The following question has been asked to several priests around the world:

What part of the Mass, words or rubrics, in its extraordinary form moves you the best?

Father Louis, OSB: the words uttered by the priest: He took bread into His Holy and venerable hands (page 35 in red booklet). My hands are neither holy nor venerable! They are the ones of a poor sinner. The Liturgy however invites me to take great care of this fragile Host and my hands are not mine any more but the one of Jesus who takes me in His own. “My Lord, I am holding Thee, I do not want to let Thee go.”

Father Emmanuel Marie de Saint Jean: “I am always more and more touched by the self-effacement of the priest who disappears behind Christ. The more the presence of the Priest goes away, the more Christ grows.”

Canon Alban Denis, ICRSP. : “The continuity and permanency of the Liturgy. The priest is never alone celebrating. He is with the entire Church. He is with the cohort of all the priests who celebrated before him. I say Mass the exact same way as Saint John Bosco; I pronounce the same words as the Curé of Ars did; I make the same movement as Pius X and all others…. We will meet in Heaven. This is a great source of humility and stimulation. Far from feeling to be limited by rules and rubrics, the rubrics carry me in my daily celebration.”

Father Benedict Joseph: “The celebration ‘ad orientem’. The orientation of the priest toward the East expresses well the function of the priest as Pontiff. Being all turned together in the same direction, gives a vivid image of the unity of the militant Church walking towards Heaven. It is also a great help to avoid any kind of self-centeredness.

Father Laurent-Marie, Servant of Jesus and Marie: “this Liturgy expresses the ‘Mysterium Fidei’ in a particular good and proper way, with the sense of contemplation, recollection and reverence. Even in the celebration of the greatest feast of the year, with the use of multiple ministers, incense, polyphonic choirs and even orchestras, all leads to the great silence of the Canon and the Consecration. God always establishes his masterpieces in an eternal silence.”

Father Claude Barthe: “The prayer of the ‘Suscipe’: May this Sacrifice be brought to the Altar. That is the Roman Epiclesis. These words bring us up to Heaven.”