The language of the Roman Empire and the early Christian church again will echo through historic St. Josaphat Church with the revival of a traditional form of the Latin Mass.
Detroit Roman Catholic Cardinal Adam Maida is reaching back 40 years to revive the Latin Mass as part of an effort to save a central city church that is struggling to retain its membership.
Mass, which derives from the Latin phrase "Ita, missa est" with which the priest dismisses parishioners at the end of worship, will be offered in Latin at St. Josaphat on Sunday mornings beginning Oct. 3.
"We're all hoping it will bring a lot of new people through our doors," Kevin Piotrowski, the 40-year-old head of the parish council, told the Detroit Free Press for a story Tuesday.
The Second Vatican Council in the 1960s led to many liberalizing changes in the Mass, such as having priests face the congregation and celebrating the service in the local language rather than Latin.
But some Catholics have longed for a return to traditional forms of worship, in which "in nomine Patris et Filii et Spiritus Sancti" replaces "in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit."
"We think there are a lot of Catholics who still want the older Mass," said St. Josaphat's pastor, the Rev. Mark Borkowski. "We think they'll come to St. Josaphat because we will have the only, regular Tridentine Mass that's authorized by the Archdiocese of Detroit."
At St. Josaphat, church officials are hoping that Catholics will drive a long way for the Tridentine Mass, a traditional form of Catholic worship, codified in 1570. During much of this Latin Mass, priests face an altar with their backs to the congregation.
Several other Detroit parishes offer regular Latin Masses, but they are Latin versions of the post-1960s Mass.
Piotrowski and Borkowski say they have been impressed by successes at nearby Episcopal and Lutheran churches, where historic buildings have been revived by suburbanites driving downtown for traditional forms of worship.
"We're talking about saving some of the city's architectural jewels and keeping them alive as churches," said the Rev. David Eberhard at Historic Trinity Lutheran Church in Detroit, widely regarded by clergy in the city as a master of this strategy.
"When I started in 1980, we had 50 members with an average age of 80 and now we've got 1,700 with an average age of 36," said Eberhard. "Our niche is traditional worship in a beautiful, historic setting, and people will drive a long way for that."
The Rev. Steven Kelly at St. John's Episcopal Church, near Comerica Park, said he is following Eberhard's example. St. John's offers a form of Episcopal liturgy that disappeared from most churches in 1979.
"And, I've got people driving from Ann Arbor, Downriver and one young couple that even comes from Lansing every weekend," Kelly said.