Photos courtesy of Claire Phillips
Holy Rosary Cathedral in downtown Vancouver
On Thursday evening, August 15, 2019, an estimated 650 people filled the pews at Vancouver’s Holy Rosary Cathedral for a High Mass in the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite (Traditional Latin Mass) in honour of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
A sense of occasion was palpable as people of different ages and backgrounds waited for the cathedral doors to open at 6:30 p.m. Despite the numbers, an atmosphere of reverence and even awe prevailed throughout the two-hour Mass, which was celebrated by Fr. Pablo Santa Maria of the Archdiocese of Vancouver. A fifty-voice choir organized by Vancouver musician David Poon specifically for this Mass sang Wiliam Byrd’s heavenly Mass for Five Voices (c. 1593) and various motets, while a smaller schola chanted the Gregorian Propers for the Feast of the Assumption. The Mass concluded with the Salve Regina, followed by extended extemporization on the cathedral’s magnificent pipe organ.
Choir and organ loft at Holy Rosary Cathedral
Prayers at the Foot of the Altar
Sermon
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Fr. Pablo Santa Maria was born in Mexico City in 1984. He has a married brother and a sister. In 2001, he moved to Vancouver with his parents and attended Vancouver College. He began discerning his vocation after meeting then Fr. Richard Gagnon, now Archbishop of Winnipeg, and serving Mass under him. As early as then, he knew that only Holy Orders would give him the happiness that he witnessed in Fr. Gagnon. Fr. Santa Maria entered Christ the King Seminary in Mission, British Columbia, in 2004, and was ordained to the priesthood in 2012. He served at St. Joseph’s Parish in Langley and then at Holy Rosary Cathedral, first as parochial vicar then as vice-rector and master of ceremonies. He began canon law studies at the University of Navarra in Pamplona, Spain, in 2017, and will complete his degree in 2020. Father has been celebrating his private Masses in the Extraordinary Form, many at the request of Una Voce Canada.
When Father was in the seminary, his grandfather gave him a Tridentine missal. He was drawn to the reverence and mystery of the Traditional Latin Mass when he first attended one, and the writings of then Cardinal Ratzinger, with its many references to the Mass, fuelled his growing love for this form of the liturgy. As a seminarian, he served the Traditional Mass under Fr. John Horgan at his home parish of Sts. Peter and Paul in Vancouver. In 2011, Fr. Erik Deprey, FSSP, then pastor at Holy Family Parish in Vancouver, helped him fine-tune his celebration of Low Mass, and after his ordination, he learned the rubrics for High Mass from Fr. William Ashley, currently the pastor at St. James Parish in Abbotsford.
In 2012, the archdiocesan paper, the BC Catholic, posted this video in which Fr. Santa Maria reflects on his vocation to the holy priesthood.
After the Mass, Fr. Santa Maria blesses the servers and other clergy outside the cathedral
Fr. Santa Maria (front, centre) with Fr. Ashley (Pastor, St. James Parish, Abbotsford) (left) and Fr. Juan Lucca, Assistant Priest and Master of Ceremonies at Holy Rosary Cathedral (right)
