Young adults gather at St. Brendan in Mexico
Advent day of recollection, Solemn High Mass
About 40 people from across Missouri attended the Resplenduit Advent day of recollection for young adults Dec. 21 at St. Brendan parish in Mexico.
Aimed at Catholics ages 18 to 35, it included talks by canons of the Institute of Christ the King Sovereign Priest, along with time for silent meditation, confessions, the Rosary, fellowship, and Solemn High Mass in Latin in the Extraordinary Form.
Young adults from across the diocese participated in the Mass, which was offered in celebration of the feast of St. Thomas the Apostle.
“Resplenduit” is Latin for “It has shone brightly.”
Marianne Cline, a member of St. Francis Xavier parish in Taos, had attended a day of recollection given by Christ the King canons at St. Brendan for Lent and enjoyed it enough to return.
“The spiritual reflections were really good,” she said. “I learned some things and got a new angle on things I already knew.”
One of the talks at the Advent retreat was about the Christmas liturgical season, including feastdays leading up to the Feast of the Epiphany of Our Lord on Jan. 6 and looking ahead to the Feast of the Presentation of Our Lord (also known as Candlemas) on Feb. 2.
“It was really informative and helped me go deep into the feastdays that happen during the octave of Christmas, how they’re all connected and why they’re important — especially St. Stephen, St. John and the Holy Innocents,” said Ms. Cline.
She noted that in secular terms, people think of Christmas being over after Dec. 25.
“But as Catholics, we keep on celebrating for quite a while,” she said.
Ms. Cline doesn’t regularly attend Mass in Latin in the Extraordinary Form — which was celebrated throughout the Church in the centuries leading up to the Second Vatican Council.
“But I feel like when I go every once in a while, it enriches my experience of the Masses I normally attend in English,” she said.
She believes both forms of the Mass — which are equally licit in the eyes of the Church — are more similar than they seem.
It boils down to emphasizing different things.
“I think they are complimentary and that both kind of enrich each other,” she said. “I always learn something new about going to the Mass that I go to regularly.”
The same goes for different emphases in the liturgical calendar.
“Even though we kind of do things differently like in a regular parish, there’s still a lot of richness of seeing how the earlier liturgical calendar was lived for so many years and how some people are still using it today,” said Ms. Cline.
Father Dylan Schrader, pastor of St. Brendan parish, who is Bishop W. Shawn McKnight’s episcopal delegate for Mass in the extraordinary form in the Jefferson City diocese said St. Brendan parish is always happy to welcome young Catholics.
“It is amazing how many young people are interested in our Catholic traditions, including Latin and older forms of worship,” he said. “I am happy that St. Brendan can partner with the Institute of Christ the King to provide these opportunities.”
