Jewish groups have also expressed concern over a prayer in the Tridentine rite that appeals for the conversion of Jews.
The Latin Mass was never abolished, but its use was restricted after the New Mass was introduced. Local bishops had to authorize it, and many did not. Traditional Catholics who prefer the Tridentine rite have long demanded freer access to it.
In 1969, Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre founded a group, the Society of St. Pius X, that insisted on celebrating the old rite because he was opposed to the New Mass and other Vatican II changes. The Vatican excommunicated Lefebvre in 1988 after he consecrated four bishops without Rome's consent -- a move that Pope John Paul II called a "schismatic act." The bishops were excommunicated as well. Lefebvre died in 1991 .
Currently, the society has six seminaries with 160 seminarians. It has four bishops and 463 priests .
The pope has been eager to reconcile with the group, which has demanded freer use of the old Mass as a precondition for normalizing relations. The other precondition has been the removal of the excommunication orders.
"By making the Latin Mass more available, the Holy Father is hoping to convince those disaffected Catholics that it is time for them to return to full union with the Catholic Church," wrote Cardinal Sean O'Malley, archbishop of Boston, after attending a meeting at the Vatican with the pope last week in which cardinals were briefed on the pending document.
Still, the society's current leader, Bishop Bernard Fellay, has said the situation "will be practically unchanged" unless the return to the old Mass is accompanied by an "in-depth discussion" with the Vatican on key doctrinal issues that also emerged from Vatican II.
