Midnight Mass

(Ours is elevenish...)
A, despite a few inaccuracies, (or more probably, simply wordburgers, "faces to the East with his back away from the congregation"?) more-than-fair article about the only Extraordinary Form Mass in one Canadian diocese.

In 1965 the church moved away from the 1,500 year-old tradition, and though it was never banned, priests were encouraged to deliver the new form, also known as the ordinary form.

In 2007, four decades after Latin mass was widely discontinued, Pope Benedict XVI revitalized it by allowing any priest to say the mass.

Father Alex MacLellan of Our Lady Queen of Peace Catholic Church jumped at the chance, and now heads the only church in the Victoria diocese that has a Latin mass.

The most obvious difference between the two forms is the language, he said. There are other routine differences as well. MacLellan faces to the East with his back away from the congregation and toward God. The Latin mass calls for almost 30 genuflections over the course of the mass (bending a knee toward the ground).

“And there’s more silence,” he said, noting that he will say some prayers in a low voice so quiet only the alter boys will hear.

“I felt a need to be able to go back and be able to say this Latin mass because I found it more contemplative, you’re directing more to God,” he said. “The other mass is more social,” although he doesn’t favour one over the other, saying neither is wrong.

"More social" is an interesting turn of phrase.

I understand there will be an EF Midnight Mass in New York City, as well.