departure of Clare Bowskill as the Society's Publicist/Communications Officer, we are seeking a replacement.

Clare has done outstanding work for the Society - often in difficult circumstances - during the time she has been with us and we are extremely grateful to her.

Working with the Society’s General Manager, Trustees, and local activists, the Communications Officer will develop a proactive communications strategy using social media and mainstream media to promote the Society, its events, and its campaigns, and to promote membership and fundraising. The Communications Officer will also be able to react to events and news stories affecting the Society, to present the Society’s position and protect its reputation.

Attendance at some key events is essential.

Status: Self-employed. Hours: variable, averaging 10 hours a week. Salary: £7,000 pa. It is envisaged that the Communications Officer will work mainly from home.

The Traditional Mass at the Oxford University Catholic Chaplaincy

This was organised by the Newman Society, a Catholic student society of the University. The feast was the Martyrs of Oxford University, a feast specific to the Archdiocese of Birmingham in the calendar proper to the 1962 Missal, which falls on 1st December.

We usually have a Votive Mass of this feast at the annual LMS Oxford Pilgrimage.

David Lloyd, Requiescat in pace

Update: a more recent
photo

David Lloyd, sometime Chairman of the Latin Mass Society, died early on Saturday morning following a stroke. Please pray for him.

I've not been able to consult the LMS archives yet and right now I don't have a good photograph of him, but he is in the middle of the photo above, with a moustache. Next to him on the right is his predecessor as Chairman, Christopher Inman. David was succeeded by Julian Chadwick, who was succeeded by me. The occasion was the Latin Mass Society Annual General Meeting in 2009, the first with me as Chairman.

David led the Society through the very difficult period of the 1990s in which, despite the friendly overture of Pope John Paul II's Ecclesia Dei, a hostile official attitude towards the Traditional Latin Mass on the part of most bishops and many priests seemed destined to continue forever. He never gave up, however, and he was vindicated by Pope Benedict XVI's Apostolic Letter Summorum Pontificum, which led to the great expansion in availability of the Traditional Mass we enjoy today.

His perseverance, and that of his whole generation, was indispensable to this. Pope Benedict would not have made this concession to the Traditional movement if, at some point in the preceding decades, the movement had given up and gone home. 

David was a tough fighter for the Mass, an authentic Catholic gentleman, and a true Welshman. 

In paradisum deducant te angeli.

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