After 19 years, Sto. Domingo Church in Quezon City to have a regular Traditional Latin Mass once more

The first Mass, on March 10, will be celebrated at the Altar of La Naval (the side altar to the left of Sto. Domingo's main altar) by Msgr. Seamus Patrick Horgan, First Secretary of the Apostolic Nunciature in Manila. The Tiples de Sto. Domingo, the oldest and one of the most renowned boys' choirs in the Philippines, will chant the Propers and Ordinary of the Mass. From March to August, the TLM will be celebrated at that altar every Second Sunday at 1:30 P.M.

The Sto. Domingo Church had been the site of the first "indult" Mass in the Philippines, from 1990 to 1994, with the late Fr. Manuel Pinon OP as the usual celebrant.

As reported on this blog, a Traditional Latin Mass was also celebrated on October 22 last year, at the main altar of the Church, by Fr. Michell Joe Zerrudo. That Mass and the enthusiastic response it generated helped to inspire the Dominicans to restore the regular celebration of the Traditional Latin Mass in this church. 

This Mass was preceded by a "Catechesis on the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite" for Sto. Domingo's parishioners, held in Sto. Domingo Church's parish hall on the evening of February 26, 2013 with Mr. Carlos Antonio Palad, a member of the Council of Foederatio Internationalis Una Voce, as main speaker. Prior to that, the Dominican community had a short seminar on the Extraordinary Form with Fr. Michell Joe Zerrudo as the main speaker. 

SEDSI receives letter and blessing from Papal Nuncio

Societas Ecclesia Dei Sancti Joseph traces its origins to the "Latin Mass Society of the Philippines" that was founded on December 18, 1987. As such, SEDSI is marking its 25th anniversary this year. Although SEDSI was not able to hold an anniversary Mass on December 18 of this year, it nevertheless received the following very important message and recognition of the legitimacy of its cause: 

The TLM comes back to Sto. Domingo Church!

The church of Sto. Domingo in Quezon City, also known as the National Shrine of Our Lady of the Rosary La Naval de Manila, was the site of the first regularly-scheduled and publicly-accessible indult every-Sunday Traditional Latin Mass in the Philippines since Quattuor Abhinc Annos was promulgated in 1984. That Mass (according to the 1962 Roman Missal rather than the Traditional Dominican Rite) was offered by Fr. Manuel Piñon OP at the altar of Our Lady of the Rosary from 1990 until 1994 when it was suppressed by the late Archbishop of Manila, Jaime Cardinal Sin.  

On October 22, 2012, the Traditional Latin Mass will make its first appearance in the Sto. Domingo church since the 1990's. This time, the Mass will be celebrated, not at a side altar, but at the main altar. The Mass will be offered by Fr. Michell Joe Zerrudo at 7:00 P.M.

Providentially, since it is October, the image of Our Lady of the Rosary La Naval de Manila is also enthroned at the center of the sanctuary (see above), thus allowing for the Mass to celebrated right in front of her -- just like in the days of Fr. Piñon.

Traditional Latin Mass returns to the world's largest Catholic university!

As previously announced, the evening of August 24, 2012 saw the Traditional Latin Mass being celebrated in public in the University of Santo Tomas (UST) for the first time since the liturgical reforms of Paul VI took effect. UST is the Philippines' oldest existing university and sole Pontifical University. It is also the world's largest Catholic university located in one campus in terms of the number of students (around 45,000 students in the Manila campus).

This surely ranks among the greatest achievements of the canonically-regular branch of the Traditional Latin Mass movement in the Philippines since it began in 1987. It was organized by students and faculty of this university, with training and other forms of assistance provided by Societas Ecclesia Dei Sancti Joseph (SEDSI).

The Mass was offered in the St. Dominic Chapel in the 3rd floor of the Tan Yan Kee Student Center. The chapel could hold about 60-70 people maximum (including choir and altar servers) but the crowd in attendance -- far more than a hundred-strong -- greatly exceeded expectations, and spilled out into the surrounding corridors. Screens and projectors had to be used to allow the faithful who were in the corridors to follow what was happening inside the chapel. The vast majority of the attendees were students of the University. Most of the servers and the whole choir were also drawn from UST students -- all in their late teens and early twenties -- who had practiced for this occasion for the past several weeks. 

Antique chalice used for the Mass

The Mass was offered by Fr. Michell Joe "Jojo" Zerrudo, priest of the Diocese of Cubao, Chaplain of SEDSI and celebrant of the daily TLM in Holy Family Parish, Roxas District, QC. He is an alumnus of the Central Seminary, one of the Philippines' two national seminaries, located in UST and run by the Dominican Fathers. In choir was Fr. Winston Fernandez Cabading OP, who was vital to the whole project of returning the TLM to UST.

Relics on the Altar used for Mass 

It is hoped that the Traditional Latin Mass will be offered monthly in UST. Plans are already being made for another Traditional Latin Mass in September, this time in a larger venue within the University. Should this push through, the City and Archdiocese of Manila (where UST is located) will once again have a regular Traditional Latin Mass for the first time since the First Friday Mass in the tiny chapel of the now-defunct Marian Center in Quiapo, Manila ceased sometime in 2010. UST will also become the second Filipino Catholic university (after the Ateneo De Manila University in Quezon City) and, not counting seminaries, the third Catholic institute of higher education in the Philippines (the first being La Consolacion College in Bacolod City) to have a regular TLM in its premises. 

For the foreseeable future, TLM's in UST will be according to the 1962 Roman Missal. Dominican-Rite Masses will, hopefully, come at a later date. 

The UST Varsitarian has a news report on the event: Tradisyunal na Misa sa Latin, muling inialay sa Unibersidad (article written in Tagalog). It is my understanding that the article has some unintentional misquotes that, nevertheless, do not detract from its positive tone. 

Most of the photos were taken by Leandro-Jose C. Tesorero and Tsard Pazcoguin. 

The last and third-to-the-last photos are from the Varsitarian, UST's student paper. 

Traditional Latin Mass comes back to University of Santo Tomas!

To our knowledge, this is the first-ever Mass according to the 1962 Missal to be publicly offered in the Dominican-run University of Santo Tomas (UST) in Manila -- founded by the Spaniards in 1611, the Philippines' sole Pontifical University, the "Catholic University of the Philippines" -- since the liturgical reforms took effect in the 1960's. 

This Mass will be offered by Fr. Michell Joe "Jojo" Zerrudo, chaplain of SEDSI, parish priest of Holy Family Parish in Roxas District, QC, and alumnus of Central Seminary, the interdiocesan seminary located in UST.