Kevin Kelly/Key photo Bishop Robert W. Finn celebrates a Bishop's Low Mass Sept. 15 at the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception. The Mass was celebrated in Latin according to the 1962 Roman Missal.

The Mass, celebrated on the Feast of Our Lady of Sorrows, drew some 500 worshipers, many of whom followed the Mass with their own personal, and by now vintage, Missals.

The date of the Mass was significant. The Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph's Latin Mass community, in existence for more than a decade, has celebrated Mass under the 1962 Missal rite, also known as the Tridentine rite, since its establishment at Our Lady of Sorrows Parish, adjacent to Kansas City's Crown Center development.

That community is in the process of restoring Old St. Patrick Oratory in downtown Kansas City for exclusive use as a traditional Latin rite church.

The Mass was also celebrated one day after Pope Benedict's motu proprio "Summorum Pontificum" took effect. The document authorizes wider use of the rites from the 1962 Roman Missal.

At the Sept. 15 Mass, no detail was left unattended.

Bishop Finn processed into and out of the Cathedral for the two-hour liturgy wearing a traditional long flowing robe called a cappa magna. Before he celebrated Mass, the cappa magna was removed and the bishop was vested by assistants that included two "chaplains" from the Institute of Christ the King Sovereign Priest - Father Denis Buchholz, pro-rector of Old St. Patrick Oratory and Father Karl Lenhardt, rector of St. Francis de Sales Oratory in St. Louis and vice provincial of the institute.

Father William Avis, another priest from the Institute of Christ the King Sovereign Priest, served as master of ceremonies.

In the choir loft, voices from the Old St. Patrick Oratory choir, from the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception choirs, the Latin Mass community of the Archdiocese of Kansas City in Kansas, and from the Benedictine Sisters of Mary Queen of the Apostles, blended in traditional hymns and Gregorian chant.

Bishop Finn, in accordance with a low Mass, read the Mass prayers aloud in Latin, but without the amplification of the Cathedral's sound system.

At Communion, two rails were formed with chairs on the sides of the altar platform. Those receiving Communion received the host on the tongue from a priest as they knelt.

In his homily at the beginning of the two-hour Mass, Bishop Finn urged the congregation to see the expansion of the pre-Vatican II liturgy as a sign of reconciliation.

"With no diminution of the authority of the Second Vatican Council, we embark on this morning's celebration to encounter the beauty and power of these sacred rites," Bishop Finn said.

"For nearly 30 years, it has been my privilege to offer the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass in Novus Ordo. I profess my love for this Mass of my priesthood, even as I embrace with trust and hope the opportunity to celebrate the Mass according to the older books," he said.

As he learned to celebrate the traditional Latin Mass, now called the "extraordinary form," Bishop Finn said he gained a deep appreciation for the riches of liturgy.

"My study of the extraordinary form has led me to a greater appreciation of the rich meaning of the priestly action, the power of the words," he said.

"I have become more aware of the great cloud of witnesses to which we are united in the Holy Sacrifice; of my prayer for the living and the dead," Bishop Finn said.

Bishop Finn urged priests to "provide and protect with renewed devotion and fidelity all to which the Holy People of God are entitled in the careful and holy celebration of the sacred liturgy, whether in the Ordinary or Extraordinary Form."

"This Mass is not from us. It flows from the cross of Christ, and each day we must breath in Christ," the bishop said. "We must become more fully children of the Father, sons of the church, sons of Mary. In this way, our actions within the Mass and outside the Mass will flow from him and bring him to others."

Bishop Finn also said that wider use the older rites can help unify and reconcile the church.

"We also pray that Pope Benedict's invitation to use the older Missal will be a cause for unity among us - even here in Kansas City - and that the celebration of the Mass, all the sacraments, and the Divine Office according to the earlier books will bring about a saving explosion and manifestation of the crucified love of Jesus Christ," he said.

"By this miracle of his grace, may there be triggered in us those transformations which, little by little, will bring about an authentic and lasting reconciliation," Bishop Finn said.

END