INDIANAPOLIS (RNS) — A mile from the main events of the National Eucharistic Congress on Thursday (July 18) afternoon, Catholic after Catholic knelt on the hot surface of an overflow parking lot of Holy Rosary Catholic Church as they received Communion during a Mass said in Latin, as it was before the modernizing changes of the Second Vatican Council. 

Holy Rosary, walking distance from Lucas Oil Stadium, the hub for the U.S. bishops’ evangelization mega-event that continues through Sunday, is one of only two parishes in the Archdiocese of Indianapolis where the Mass is offered according to the 1962 Missal, often colloquially known as the traditional Latin Mass.

In his 2021 directive “Traditionis Custodes” (“Guardians of Tradition”), Pope Francis limited the celebration of the traditional Latin Mass to designated parishes and took measures to stop the Mass from being celebrated by new priests or parishes out of concern that the traditional Latin Mass ran counter to the spirit and reforms of Vatican II and caused division in the church.

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Despite those restrictions, hundreds of Catholics came out to the first of two traditional Latin Masses offered at the National Eucharistic Congress, which will also feature four Masses in English, three Masses in Spanish and for youth, a Mass in Vietnamese and three separate Eastern Rite liturgies. 

They filled Holy Rosary, which has a capacity of about 350, spilling into an overflow parking lot and an adjacent park. Priests and altar servers filed out of the church when it came time to distribute Communion, shielding the Eucharist with white umbrellas, to serve Communion to the crowd outside, who were watching on video screens as San Francisco Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone, facing away from the pews inside, said the Mass.

Besides the orientation of the priest, the pre-Vatican II Mass, all in Latin, diverges from the order and substance of some prayers from today’s most commonly celebrated Roman Catholic liturgy.

Although total attendance for the National Eucharistic Congress has not been confirmed by organizers, it’s estimated that about 45,000 attended the five-day event, from July 17 to 21. Regular English-language Masses held inside the stadium, which is the home of the Indianapolis Colts National Football League team.

Many traditional Latin Mass attendees, who included a significant contingent of Californians, said that they were particularly motivated to attend because of Cordileone’s presence.

Cordileone, known as an outspoken conservative among the American bishops, announced in June of 2022 that he would ban then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who represents San Francisco, from receiving Communion in his archdiocese until she publicly renounced her “advocacy for the legitimacy of abortion.” 

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“We know how protective and how conservative he is,” said Angelica Rosario, who normally attends the traditional Latin Mass at Saint Anne Catholic Church in San Diego. She began attending that liturgy about two and half years ago when a priest who attended seminary with Cordileone suggested it.

Cordileone’s homily, said Rosario, “really solidified and validated that our traditional Catholicism is alive and we got to bring it back.”

Rosario, who is active in anti-euthanasia and anti-abortion ministry through her church, said she wished the traditional Latin Mass would be “rolled out” instead of “restrained,” but she added the current situation is “the church, and we must be obedient.”

John Andrews and Magdalena Lopez, who both work for the Diocese of San Bernardino, came to the liturgy at Holy Rosary to experience their first traditional Latin Mass. They both wanted to support Cordileone as a fellow Californian.

“There’s a real hunger for this,” said Andrews, the diocese’s director of the office of media, adding that he and Lopez had attended in the overflow parking lot.

Andrews noted that the traditional Latin Mass was in many ways the opposite of the “glitzy production” of the evening revival sessions in the stadium, which is being managed by the production company behind Protestant young adult Passion Conferences, according to Bishop Andrew Cozzens, who is overseeing the event for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

“I’m not saying one is better than the other,” said Andrews, who added that Cordileone’s homily touched on returning to “practices that were very common in the earlier church that were maybe things that we shouldn’t have let go.”

Another parishioner from the San Bernardino diocese, Javier Cordova, who became a Catholic at Easter vigil three months ago, said he’d fallen in love with the traditional Latin Mass at the beginning of this year. Cordova said he wasn’t “much of a churchgoer” growing up, though his family attended Protestant evangelical churches associated with Calvary Chapel and Victory Outreach International.

As a new Catholic, he said he was praying for unity and a “top-down system” in the church.

“I feel this is the highest praise of the Lord in the Eucharist,” he said. He often travels 40 to 50 miles from his own parish to attend.

Regular Holy Rosary parishioners Peter and Lindsey DeMass also drive 40 minutes to attend the church’s traditional Latin Mass. The overflow parking lot, they said, has been used when Holy Rosary was one of the first parishes to reopen after COVID-19-related closures, but said the Congress Mass was the largest event  they had seen in the six years they’d attended.

“We felt kind of like we got ripped off. We were never shown this growing up,” said Peter.

Lindsey added, “It was just beautiful. It spoke to us in a way that none of those liturgies from our childhood did.”

“The Latin Mass really draws me into a spirit of prayer,” said Ashley Anduiza, a parishioner at Our Lady of Lourdes parish in Miami. Comparing leaving the Mass to a retreat, Anduiza said, “It feels like a really quiet hum inside.”

“I love going to Novus Ordo Mass as well,” Anduiza explained, “but sometimes I catch myself just going through the motions because I am so used to it.” Having to pay more attention helps her “lock in,” Anduiza said.

Anduiza, a member of a Catholic band, Adore Praise & Worship, that holds monthly Eucharistic adoration nights, said she wasn’t familiar with the concerns about the traditional Latin Mass, explaining that, having been born after the reforms of the Second Vatican Council, she “didn’t have much to compare to.”

Angelica Rosario’s 18-year-old son, Diego, said he was still trying to discern his place in the church. He said his devotion to the traditional Latin Mass stems from the “amount of reverence.

“I think it really adds another level to what we know as the Eucharist,” he said.