The letter, posted online on 15th July, appeals to the Pope to maintain the older liturgical forms of the Catholic Eucharistic liturgy.

This follows a similar plea made by prominent UK figures, including Andrew Lloyd Webber, in a letter published on 3rd July in the Times of London.

Organised by former National Endowment for the Arts chairman Dana Gioia, the letter includes signatories such as blogger Andrew Sullivan, actor Eduardo Verastegui and theologian Larry Chapp.

The signatories, identifying as Catholics and non-Catholics, believers and nonbelievers, argue that the Traditional Latin Mass has significantly influenced Western culture.

The letter states: "to deprive the next generation of artists of this source of mystery, beauty and contemplation of the sacred seems shortsighted. All of us, believers and nonbelievers alike, recognise that this ancient liturgy, which inspired the work of Palestrina, Bach, and Beethoven and generations of great artists, is a magnificent achievement of civilisation and part of the common cultural heritage of humanity. It is medicine for the soul, one antidote to the gross materialism of the postmodern age."

Vatican response expected

While such petitions to Pope Francis are not uncommon, they often receive little attention from Church leaders.

However Cordileone's public support for the letter has garnered significant notice. A spokesman for the archbishop released a statement praising the letter as "an extraordinary statement from some great artists and other cultural influencers about the value and inspiration they have received from the Traditional Latin Mass".

Cordileone added "I am grateful that faithful Catholics, who make clear that they love the Latin Mass but love Jesus Christ and His Church more, are making their voices lovingly heard."

The signatories assure Pope Francis of their loyalty:

"Those of us who are Catholics pledge our filial loyalty to you, Pope Francis. We come to you with the humility and obedience but also the confidence of children, telling a loving father of our spiritual needs. We pray that you will not lump us with some of the angry and disrespectful voices magnified by social media."

Despite the letter's respectful tone, its endorsement by a sitting American archbishop is expected to provoke a response from Vatican officials.

This all comes amid rising tensions between the Apostolic See and some members of the American episcopate.

Sources

The Pillar

Catholic Vote

CathNews New Zealand

Neither should priests be exasperatingly creative, merely functional, rushed, sloppy, careless or superabundantly friendly.

Francis letter is designed to protect the celebration of Mass from ideological influences.

"With this letter I simply want to invite the whole Church to rediscover, to safeguard and to live the truth and power of the Christian celebration," Francis wrote.

He does not want it "spoiled by a superficial and foreshortened understanding of its value or, worse yet," he added, "exploited in service of some ideological vision, no matter what the hue".

The beauty of the Eucharistic liturgy is not about "the search for a ritual aesthetic" that focuses on "a careful exterior observance of a rite" or "a scrupulous observance of the rubrics".

Nor does Francis wish for the Catholic Mass to be reduced to "a careless banality" or "ignorant superficiality".

Communities' living out of the mass "is conditioned — for better or, unfortunately, for worse — by the way in which their pastor presides in the assembly," Francis says.

He lists "models" of inadequate presiding, such as "rigid austerity or an exasperating creativity, a spiritualising mysticism or a practical functionalism, a rushed briskness or an overemphasised slowness, a sloppy carelessness or an excessive finickiness, a superabundant friendliness or priestly impassibility".

The liturgy must be rehearsed and carefully prepared so the faithful may participate in wonder at the sacrament when the bread and wine are transformed into the body and blood of Jesus.

"But even if the quality and the proper action of the celebration were guaranteed, that would not be enough to make our participation full," Francis's document states.

"The theological understanding of the Liturgy does not in any way permit that these words be understood to mean to reduce everything to the aspect of worship.

"If the reform has eliminated that vague ‘sense of mystery,' then more than a cause for accusations it is to its credit," Francis wrote.

"Beauty, just like truth, always engenders wonder, and when these are referred to the mystery of God, they lead to adoration."

The Pope is critical of the use of the term "sense of mystery".

"When I speak of astonishment at the paschal mystery, I do not at all intend to refer to what at times seems to me to be meant by the vague expression ‘sense of mystery'.

Sometimes this is among the presumed chief accusations against the liturgical reform. It is said that the sense of mystery has been removed from the celebration.

Francis voices dismay in "Desiderio Desideravi" at the pushback Vatican II still meets today.

The pope has opened the church and the Eucharist to divorced and remarried couples, people who have had abortions and, most recently, politicians who support abortion rights.

"The world still does not know it, but everyone is invited to the supper of the wedding of the Lamb," Francis says.

Sources

• Church Times
• RNS