Bishop Larry Silva will celebrate a Solemn Pontifical High Tridentine Mass on June 29 at Blessed Sacrament Church in Honolulu for Oahu’s Latin Mass community during which he will administer the sacrament of Confirmation to 15 youth and adults.

It will be the first time he will celebrate the Mass in Latin according to the 1962 Roman Missal, called the “extraordinary form,” and commonly known as the Tridentine rite.

“I am still learning all the rituals, and I am a little nervous about it, but with God’s grace I will be able to celebrate it reverently,” the bishop wrote in an e-mail message in answer to questions from the Hawaii Catholic Herald.

Confirmation will also be conferred using the old rite, complete with the symbolic “slap” on the cheek by the bishop, which Bishop Silva explained is “really a touch on the cheek to wish the Lord’s peace.”

The bishop said the “slap” at one time signified “the person’s willingness to suffer for Christ,” following an older theology of the sacrament in which Confirmation made one a “soldier of Christ.”

According to Thomas Herndon, president of Hawaii Tridentine Mass, those to be confirmed range in age from 11 to adults in their 40s.

“All have been trained over the past year using the Baltimore Catechism,” he said.

Bishop Silva described the candidates as “well prepared.”

The bishop is celebrating the liturgy at the request of Hawaii Tridentine Mass, the formal name of the diocese’s Latin Mass community.

“Just as I have celebrated Masses with the Vietnamese Community, the Korean Community, and the Hispanic Community, so I want the Latin Mass Community to know that I am their pastor as well,” the bishop said.

Bishop Silva will celebrate a Solemn Pontifical High Mass, which he described as the Mass “in its fullest and most solemn form” where many parts of the liturgy are sung and incense is used. He said the extra solemnity is appropriate for the occasion of a bishop’s visit.

The Tridentine Mass was instituted by Pope Pius V in 1570 following the Council of Trent. Minor changes to the rite were instituted over the years, the last being revisions made by Pope John XXIII in 1962.

The liturgy changed to the present form following the Second Vatican Council. It was introduced gradually through the 1960s and formalized in the Roman Missal promulgated by Pope Paul VI in 1970.

In 1988, Pope John Paul II authorized diocesan bishops to allow the celebration of the Tridentine Mass under certain circumstances for those who cherished the older form.

Bishop Joseph A. Ferrario granted permission for the celebration of a weekly Latin Mass in Hawaii in 1990.

Pope Benedict XVI expanded the use of the 1962 rite through his apostolic letter “Summorum Pontificum,” which went into effect last Sept. 14.

The pope said the Tridentine Mass — which he called the “extraordinary” form as opposed to the “ordinary” Mass that is the norm in Catholic churches today — should be made available in every parish where groups of the faithful desire it and that any priest could freely celebrate the rite.

In response to the pope’s decree, Bishop Silva said, “six or seven” Hawaii priests are learning the Tridentine rite, some in response to neighbor island requests.

Summorum Pontificum also permits the other sacraments to be celebrated using the Tridentine rite.

“We have already had several baptisms and first communions using the traditional rite,” Herndon said.

Bishop Silva said he was an altar boy for the Latin Mass many times when he was growing up. But the June 29 Mass will be the first time he will celebrate it as a priest or bishop.

According to the website of Una Voce America, an organization that promotes the use of the Tridentine Mass, more than 20 American bishops have presided over or celebrated the 1962 Latin Mass.

Hawaii Tridentine Mass this week brought to the islands Father Jean Marie Moreau from Green Bay, Wis., to celebrate the Mass in Latin at St. Maria Lanakila in Lahaina and Holy Rosary Church in Keaau.

Father Moreau belongs to the Institute of Christ the King Sovereign Priest, a society which preserves and promotes Catholic rites in Latin.