'Packed House' Welcomes Latin Mass to Front Royal

By Gretchen R. Crowe
HERALD Staff Writer
(From the Issue of 8/10/06)latin mass

The choir loft at St. John the Baptist Church in Front Royal offered the best view of the delicate black and white head coverings, the newly installed Communion rail and the tall candles on the ornately adorned altar. Each served as a telling sign that the parish’s first Latin Mass was no ordinary eucharistic celebration.

A large group of altar boys assisted Father Ed Hathaway, pastor, in celebrating the Mass last Sunday. Attending in choir were Fathers Paul deLadurantaye, director of the Office of Sacred Liturgy; Chris Pollard, parochial vicar; and Jerome Fasano, pastor of St. Andrew the Apostle Church in Clifton. Eager parishioners and curious visitors filled the pews and flooded out the back of the church into the vestibule.

“It was a packed house,” said Father Hathaway, who said the Latin Mass is “an expression of our tradition that fills in a piece of our heritage.”

While the Latin Mass was familiar to older parishioners, it was the first introduction for many younger ones. Following the Mass, Ellen Kelly signed a “thank you scroll” for Arlington Bishop Paul S. Loverde, who expanded the option for the Latin Mass to be celebrated in the diocese in March. The Latin Mass also is celebrated every Sunday at St. Lawrence Church in Alexandria.

Holding son, Peter, 1, Kelly said that she and her husband enjoyed “teaching our boys what a truly reverent Mass can be like.”

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