San Francisco Frontiers - Pope Leo offers olive branch in allowing traditional mass

The Tridentine or so-called Latin mass was commonly used across the Church before it was modernised in the 1960s, and was further limited by Pope Francis in 2021.

With Leo's approval, it will be celebrated in St Peter's Basilica at the Vatican on Saturday afternoon by ultraconservative US cardinal Raymond Burke, a fierce opponent of the late pontiff.

Conducted in Latin by a priest who keeps his back to the congregation, in a ceremony marked by the use of incense and Gregorian chants, the mass is preferred by many traditionalist Catholics.

Francis feared, however, that its use could undermine the legacy of the Second Vatican Council (1962-65), a series of reforms that sought to bring the Catholic Church into the modern era.

His papal decree restricting the use of the mass, "Traditionis Custodes", sparked anger among Catholic conservatives who felt they were being sidelined.

Pope Leo's move to allow the mass in the Vatican sends a "very strong signal to the conservative fringe", said Francois Mabille, head of France's Geopolitical Observatory of Religion.

The action of Leo suggests that "maybe the tensions within the church are stronger than we imagined a few months ago," he told AFP.

- Strategic balance -

Elected on May 8 following the death of Francis, Pope Leo faced a delicate mission bringing together a church of 1.4 billion followers deeply divided over social issues, from the role of women to the openness of the Church towards divorcees, gay faithful and migrants.

In his 12 years as pontiff, Francis often irritated conservatives with his decisions, especially in the United States. Burke, who will lead Saturday's mass, was one of the Argentine pope's strongest critics.

Leo has pursued many of the policies favoured by his predecessor, highlighting the need to help the poor and marginalised and to protect the environment.

When the Vatican welcomed an LGBTQ+ pilgrimage as part of the church's Jubilee year in September, critics renewed their attacks on the Holy See's "ideological drift".

But Leo has also given ground to conservatives.

He named Guinean Cardinal Robert Sarah, who considers immigration a threat to Europe's Christian identity, as a special envoy to a pilgrimage in France.

And the return of the Tridentine mass to the Vatican is also "a gesture of appeasement," said Martin Dumont, a historian and secretary general of the Research Institute for the Study of Religions.

It signals that "everyone is a part of the Church -- all sides must be accepted and received", he told AFP.

Leo "would like to meet Catholic groups who want this form of rite" to understand their motives, said Dumont, adding: "He is a man of peace, attentive to others."

Leo appears to be sending the message that the traditional mass has a place, as long as it does not threaten the legacy of the Vatican II reforms.

But the line between liturgy and politics is fraught.

In an interview published in September, Leo acknowledged that the debate over the mass was "very complicated" and had become part of the "polarisation" within the Church.

"Some have used the liturgy as a pretext to advance other subjects. It has become a political tool and that is very regrettable," he said.

C.Lewis--SFF