Nobel Prize Winner: I Really Like the Mass And I Prefer the Latin Mass"

Jon Olav Fosse, a Norwegian author, translator and playwright, was awarded the controversial Nobel Prize for Literature in 2023. In June 2024, he explained to RivistaStudio.com why he became a Catholic.

"When I saw the cathedral [of Milan] just now, I felt a great distance. Compared to the religious context I know in Norway.

For years I was really fascinated by the Quakers: no priests, no sacraments, nothing. As simple as possible. Just a few chairs, sitting in a circle, concentrating on the inner light that God has given us.

It was my spiritual place, and it still is. They do not drink alcohol, they are pacifists.

And I have no respect for authority, I never took my hat off when I met a priest. (laughs).

But one meeting a month with the Quakers was not enough, I needed something more, and I ended up with Catholicism.

Mainly because I really like the Mass. And I prefer the Latin mass. And these liturgies, these repetitions...

And through repetition you really stop and think about what you're saying, but you also create a silence through repetition.

It is very strange for a Norwegian to be Catholic, because there are very few of us, maybe two thousand of us. Almost all are converts. Most are intellectuals".

Picture: Jon Olav Fosse © wikicommons CC BY-SA, #newsIdrajluvpk