The background to his appointment was an argument within the ranks of the Fraternity as to whether they should say the Mass of Paul VI if asked to by their bishop.
As the effects of the Cultural Revolution faded in the 1980s, the Mass of Paul VI began to be used, and at the beginning of the next decade the CPCA officially permitted the publication even locally of texts, originally prepared in Taiwan, that brought the Mass liturgy into line with that in use in other countries.
Hacker attended all four sessions of the Second Vatican Council from 1962 to 1965, and dedicated much of his tenure implementing the Council's reforms, especially the Novus Ordo Mass and greater participation of the laity.
He is best known for his blog Fr. Z's blog (previously named: What Does the Prayer Really Say?), in which he advocates for reverent celebration of both the Ordinary Form and the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite liturgy of the Mass and the revival of the Sacrament of Penance.
In his 1962 apostolic constitution Veterum sapientia on the teaching of Latin, Pope John XXIII spoke of that language as the one the Church uses: "...the Catholic Church has a dignity far surpassing that of every merely human society, for it was founded by Christ the Lord. It is altogether fitting, therefore, that the language it uses should be noble, majestic, and non-vernacular."
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The Council's Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy, Sacrosanctum Concilium, stated both that "since the use of the mother tongue ... frequently may be of great advantage to the people, the limits of its employment may be extended," and that "particular law remaining in force, the use of the Latin language is to be preserved in the Latin rites".
The study cast doubt on the orthodoxy of the Mass of Paul VI, which had been promulgated by the Apostolic Constitution Missale Romanum of 3 April 1969, though the definitive text, which took account of some of the criticisms of the Short Critical Study, had not yet appeared.
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The Sunday Mass at 11.30am (Missa normativa) is celebrated in English and Latin, and the music includes both Gregorian Chant and the Polyphony of the Renaissance.
Its Eucharistic liturgy can be divided into three historical stages: Pre-Tridentine, Tridentine, and the Post-Tridentine.
The Tridentine Mass, which supplanted the various versions of the Pre-Tridentine Mass and in turn, with the introduction of the Mass of Paul VI ceased to be the ordinary form of the Roman Rite but some versions of which continue to be used as extraordinary forms of the Roman Rite, with official approval in the case of the 1962 version.