George Galloway comes out in favour of the Traditional Mass

George Galloway:
Official photo from the UK Parliament

George Galloway, the radical left-wing politician vying for Muslim votes in Britain's current general election, who was too hot to handle for the British Labour Party and so created his own--first, the Respect Party, now the Workers' Party of Britain -- yes, that George Galloway -- loves the Traditional Mass and has advised the Pope not to restrict it.

This has emerged in an interview with Timothy Stanley in the Daily Telegraph. Galloway, who is seeking re-election as the Member of Parliament for Rochdale in England's north west, noted that he is a practicing Catholic, and a 'big fan' of Pope Francis.

Stanley, a Catholic convert who also has experience of the radical left, felt inspired to ask him about the Traditional Mass.

The article is paywalled (here) but this is the money quote:

“I’m in favour of it.” George calls it “poetry in motion”. Has he heard the rumour that the Pope is thinking of banning it? “We discussed that.” Did he advise His Holiness against a prohibition? “I did.” But he doesn’t think it will happen: “A lot of things that have emerged from the Pope are actually collegiate positions… He has a lot of enemies, so he has to rely on different factions. It’s a very back-stabbing place, rather like Parliament.”

Older readers in the US might possibly remember Galloway's testimony before Congress in 2005. In Britain, he is very well known as the foremost representative of the radical left, stranded by the Labour Party's move towards globalist managerialism. It would be simplistic to call Galloway 'Old Labour', because of his successful navigation of the new politics of ethnic minorities and Islam, but this is part of his identity, and as such he even calls himself 'socially conservative'. It is a fact that were the great Labour politicians of the past to rise up and repeat what they regarded as common sense about social issues fifty years ago, they would be denounced as 'far right' by some.

Galloway's intervention is a reminder that the Traditional Mass is not limited by party, educational background or class. It appeals to all kinds of people, and once served as an unbreakable bond of solidarity in a Catholic community with a range of ideas about how to implement the Church's teaching in the secular sphere. 

One early proponent of the Traditional Mass was s founder of Plaid Cymru, the Welsh nationalist party: Saunders Lewis. There is an article about him in the current Mass of Ages, the magazine of the Latin Mass Society. Another, Hugh Ross Williamson, had also, like Galloway, once been ejected from the Labour Party for his radicalism.

Let us hope that Pope Francis, recognising in Galloway a political soul-mate, will take his words about the Traditional Mass to heart. I understand Pope Francis has had the same advice from a Parliamentarian from the other end of the party-political spectrum: the senior Conservative backbencher and specialist in Italian affairs, Sir Edward Leigh, who is also a patron of the Latin Mass Society.