VATICAN CITY - Pope Benedict XVI removed restrictions on celebrating the old form of the Latin Mass on Saturday in a concession to traditional Catholics, but he stressed that he was in no way rolling back the reforms of the Second Vatican Council.
Benedict issued a document authorizing parish priests to celebrate the Tridentine Mass if a "stable group of faithful" request it. Currently, the local bishop must approve such requests -- an obstacle that fans of the rite say has greatly limited its availability.
"What earlier generations held as sacred remains sacred and great for us too, and it cannot be all of a sudden entirely forbidden or even considered harmful," Benedict wrote.
The Tridentine rite contains a prayer on Good Friday of Easter Week calling for the conversion of Jews. The Anti-Defamation League called the move a "body blow to Catholic-Jewish relations," the Jewish news agency JTA reported.
In addition to Jewish concerns, some bishops in France and liberal-minded clergy and faithful elsewhere had expressed concerns that allowing freer use of the Tridentine liturgy would imply a negation of Vatican II, the 1962-65 meetings that modernized the Roman Catholic Church. They also feared it could create divisions in parishes since two different liturgies would be celebrated.
Benedict sought to allay those concerns in a letter to bishops accompanying the Latin text. "This fear is unfounded," he said.
He said the New Mass celebrated in the vernacular that emerged after Vatican II remained the "normal" form of Mass while the Tridentine version was an "extraordinary" one that would probably only be sought by relatively few Catholics.
The Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi, said Benedict was in no way refuting Vatican II.
The document, he said, "doesn't impose any return to the past, it doesn't mean any weakening of the authority of the council nor the authority and responsibility of bishops."
