Fr. Lockwood of Assumption Parish Confirms Traditional Latin Masses There

I want to thank Father Lockwood for emailing me to confirm that, indeed, Assumption Parish on Mattis Road has added regularly scheduled traditional Latin Masses to their rotation. And, what is better, it has proven to be very popular to date.

From his email:

Here’s how it happened-

The day the motu proprio came out, I was asked by several parishioners if we were going to do something at Assumption. Our pastor was also asked the same question by others. I had long wondered about doing the TLM (for personal reasons as well as the welfare of ALL our people here). I have, therefore, been spending time at St. Francis de Sales for several months as well as learning on my own. Fr. Lenhardt has been a good friend and helper; Fr. Avis has also been my teacher, as have the many candidates and servers there. Archbishop Burke’s support for the Holy Father’s liturgical vision is well-known, and he has made it clear to us (the priests who are amenable to this) that we have his support and help. It became clear that Assumption, Mattese, was in a perfect location, well south of town and to the east of any TLMs then being celebrated. Our pastor has been uniformly supportive, and he, as I, began to realize that there was a great deal of interest within our parish.

This was confirmed by the attendance at our first Latin Mass (1962) on Christmas Eve; it was the first TLM celebrated in the parish in over 30 years and we had over 250 people. It was a Solemn High Mass with help from some of our friends from Kenrick Seminary (I teach Mariology there). Our Holy Day Mass yesterday had more folks than the Christmas Mass. We have not advertised the masses outside the parish; I decided we needed to do this within our parish family-I would say 90% of the folks at both masses were from the parish (though we would certainly welcome anyone from anywhere who loves the TLM). This confirms what I have suspected for some months: There is a sizeable minority of Catholics out there who would attend the 1962 Mass if it became “normalized,” so to speak, and was not just confined to indults or personal parishes or oratories. We will begin our weekly TLM on January 13th, at 3PM and see how it goes. Fr. Lenhardt is totally supportive of this development and I look forward to “paying him back,” by helping out at the oratory from time to time.

God alone knows where this will lead, but we have been graced with a good start. I’m sending you the same pics I sent to Fr. Z.

God bless,
Fr. Gregory J. Lockwood, part-time assoc. pastor
Assumption Parish, Mattese, MO, Archdiocese of Saint Louis

In addition to all of the other wonderful aspects of this news-- particularly the popularity within the parish setting-- what is nice to see is that an obviously modern-architectural-type Church can be made a suitable venue for the traditional Mass. No, it's not St. Francis de Sales, but it is a nice example that steps to make our worship spaces more reverent and God-centered are not wasted.

Congratulations to Fr. Lockwood and everyone at Assumption, and thank you for the update.

Deo Gratias!