Cardinal Castrillon's address to the LMS

I posted earlier today a quotation from the address of Cardinal Castrillon Hoyos to the Latin Mass Society. The full text of the address has now been posted at NLM. I particularly appreciated his comment:

I also say, “Take heart!” for it is obvious from the many young people in England and Wales who love the Church’s ancient liturgy that you have done very well in preserving and handing on a love for this liturgy to your children.

It is good to hear the Cardinal encouraging families in the context of a speech about the traditional liturgy. I have to say that I also have experience of children growing to love the traditional liturgy and passing on that love to their parents who have been overjoyed that their children have found something that will nourish their faith and keep it strong.

His Eminence also made special mention of the Merton conference to train priests to celebrate the usus antiquior and gave his blessing to this year's conference. As one of the tutors for the conference, I greatly value this blessing.

NLM rightly highlighted this section:

Let me say this plainly: the Holy Father wants the ancient use of the Mass to become a normal occurrence in the liturgical life of the Church so that all of Christ’s faithful – young and old – can become familiar with the older rites and draw from their tangible beauty and transcendence. The Holy Father wants this for pastoral reasons as well as for theological ones

. The Cardinal went on to quote one of the key points of Summorum Pontificum:

In the history of the liturgy there is growth and progress, but no rupture. What earlier generations held as sacred, remains sacred and great for us too, and it cannot be all of a sudden entirely forbidden or even considered harmful. It behooves all of us to preserve the riches which have developed in the Church’s faith and prayer, and to give them their proper place.

NLM links to a pdf of the Cardinal's Homily at the Pontifical Mass. It is posted in html by the Times Online.