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CMAA Celebrates 50 Years

May 16, 2014, 2:00 am
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Fifty years of Musica Sacra… the Church Music Association of America (CMAA) will celebrate its 50th Anniversary during Colloquium XXIV. This year’s Colloquium is to be held in Indianapolis, Indiana, June 30 – July 6, 2014. The week’s liturgies will be held at beautiful St. John the Evangelist Church in downtown Indy.

Although fifty years may seem like a long time, the CMAA was not a new society even in 1964. Two societies (St. Cecilia, founded in 1874 and St. Gregory, founded in 1913) joined forces in order to take advantage of the directions of the Second Vatican Council in the integration of the treasury of sacred music with substantive participation of the people in the sacred action. In short, “the great heritage of Gregorian chant and classical polyphony should enhance the participation of believers in the action of Christ in the Mass…” (Dr. William Mahrt).

CMAA President William Mahrt has shared a short history of the CMAA at the MusicaSacra site. Read the entire article.

 Make plans to join us as we celebrate Fifty Years this summer. For information about the Colloquium, registration, faculty, schedule and repertory, visit our Colloquium page.

Don’t delay. Avoid late fees by registering before June 4th.
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Sacred Music and the Virtue of Religion: An Upcoming Talk in Portland, Oregon.

May 16, 2014, 8:00 am
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As part of an ongoing Dominican Forum speakers series, the church of the Holy Rosary in Portland, Oregon, will host a talk this coming Tuesday, May 20th, at 7:30 p.m., entitled “Sacred Music and the Virtue of Religion”.


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The Feast of Saint John Nepomuk

May 16, 2014, 1:05 pm
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May 16th is the feast of St. John Nepomuk, a priest of the Archdiocese of Prague who was martyred in the year 1393. His family name is variously written Wölflein or Welfin, but he is generally called “Nepomuk” or “Nepomucene” after the town where he was born between 1340-1350, about 65 miles to the southwest of Prague. As vicar general of the archdiocese, St. John fell afoul of the king of Bohemia, Wenceslaus IV, on various accounts. One was the appointment of an abbot to a monastery which the king wished to suppress and turn into a bishopric, so that he could appoint a favorite to it. But a much more famous story, though far less well attested, is told that John was the confessor of the queen, Sophia of Bavaria, of whom Wenceslaus, although continually unfaithful himself, was intensely jealous. In the midst of his other conflicts with St. John and with the archbishop of Prague, Wenceslaus demanded that St. John reveal to him the contents of the queen’s sacramental confessions; when John refused, he was tortured, and then killed by being trussed up and thrown off the famous Charles Bridge into the Vltava River. On the night of his death, seven stars were said to be seen hovering over the place where his body lay under the water, until it later washed up on the shore. He was buried in the Cathedral of St Vitus, and is today honored as the Patron Saint of Bohemia. Although his feast was never added to the general Calendar of the Roman Rite, it was kept in a great many places; statues of him may be seen on bridges all over Europe, especially within the lands of the former German and Austrian Empires. The first canonized bishop of a see in the United States, St John Neumann of Philadelphia, was named for him, his middle name being “Nepomucký” in Czech.
The spot on the Charles Bridge from which St. John was thrown; the image of the Saint is worn away from continual touching and kissing. 
The Charles Bridge is named for King Charles IV of Bohemia, who began its construction in 1357. It is justifiably one of the most famous sites in one of the most beautiful cities in Europe, not the least because of the 30 Baroque statues or statue groups on the parapets. Here is the statue of St. John with a halo of seven stars.
The inscription reads “To Saint John Nepomuk, cast off this bridge in the year 1383, Matthias Dewinschwitz raised (this statue) in the year 1683.” It must be granted that many of the details of Saint John’s life and death are debated by scholars, and at the time this statue was erected, the year of his death was noted incorrectly by a margin of 10 years.
The tomb of St John, inside the Cathedral of St Vitus, on the right side of the ambulatory of the main apse.
 


A monument to St. John on the outside of the cathedral.
A detail on the front, showing St. John being cast from the bridge.
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A Surge of the Heart

May 17, 2014, 4:40 am
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Saint Thérèse of Lisieux described prayer as 'A surge of the heart'. This wonderful expression is the title of a new DVD about prayer from St Anthony Communications. The beautifully produced film features Bishop Mark Davies of Shrewsbury, Fr Marcus Holden, Fr Andrew Pinsent, Sr Mary Trinity, Joanna Bogle, Fr Stephen Brown and Sr Hyacinthe Defos Du Rau. It looks at the true meaning of prayer, the different types of prayer, how to find inspiration in the lives of the saints and the centrality of the Holy Mass.

The DVD is in a multi region PAL format and can be purchased here. Saint Anthony Communications also produced 'Faith of our Fathers' which we featured here. The trailer for 'Prayer: A Surge of the Heart' is below:

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There But for the Grace of God

May 18, 2014, 9:00 pm
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As we witness more and more of a resurgence in today’s Church of the goofy and often heretical lingo and practices of the 1960s and 1970s—a season of confusion, chasing after the world, and aberration that so many of us had hoped and prayed was gone or at least going away fast—it can be a challenge to find the right way to think about and deal with the situation. We obviously want to practice charity in all and towards all, without yielding an inch on orthodoxy and orthopraxy. We want to win over to Tradition the disillusioned, the undecided, and the good-willed, while finding legitimate ways to obstruct or undermine the efforts of those who would pull us back into the quagmire of the immediate post-conciliar period.

It is always a healthy spiritual practice to attempt to figure out why someone might end up where they have: what is it they are seeing or wishing to protect, where is the issue that they are getting stuck on? And couldn’t I have ended up in the same place, if only Divine Providence had willed or allowed a few variables of life to have been different? Any of us could have been caught up in the false rapture and seductive ideologies of the Sixties and Seventies. I recall reading once that, when an acquaintance of his was carrying on indignantly about a criminal whose execution was reported in the newspaper, Goethe remarked: “Friend, you do not know yourself if you cannot see that criminal on the scaffold as you.”

Those who today adhere lovingly and gratefully to Catholic Tradition are fortunate to have been born not during the earthquake but in the aftermath, in a time when much of the dust had settled and it has become possible to rebuild intelligently. Those who are young today (interpreting “young” in the very broad sense of having been born after the Second Vatican Council) have the immense advantage of seeing, without any distorting goggles on, the total disaster and wreckage that has resulted from the “Spirit of Vatican II” and of asking the very precise and painful questions about the Missal of Paul VI that need to be asked but were, for so long, treated as if forbidden.

There is divine providence in the fall of every sparrow. It was easier in days of yore to take for granted the traditional form of the Holy Mass, since it was the only Eucharistic liturgy most Catholics had—and it was surely a temptation to celebrate it with unbecoming haste or inadequate music and ceremonial. Today, wherever the old Mass has been rediscovered, there is a fresh joy about the beauty of its prayers and ceremonies, and a youthful zeal for celebrating it worthily, down to the last bow and bell. Proportionate to the number of Masses being celebrated, it seems that Sung Masses and Solemn Masses are more frequent, in contrast with a time when the Low Mass, often featuring a “four-hymn sandwich,” predominated.

Many who were caught up in the euphoria (“let’s change everything!”) were believers with a genuine desire to spread the Gospel to modern people. Instead of relying on “the tried and true,” as the Saints have taught us to do, such Catholics confusedly experimented with novelties and innovations in a desperate attempt to reach their confused secular neighbors. They chose the wrong means to a good end. It’s like people today who want to use rock music in church because they think the youth will respond better to it. In reality, we know that the church can never compete with the world on the world’s own terms; it’s actually rather embarrassing to behold, and as a long-term strategy, it is doomed to failure. We need to be very patient with such people, and at the same time work very hard to defeat their misguided efforts and put something better in place—as the Church, our Mother, has asked us to do in so many magisterial documents.

Modernity is a terribly confused time, and the Church, in her human members, will not escape at least some of that confusion. It is one of the crosses we are asked to bear in our lives: the cross of a confused world that is careening out of control. We don’t know when the end of time will come, but we do know that it will be like purgatory on earth. As our Lord prophesies, it will be a time of momentous upheavals, massive apostasy, vast deception, horrible crime: “Will the Son of Man find faith left on earth?” The barque of the Church will be tossed on the waves of this storm, and some of the raging sea will come overboard, not to mention plenty of shot and cannonballs. To play our part well, we need to be full of faith, equipped and ready for anything, gritty, determined, ever obedient to high command and not overwhelmed by the casualties or the confusion. And to do that, we need, more than ever, a serious interior life.

St. Alphonsus Liguori once said: “Short of a miracle, a man who does not practice mental prayer will end up in mortal sin.” Even fifteen minutes of quiet prayer each day, abiding in the presence of our Lord, will make the difference between sanity and insanity. According to the saints, daily mental prayer, jealously guarded, makes the difference between a frantic activism that terminates in despair and a peaceful reliance on God’s grace that renders our activities fruitful, even when humanly unsuccessful. The deeper our interior life, the more we can handle adversity of any kind. The shallower it is, the harder life seems for us—indeed, the harder it really becomes. It is a truth taught quite clearly by our Lord: “Seek ye first the kingdom of God and his justice, and all these other things shall be given unto you.” “Come to me, all you who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest.”

The ultimate book on this subject, a classic that I cannot recommend highly enough, is Fr. Jean-Baptiste Chautard’s The Soul of the Apostolate. I hope someday to post more about Chautard, but for now, I will simply say that few books could be more timely, even life-saving, for our contemporary world of activists without roots.
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Creating the New Culture of Beauty - a little parish in Jasper, Georgia shows us the way

May 19, 2014, 10:00 pm
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Following on from the interview with Cardinal Burke, Here is an example of how it might be done. The artistic and musical creativity of a parish shows us why liturgical and, hence, cultural renewal is likely to be a grass-roots, bottom-up process.
Who is going to patronize, ie pay for, the new works that will the Catholic culture? Will it be committees created by the Vatican? Unlikely, given the evidence of the past 50 years or so. Will it be those who fund the grand cathedrals in our large cities? Possibly, but again the evidence of the recent past is not too encouraging there (although not altogether hopeless). How about the ordinary parish church? I think probably the latter. The sheer statistics point to it. There is no reason to believe that a parish priest or parish community is going to be any less (or more) aware of Catholic cultural traditions than those of cathedrals. But given that there are more parishes than cathedrals, says it is more likely that the first green shoots of cultural recovery are going to happen at the local level. 
The obvious objection to this is money - where will parishes get the money to patronise the liturgical arts? Don't you need the sort of money that those who build cathedrals have to pay the artists well? I would say no. First, I do believe that artists ought to be paid at least the hourly rate we would pay any other artisan for his work (think of how much a plumber charges) which would ensure a decent price for a picture. But I say also that if the will is there it can pay for art. If a church can afford to keep the plumbing and its roof in good order; it can afford to pay reasonable prices for art and music. 
I have two heartening stories about ordinary parish churches having the interest to do great work. The first is the subject of this week's story and is in Jasper, Georgia. The second is a little church in Wyoming that has decided to install a full cosmati pavement in its floor, to replace the carpeting that was there previously. I will give more detail about the second on another occasion. But today Our Lady of the Mountains, Jasper, Georgia, set, as the name suggest up in the hills, the blueridge North Georgia mountains.
I have just been contacted by Fr Charles Byrd the paster who informed me that the church had commissioned and original piece of music for their Good Friday liturgy. I'll let him tell you some detail:

“On Good Friday, 18 April 2014, at the close of Communion, the St. Gregory Choir of Our Lady of the Mountains Catholic Church in Jasper, Georgia, with soloist, Mr. Joseph McBrayer, and organist, Mr. Joseph D’Amico, under the direction of Mrs. Bridget Scott, performed for the first time ever The Song of Rood. Our relic of the True Cross, which the congregation had just venerated, was enthroned upon the altar. This recording documents that first performance. The parish had commissioned this music from Mr. Dallas Gambrell with the text loosely based upon a portion of Saint Caedmon’s epic poem, The Dream of the Rood, one of the oldest, if not the oldest, Christian texts written in English. St. Caedmon was a 7th / 8th century herdsman, lay brother, and poet, and is considered the Father of English Sacred Song. The section we used for the anthem is that part of his longer poem that had been carved in runes on the Ruthwell Cross (or rood), a standing preaching cross, in what is today southwest Scotland.”

It was sung after the Reproaches and Communion and Fr Charles tells me, may be used for the Exaltation of the Cross. You can read more about this and hear the recording of the piece (which I like very much) on their website here.

This is the same parish that contacted me and was looking to commission four icons (they commissioned two from me in the end and I referred them to another iconographer for the other two). What was noticeable to me in undertaking these is how knowledgeable and helpful he was as a patron. He had a firm idea of what he wanted, had done all the background reading on the appearances of the two saints - Ambrose and Gregory - and was clear in his mind why he wanted new images. He was open to suggestions from me as to how we might conform to his idea. As this discussion was taking place I was reminded of John Paul II's call, in his Letter to Artists, of a 'renewed dialogue' between artists and the Church. How did JPII imagine this dialogue would play out, one wonders. I can't answer that, but my own part, I don't think this is something that is going to happen at an institutional level or at grand conferences in Rome. Rather, it will right at the grassroots, where priest and congregation talk to artist and between them they produce something that will be used regularly by those who are commissioning. The great thing about the modern age is that technology, such as the internet (with media such as this blog!), ensure that remoteness does not mean isolation. Georgia and Wyoming can speak to world as easily as Rome or Washington.

Here we have someone with a great sense of the culture and the liturgy and this is what makes it. As a general rule, for a parish to be able to achieve this is needs a consensus on what is good, artistically and musically; or at least a well placed trust on the part of those who do not know, in those who do. That is the difficult part. If priest and congregation are at odds with each other it will reduce the chances of anything being done. Choosing art or music by committee which has to reconcile widely differing views by compromise, often leads to the worst of all both worlds, not the best.

Coming back to this commission: here is the description of their adaptation of the text for modern congregations: 'Our text, a modern adaptation, takes some liberties with Caedmon’s text. We augmented the text with some verses from the Vercelli Book to give this abridged poem more clarity. The original Anglo-Saxon text would be hard for us to understand today, but one phrase in that original tongue remains in our anthem — “Krist waes on rodi,” which means “Christ was on the cross.” There are two voices in the poem, the voice of the dreamer who narrates his vision, and the voice of the Holy Rood, who recalls the heroic struggle of the Crucifixion of the Lord. We can almost think of this song as a dramatic play. The chorus speaks for Caedmon and a soloist speaks the soliloquy of the Rood.

Chorus:
Hear now a vision long foretold of greatest hero from of old.
Naked He embraced the rood;
He was stripped upon the wood.
So the blessed Cross did say of Him who died for us that day.
Krist waes on rodi, Krist waes on rodi, Krist waes on rodi. Gloria.
Krist waes on rodi, Krist waes on rodi, Krist waes on rodi. Gloria.'

I give you images of the paintings commissioned from me which were delivered last Christmas as well as the recording of the music commissioned. I can't comment on the pictures (being mine) and I think the music is has the qualities of goodness of form, holiness and universality that are needed in liturgical music. Regardless, here is the point: even if you don't like what Our Lady of the Mountains has done, we can see from this example that this really can be a bottom up cultural transformation. It starts with inculturation in families and parishes who demand beautiful forms in unity with the liturgy, and beautiful worship. I don't know what the liturgy at Our Lady of the Mountains is like, but I'm guessing from the images and the music I have heard, that it is not dominated by guitars and tambourines.



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Pontifical High Mass of St Philip celebrated by Bishop Robert Byrne at the London Oratory

May 21, 2014, 6:31 am
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Bishop Robert Byrne celebrated Pontifical High Mass for St Philip's Day at the London Oratory earlier today. The Mass was celebrated in anticipation for the boys of St Philip's School who will be on holiday next week. The Deacon was Fr Dominic Jacob, the School Chaplain, the Sub-deacon was Fr Rupert McHardy, a former pupil of the school, and the Assistant Priest was Fr Julian Large, Provost of the London Oratory. The St Philip's Schola sang plainchant, Palestrina, Elgar, Perosi and a setting of Regina Caeli by Fr Dominic Jacob for full choir, organ, trumpets and timpani. The organ was played by Peter Stevens, Assistant Master of Music at Westminster Cathedral. After Mass, Bishop Byrne blessed the school with the relic of St Philip and gave every boy a prayer card of St Philip. St Philip's School, which readers may remember from this post, celebrates its 80th anniversary this year.

The Solemnity of St Philip is on Monday 26 May and there will be a High Mass (with choir and orchestra) at the London Oratory at 6.30pm. The preacher will be Bishop Athanasius Schneider. There will also be a talk tomorrow at 8pm given by Bishop Schneider at St Wilfrid's Hall entitled 'Living under Communism'.















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Ordinations at St John Cantius, Chicago

May 21, 2014, 10:11 am
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On Tuesday, May 27th, beginning at 7:30 pm, the Archbishop of Chicago, Francis Cardinal George, OMI, will celebrate the Mass of Priestly Ordination at St John Cantius Church, 825 N. Carpenter Street in Chicago. Three members of the Canons Regular of Saint John Cantius will be ordained to the Priesthood: the Reverend Brothers Joshua Caswell, Nathan Caswell, and Kevin Mann. All are welcome to attend the ordination Mass and a light reception in the parish hall.

Messe, Op. 36, Charles-Marie Widor
Ecce Sacerdos, Edward Elgar
Ave Verum, Colin Mawby
Magnificat in G, Charles Villiers Stanford
I Was Glad, C. H. Parry
Ye Watchers and Ye Holy Ones, arr. Rev. Scott Haynes

Resurrection Choir
Rev. Scott A. Haynes, SJC, Director
Phillip Kloeckner, Organist, University of Chicago
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From Simple English Propers to the Lumen Christi Series

May 21, 2014, 11:14 am
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Today we have a guest post by the composer and editor of Simple English Propers, Adam Bartlett, who would like to share with us how his work with SEP led him to develop the Lumen Christi Series.

Many of you will remember when Jeffrey Tucker was posting videos with recordings of Simple English Propers here on a weekly basis a few years ago. Much has happened since then, and I have been asked by many to tell the story of how SEP came into being, and to describe how it led me to further develop the Lumen Christi Series, from Illuminare Publications.

As the composer and editor of Simple English Propers, I would like to share a bit of what surrounded the creation of what appears now to have been something of a seminal project, and, also, how it led me to develop its immediate successor—my most recent effort—the Lumen Christi Simple Gradual, which is now shipping (you can order it here).

How Simple English Propers Came About

Simple English Propers grew out of a project that developed at Chant Cafe. The Cafe began in the summer of 2010, amidst the excitement that surrounded the new translation of the Roman Missal. Jeffrey and I began to put our heads together a few months after the blog began, when he made the startling realization that no single book existed that simply contained the processional proper antiphons of the Mass, in English, that was readily accessible and available to parishes today. He was determined to fix this problem right away.

He decided that a book needed to be produced—a single, inexpensive volume—that contained nothing more than a collection of simple chant settings of the Entrance, Offertory and Communion antiphons from the Graduale Romanum for Sundays and Feasts, in English, with Psalm verses, that could be sung in any parish by cantors and choirs without much chant training.

SEP Text Translations
The first issue that we discussed was the issue of text translation. I recommended that we try to make use of the new translation of the Roman Missal as much as possible, and also the Revised Grail Psalms for the verses—both sources had just recently been approved as official sung texts by the Church. Being that the Roman Missal and Graduale Romanum are at times quite different (e.g. the Missal contains no Offertories, and many of the Entrance and Communion antiphons between the two books do not correspond), it was clear that at least some unofficial translations would be needed. 

After much discussion, two factors led the CMAA to decide to use the text translation of the Solesmes Gregorian Missal for the entire book, instead of the antiphons of the Roman Missal, wherever this was possible:

Firstly, because Graduale Romanum technically has no “official” English translation, so any good translation of the antiphons can justifiably be used under the GIRM when the texts are sung in English.

And secondly, it was important for the entire book to be released under the Creative Commons so that it could be posted online for free download and be used by anyone according to their wishes, in addition to being sold in print editions. At the time, the copyright on the Missal texts appeared to restrict this.

And so it was decided that unofficial translations would be used for the antiphons, and the project moved on.

SEP Musical Settings

Once this was settled, Jeffrey began considering a possible solution for the needed simple chant settings, with the English antiphon texts set to music using the Gregorian Psalm tones. Jeffrey and I and a few others considered this model briefly, but almost immediately ruled it out as a viable option, primarily because of the conflict between the Latinate melodic structure of the Gregorian tones and the characteristic accent patterns of the English language. We decided that a better and more satisfying solution was needed.

After some more discussion, I presented an alternative approach to Jeffrey, which we both soon began to realize might be the most viable solution to the problem at hand. 

Developing SEP's Melodic Models

I had recently read the proceedings of the 11th International Colloquium of CIEL (edited by Uwe Michael Lang and published by Hillenbrand Books in 2010) and began considering and experimenting with one of the proposals made there by Laszlo Dobszay (requiescat in pace). His proposal was that a small set of simple melodic formulas be used to set vernacular translations of the Proper of the Mass. In principle, this would allow for the many different texts of the Mass Proper to be sung to a handful of easily learned “tunes”, and make the sung proper accessible to parishes that have never sung it before. 

His specific idea was to use the dozen or so formulaic Gregorian chant melodies that are found in the antiphons of the Divine Office, so as to form a substantial connection with the authentic chant tradition. Having been under the mentorship of Fr. Columba Kelly, OSB, for a few years, I was unsure of the extent that melodies that were written for Latin texts could effectively be used with the English language, but found the idea compelling and so I began to dig into it more deeply.

Before going any further in my compositional modeling and experimentation, however, I contacted Prof. Dobszay directly to discuss some points in his paper further. He responded right away, with great enthusiasm, and shared with me very generously some of his settings contained in his then-developing project, the Graduale Parvum, in addition to some of his other concerns and possible solutions surrounding the issues at play.

I was very eager to study his settings, and saw the potential benefit of his approach. At the same time, many of my previous fears were confirmed. While most of his formulaic settings of Latin texts appeared to be done in a very beautiful and congruent way, a great deal of the settings of English texts were laden with incongruencies between the text and its melodic setting to such a degree that I began to wonder if the proposal could even yield reasonably satisfactory results.

I shared the settings with Dom Kelly, and he further articulated the concerns that I raised, repeating his long-held conviction that the melody of a chant must always be in service of the text, and, in some way, naturally grow out of it. He stressed that the melodic formulas of the Gregorian tradition were developed with the characteristics of the Latin language in mind, and he asserted firmly that if there is to be a satisfactory use of them with English texts, the melodic formulas themselves would have to be substantially adjusted, or even re-written.

Fr. Kelly encouraged me to explore this further, and he reviewed and oversaw the compositional models that I began to develop—at first, altering the pre-existing Gregorian formulas, and, eventually, composing new melodic formulas that anticipated the particular challenges that the English language presents. It’s beyond the scope of this essay to get into the details of this effort any further, but suffice it to say that the result was the development of 24 melodic models for use with English language texts, which would become the basis for the book Simple English Propers.

SEP is Born

As I began to apply the melodic formulas to the English antiphon texts, I also began sharing them with Jeffrey and others in the CMAA, and the response was overwhelmingly positive. Those who remember Jeffrey’s contagious enthusiasm and optimism, especially surrounding this project, realize that this is more than just a bit understated!

Effectively, all who were involved in this project almost immediately saw that the model that I had proposed was the right one, and so I proceeded to draft settings of the entire body of antiphons, Sunday by Sunday, with the weekly results being posted on Chant Cafe for review, feedback, and trial use. 

I called the weekly postings “Simple English Propers for Name of Liturgy Here”. What was first a functional name soon became an identifying brand, and before long, “SEP” began to take flight, with parishes reporting on a weekly basis how these new settings were allowing them to introduce propers at their parish for the first time.

SEP Finances

Realizing the amount of work that laid ahead, Jeffrey decided to run a crowd-sourced funding campaign to raise $5000 to help see the project through. We were able, in a matter of weeks, to raise this money, and the proceeds helped see through the successful completion of the work. I was very grateful for the generosity of those who contributed to the fundraising effort, which helped me finish the project after 9 months of diligent work.

When the book was finally published, it was sold at cost, as the CMAA had promised it would be during the fund-raising effort. In other words, the CMAA intentionally chose not to profit from sales of the book—and still hasn’t to this day—and the digital files were posted on the CMAA website for free download. This certainly was a sign of the sacrifice and goodwill of all who were involved in the project from the outset. 

SEP Practice Videos

Shortly after this, Jeffrey Ostrowski of Corpus Christi Watershed began making recordings and YouTube videos of the antiphons of SEP on his own, at the request of Jeffrey Tucker. These videos were posted weekly at Chant Cafe, and, eventually, at the New Liturgical Movement. I am very grateful for this act of generosity on the part of Jeff Ostrowski, as I know that these videos were the gateway and introduction to the propers for many.

Resolving Certain Confusions

As grateful as I was, it came as a bit of a surprise to me when I began to see advertisements for Corpus Christi Watershed's Vatican II Hymnal in the videos. There has been some confusion over the years about this, with people assuming Simple English Propers was a project of Watershed's in particular. There have even been instances where high-profile individuals have directed people the CCW website for information about the Simple English Propers, assuming that it would in some way financially benefit its author.

Just to clear up any possible confusion: Simple English Propers is not a project of Corpus Christi Watershed. It was an open, intentionally non-profit project that I undertook with the Church Music Association of America. Neither the CMAA, nor Illuminare Publications, nor I myself are connected to CCW in any way or receive any financial benefit from CCW’s advertisements, or from the sale of their materials and resources.

I wish Jeff Ostrowski and Corpus Christi Watershed the best of luck and God’s blessings in their continuing efforts to promote the sung liturgy and the traditions of the Church. However, after discussing the matter privately with Jeff, I feel I must clearly and publicly state:

The views expressed by Corpus Christi Watershed are solely their own, and do not reflect the views of the composer and editor of Simple English Propers. 

Regardless of how SEP has been used, whether for good or for ill, it was intended as and remains a free gift to the Church, and I remain grateful for the ways that the Lord has used it to help parishes begin singing the Proper of the Mass.

From SEP to the Lumen Christi Series

Simple English Propers, however, is not the end of this story—it is actually only the beginning. This one resource was imagined and developed as a means to fill a specific gap, and it appears to have done its job well.

Even before the book was completed and published, I began to imagine an organized effort that could take on the task of developing a complete program of sacred music resources for parishes—one that could make the riches of the Church’s chant tradition as accessible as any popular resources today. I had discussed and proposed this idea to Jeffrey Tucker, but it was clear that such a project was well beyond the scope of the CMAA, which is a volunteer organization without a single employee.


And so, I took a leap of faith and gathered the funding and support that would be needed to undertake and sustain this long-range effort and established Illuminare Publications, where I have served as President and Editor since 2011. I began to develop the Lumen Christi Series, which will soon be fully available to parishes, containing a comprehensive Missal for the pew, a Simple Gradual in both Choir and Assembly Editions, a Hymnal for Mass and the Liturgy of the Hours, a complete Gradual in English, Accompaniment Editions, and so much more that lies on the horizon. 

The Lumen Christi Missal continues to make its way into the liturgical life of parishes and cathedrals across the country, and the Lumen Christi Simple Gradual—the first true successor of Simple English Propers—is opening many of the doors that SEP had left closed, helping parishes sing the Mass in a way that will naturally develop and endure over time.

The Lumen Christi Hymnal is due out in the Fall of 2014, in addition to accompaniment editions for the Lumen Christi Simple Gradual, and for Responsorial Psalms and Alleluias for Sundays and Feasts. The Lumen Christi Gradual also continues to develop, and draft scores can already be downloaded weekly at the Illuminare Score Library.

The Lumen Christi Simple Gradual

Before concluding, I would like to share some of the ways that the Lumen Christi Simple Gradual builds upon the experience gained from SEP, and how it opens up new possibilities for sung liturgy in ordinary parish life:

Translations

As I have noted before, SEP created great confusion for the faithful by choosing not to use the English translations of the antiphons as they are found in the Roman Missal, Third Edition, wherever this was possible. In order to lay the groundwork for the Lumen Christi Series, Illuminare Publications undertook an extensive project to translate the antiphons of the Graduale Romanum (e.g. the Offertory Antiphons), with professional translators, according to the principles and methods that were used to translate the antiphons of the Roman Missal itself. We worked in close consultation with those who actually made the translations in the Roman Missal, and took great pains to assure that the requirements of Liturgiam Authenticam were heeded. What resulted was a seamless translation between the new edition of the Roman Missal, and the Graduale Romanum, which is the Church’s primary source or the sung liturgy. These translations bear the episcopal imprimatur of Bp. Thomas J. Olmsted, and form the basis of the antiphon settings found in the Lumen Christi Simple Gradual, Lumen Christi Missal, and forthcoming Lumen Christi Gradual.

Lasting Musical Settings

At the outset of this essay, I described the process of experimentation that was undertaken with the musical settings found in Simple English Propers. The chant settings that resulted from this effort varied in quality. After living with these settings for a few years now, I feel that about a third of the antiphons have a high musical integrity, a third are satisfactory but less than inspiring, and another third clearly sound as though a square peg was being forced into a round hole. While these musical settings have certainly helped parishes sing the proper texts, week after week, it is becoming clear that the chant settings are not wearing well over time. In order to remedy this, the antiphon settings in the Lumen Christi Simple Gradual (and full Gradual) are composed with a musical quality that fully respects the integrity and character of the text, all while remaining just as accessible, if not more so, than SEP.

Completeness

The Lumen Christi Simple Gradual contains, in addition to a full repertoire of Entrance, Offertory and Communion Antiphons, the fully sung Order of Mass, and 18 chant Mass Settings, in English and Latin. The four English settings (from ICEL, Bartlett, and Kelly) contain great variety amidst their simplicity, while the five Ordinaries of the Kyriale Simplex and nine of the most commonly sung Ordinaries of the Kyriale Romanum form a series of progressive steps into the Church’s inestimable treasure. Also, the Simple Gradual includes simple chants for the Commons, various Votive Masses, Ritual Masses and the Mass for the Dead. It truly is a complete starting point for sung liturgy.

Flexibility

Simple English Propers was intentionally designed as a resource for parish choirs and cantors to sing the proper antiphons week after week. In a sense, a parish has to fully jump into the ocean of the propers and must either swim or sink. Some have been able to swim, while others have gone through the discouragement of being unable to sustain this weekly demand. The Lumen Christi Simple Gradual, on the other hand, is laid out with this reality in mind. It makes use of the permissions and guidelines in the GIRM, Musicam Sacram, and in the Introduction of the Graduale Romanum (Ordo Cantus Missae) for parishes to begin introducing new musical settings seasonally, if needed, so that they can slowly being developing a repertoire of sung antiphons that can be repeated enough to be properly learned. The antiphon settings in the Simple Gradual are indeed simple, but they are through-composed, not formulaic, so that each setting is uniquely beautiful and will continue to inspire the faithful for years, even for decades and generations.

Assembly Edition

Some well-meaning parishes assumed that Simple English Propers would be simple enough for the faithful in the pews to sing, and proceeded to purchase bulk quantities for their parish. Others understood that this would not be a viable solution for congregational singing, and have allowed the choir or a cantor to chant the propers before or after a congregational hymn. In either case, the desire of Musicam Sacram 33, “that the assembly of the faithful should participate in the songs of the Proper as much as possible, especially through simple responses and other suitable settings”, is not being satisfactorily met. This is why the Lumen Christi Simple Gradual is available not only in a Choir Edition, but also is available in a Assembly Edition, which is only a half of an inch thick. All of the antiphons are numbered, in keeping with the common convention of popular hymnals and song books, and only the antiphons are provided for the faithful, while the Choir Edition provides Psalm verses for the cantor or choir. In this way, the faithful have in their hands a complete repertoire of liturgical chant for the Order of Mass, Ordinary of the Mass, and Proper of the Mass, which can be sung in a variety of ways, even in combination with choral settings of the proper by the choir or schola cantorum, where this is possible. The Assembly Edition offers great flexibility and value, in a highly economical edition, that can help the assembly of the faithful sing the Mass.

Worthy Binding

One look at the cover of Simple English Propers can tell any casual observer that the edition is designed more as a textbook than as a book that is intended to be used and seen in a liturgical context. If it is used in a choir loft, it is out of sight, but, if it used anywhere else, the words “Composed and Edited by Adam Bartlett” on the cover seem highly out of place for use in a ritual context. The Lumen Christi Simple Gradual (in addition to the Lumen Christi Missal, and all parts of the Lumen Christi Series) is hardbound, with a gold-embossed cover, with a silk ribbon and high-quality paper. The binding is “round back”, so that the book opens easily and can lay flat in the palm of the hand, or even flat on a table, without having to break the binding first. The Assembly Edition is unbelievably thin and light, making it easy for anyone to comfortably hold. The books in the Lumen Christi Series take the beauty of the liturgy and the sacredness of the words of the Mass very seriously, and the high-quality production values directly reflect this.

Conclusion

I remain grateful for the Simple English Propers project, and am extremely honored to have been able to play a part of this movement in the life of the Church. I am happy that the modest work is able to be shared freely and used by anyone, even if it has created confusion in some cases. I am even more excited about what lies ahead, though, and there is much more that could be mentioned here, but that will be announced soon.

As it happens in life, so too it does in the Church: A tree must grow from a planted seed, and it will grow steadily and naturally, with the help of proper cultivation and care, even pruning when necessary. Also, the tree can only be judged by its fruit, and its yield is unknown until a certain point of maturity.

I am grateful to the CMAA for helping plant many of the seeds of liturgical renewal in our day, one of which was Simple English Propers, and also to the many who have helped cultivate and bring about buds of life in the sung liturgy around the globe. The mission of the Lumen Christi Series from Illuminare Publications is to assist the renewal of the Church’s liturgy in the stages of growth that lie ahead in the coming years and decades, as these fruits continue to become readily visible and ripe for harvest. I would like to ask for your help in supporting this work, and especially ask you for your prayers. May the Lord bring to completion in our day the good work that he has begun.
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Latin Holidays with the Familia S. Hieronymi

May 21, 2014, 2:01 pm
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The cultivation of the Latin language in the Church is a cause dear to the hearts of not a few NLM readers. The bond of Latin links us to the universal Church and her worship, and also to the thought of our forebears in the faith across the centuries. The recent canonization of Pope St. John XXIII also is giving us the opportunity to recall his under-appreciated encyclical Veterum Sapientia on the need to spread knowledge of Latin.
A part of that work is the cultivation of Latin as a living language and indeed a spoken language, and no discussion of spoken Latin is complete without a mention of that great organization promoting spoken Latin in our country, the Familia Sancti Hieronymi, founded by the late Carmelite friar Suidbertus Siedl, O.C.D. The Family of St. Jerome meets for an annual week, a Caenaculum, a full-immersion experience with spoken Latin. It is open to all sorts of learners, even those turning their school Latin into spoken words for the first time.
The event is usually held along the southern Gulf coast, and this year it will take place at the Visitation Monastery in Mobile, Alabama in the first days of August; a fuller description is on-line as a PDF document.
To provide a personal account of the Caenaculum, I would like to welcome the distinguished canonist and holder of the Edmund Cardinal Szoka Chair in canon law at Detroit's Sacred Heart Major Seminary, Dr. Edward J. Peters:
My experiences of a Cenaculum with the Family of St. Jerome
Edward Peters, Ann Arbor, MI
I have attended three Cenacula (olim Feriae Latinae) over the years, two in the 1990s (both in Florida, once alone, and once with an 8-year-old son) and a third just last year in Puebla, Mexico (with a 16-year-old daughter). I’ll be attending this year’s gathering in Mobile, Alabama, with two of my young adult children and some of my Latin students from Detroit’s Sacred Heart Seminary. 
I arrived at my first Cenaculum with no Latin speaking ability but, backed by two years of Latin grammar classes (and competence in French), I was confident in my ability to chatter away if not in perfect Ciceronian, then at least ably modo Aquino.
I was wrong.
For the first three days of that first Cenaculum, I understood barely a word. Not that everyone else was fluent (only some participants had a solid grasp of conversational Latin) but, if one has never heard a Latin sentence that didn’t come straight from a grammar book or the liturgy, then the vocabulary, the cadences, even the sounds of spoken Latin, seem so exotic that one might as well be listening to ancient Sumerian. I called my wife on Tuesday and said “I feel like such an idiot. If I don’t understand something by tomorrow I’m taking a cab to the airport and flying home.”
Well, long story made short, the very next day, a few words, then some phrases, and eventually whole sentences (if not yet whole paragraphs) began coming together in my mind. My bookish grammar (which helps, though it is not crucial for a good experience) began to come to life in spoken Latin. 
The Cenaculum does not present grammar classes as such. There are no lectures on, say, the use of the supine with verbs of motion or, for that matter, drills on the second declension neuter. Instead Living Latin is experienced in three main ways. 
First, there are frequent liturgical and devotional practices led by competent Latin-speakers. The Liturgy of the Hours is prayed at the right times and daily Mass is celebrated (about half the time in the new rite, about half in the Tridentine), along with a Rosary around lunch time. No one takes attendance at these events, of course, but most folks come for most spiritual and linguistic exercises.
Second, during the day two or three, sometimes four, presentations on very interesting topics are offered in Latin again by good speakers. One lecture might address, say, the history of the Rosary, another will explain the parts of the Bible, a third will give a slide show tour of Roman ruins or discuss a modern political question, and so on. The best thing about these talks (besides there being no quiz at the end!) is that one gets interested in the topics themselves and forgets that one is learning Latin at the same time. 
Third, there is “down time” for conversation at meals and especially during afternoon breaks and into the evening. A lot of conversational Latin gets done in these informal gatherings (and yes, some folks take naps or go to bed early, which is also fine). One of the best things I’ve noticed about Cenacula is the international flavor they have: participants come largely from the USA, but I’ve met many folks from Europe and South America. Speaking skills range considerably (not counting that some kids, with their parents, come from time to time). Most participants are not Classics majors or college Latin teachers, but rather, they come from all walks of life including clergy, seminarians, lawyers, home-schooling parents, white collar workers and blue, and a fair number of college and graduate students. 
No matter what your level of Latin speaking skills, you will find others at your level at the Cenaculum, and you will find others above it. You will, in other words, find folks to talk to and folks to learn from. And you won’t help but be able to help teach others Latin just by your trying.

The chairman of Familia S. Hieronymi, attorney Jan Halisky, was interviewed about Latin in Catholic life on the "EWTN Live" program in 2012:

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Holy and Great Constantine, Equal to the Apostles

May 21, 2014, 10:26 pm
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Icon of Sts. Constantine and Helen with scenes from the life of Christ and Constantine

For Churches of the Byzantine tradition, May 21 is the feast of Saint Constantine and of his mother St. Helen.  The Greek Synaxarion, comparable to the Roman Martyrology, notes:
This great and renowned sovereign of the Christians was the son of Constantius Chlorus (the ruler of the westernmost parts of the Roman empire), and of the blessed Helen. He was born in 272, in (according to some authorities) Naissus of Dardania, a city on the Hellespont. In 306, when his father died, he was proclaimed successor to his throne. In 312, on learning that Maxentius and Maximinus had joined forces against him, he marched into Italy, where, while at the head of his troops, he saw in the sky after midday, beneath the sun, a radiant pillar in the form of a cross with the words: "By this shalt thou conquer." The following night, our Lord Jesus Christ appeared to him in a dream and declared to him the power of the Cross and its significance. When he arose in the morning, he immediately ordered that a labarum be made (which is a banner or standard of victory over the enemy) in the form of a cross, and he inscribed on it the Name of Jesus Christ. On the 28th Of October, he attacked and mightily conquered Maxentius...The following day, Constantine entered Rome in triumph and was proclaimed Emperor...Under him and because of him all the persecutions against the Church ceased. Christianity triumphed and idolatry was overthrown. In 325 he gathered the First Ecumenical Council in Nicaea, which he himself personally addressed...Falling ill near Nicomedia, he requested to receive divine Baptism and when he had been deemed worthy of the Holy Mysteries, he reposed in 337, on May 21 or 22, the day of Pentecost, having lived sixty-five years, of which he ruled for thirty-one years. His remains were transferred to Constantinople and were deposed in the Church of the Holy Apostles, which had been built by him.
While in the West, Constantine's holiness is regarded as a bit more ambiguous, in the East, he is commemorated with some minor solemnity, and is regarded, as the title of this post notes, as "equal to the Apostles."  By this is meant not his position within the ecclesial hierarchy, nor his dogmatic teaching authority, nor even his personal sanctity (even though Eusebius movingly notes that from the moment of his baptism, Constantine wore purple no more, but only the white robe of his baptismal garment).  Rather, the Church acclaims that his activity was comparable to the Apostles' in spreading the Gospel through all the world, and for this reason she sings on his feast as on the feast of the Apostles, "Their utterance has gone forth into all the earth, and their words unto the ends of the world."  It is one of those marks of Providence, that St. Constantine entered into eternal life on Pentecost, and was laid to rest in the Church of the Apostles. The Troparion for the day notes that Constantine, through his heavenly vision of the Cross, received, "like Paul the summons that was not from men."  The link to St. Paul is stressed even more by the reading from the Acts of the Apostles prescribed for today, where Paul bears testimony of his conversion to King Agrippa (Acts 26 1-5, 12-20); such a conversion story is to be taken as a type of Constantine's.  Constantine is further acclaimed in the troparion Christ's "apostle among kings" who entrusted the imperial city into the Sacred Hands.   

St. Constantine's Vision and Subsequent Victory at the Milvian Bridge.

For the purpose of this post, I want to focus not on the objections to Constantine's personal sanctity, but rather on the Liturgy's portrayal of his sacred office.  In particular, I want to draw attention to the Evangelion of the day.  Every major commemoration of a saint has two Gospel readings prescribed, one for Matins and one for the Divine Liturgy.  For the commemoration of saintly bishops, the standard Matins Gospel is Jn. 10:1-9, where Jesus describes the shepherd of the sheep as he who enters through the door, and then identifies himself as the door.  The Gospel for the Divine Liturgy is then Jn. 10:9-16, where Christ declares himself the the Good Shepherd and promises one flock and one shepherd.  

On the feast of St. Constantine, however, (and also on the feast of Prince Volodymyr of Kiev, also equal to the apostles), the order is reversed.  The Matins Gospel is Jn. 10:9-16, and the Gospel for the Divine Liturgy is Jn. 1-9.  For a bishop's commemoration, therefore, the last Gospel the faithful hear will declare at its ending: "I am the good shepherd...and I have other sheep not of this fold; I must bring them also...so there shall be one flock and one shepherd."  But for the feast of St. Constantine, the faithful are left with: "I am the door; if anyone enters by me he shall be saved, and will go in, and find pasture." While both bishop and emperor are presented to us as participating in Christ's role as Shepherd, the emphasis for the emperor is the image of the door.  He serves as the door through which the faithful come to the shepherd that secures their unity.  The emperor is a "royal door" through which the world is brought into the sheepfold.  

It is Constantine the emperor who has been chosen by God to bring about the conversion of the inhabitants of the Roman world.  He, the “joy and pride of the Romans,” was the one who, in the words of the Pentecost troparion, “drew those who spoke foreign languages into a single tongue in the faith.” God in his providence had ordained this work not for a bishop, patriarch, monk, or even original apostle.  The pax Romana had been intended by providence for the spread of the Gospel, and this fulfillment of Augustus' pax Romana was the work of Augustus' successor in the purple.  From Constantine on, the empire was steadily advancing to complete Christianization.  In this work, Constantine was like the vicar of Christ on earth.  As the apostles had continued to carry out the work of Christ, so too, it was believed did Constantine.  Eusebius of Caesarea drew out the details of the comparison, noting that while the Father could be understood to govern the cosmos through the Word, Christ governs man through the emperor:
[Christ is] that Light which, streaming from on high, proceeds from that Deity who knows not origin or end, and illumines the super-celestial regions, and all that heaven itself contains, with the radiance of wisdom bright beyond the splendor of the sun. This is he who holds a supreme dominion over this whole world, who is over and in all things, and pervades all things visible and invisible; the Word of God. From whom and by whom our divinely favored emperor, receiving, as it were a transcript of the Divine sovereignty, directs, in imitation of God himself, the administration of this world's affairs.
This praise certainly strikes the modern western ear as excessive, but the list of Constantine's public works is fairly astounding: he erected multiple and elaborate churches, including the monument to Christ's Sepulcher, he passed a variety of laws prohibiting gladiatorial combat, certain kinds of sacrifice to idols, and homosexual pagan rites, while at the same time legislating Sunday be a day of worship, no longer penalizing celibates, and offering gifts and bounties to the poor, virgins, and the Church.  Here at last was an emperor not intent on destroying the Church, but instead building it up.  The laws of the Church were being introduced throughout the civilized world; at last there was a truly universal mechanism for realizing the laws, morals and glory of the Church.
           In view of these actions, we can understand the second title attributed to Constantine.  He was a bishop.  As Eusebius recounts,

Hence it was not without reason that once, on the occasion of his entertaining a company of bishops, he [Constantine] let fall the expression, that he himself too was a bishop, addressing them in my hearing in the following words: You are bishops whose jurisdiction is within the Church: I also am a bishop, ordained by God to overlook whatever is external to the Church. And truly his measures corresponded with his words: for he watched over his subjects with an episcopal care, and exhorted them as far as in him lay to follow a godly life.

While the title of “equal to the apostles" was intended to express Constantine's role in the evangelization of the world, the title of bishop was meant to communicate his care for the baptized Christians already present in the empire.  His priesthood was found in his offering of his mind to God, placing his salvific imperial work under the inspiration and direction of the Deity. By promoting the peace and unity of the empire, protecting the Church from outside enemies, and by making laws in accord with Christian morality  the emperor was an external bishop.
Fresco traditionally  attributed to Manuel Panselinos in Protaton Church of Mt. Athos, 13th century

This idea of Constantine as an external bishop is what lays behind the reversal of the Gospel readings described above.  He is like a bishop; the same two Gospels are read on the feast of both he and many a holy bishop.  But the bishop's gaze is directed internally to the governance of the Church, while the emperor's gaze is directed to ordering the wider world, but in a way that sees the secular governance as a door that leads to the life of the Church. 

The reading from Acts prescribed for today, therefore, has a two-fold point.  Not only is St. Constantine like St. Paul as regards the origin of his apostolic mission, he is also a bit like King Agrippa who grants the Apostles in the person of St. Paul, permission to speak in the public court.  Thus he is both King and Apostle, and serves, as depicted in the Hagia Sophia to support the Church.  But even more importantly, he also, together with his saintly mother, takes the heavenly vision of the Cross, and like an Apostle, makes the Gospel of the Cross present throughout the world.  As the Church sings in her Kontakion:
Today Constantine and Helen his mother reveal the cross, the all precious wood which shames those who refuse to believe.
Holy and Great Constantine and Helen, equal to the Apostles, pray for us!

10th century Mosaic of Constantine, Hagia Sophia
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Fota VII Liturgical Conference in Cork, Ireland

May 22, 2014, 3:00 am
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St. Colman’s Society for Catholic Liturgy is pleased to announce that His Eminence Raymond Leo Cardinal Burke, Prefect of the Apostolic Signature, will officially open the Fota VII International Liturgy Conference to be held at the Clarion Hotel, Cork, Ireland on 5-7 July 2014. His Eminence will also deliver the key-note address at the conference. The title of this year’s conference is “Agens in Persona Christi: Aspects of the Ministerial Priesthood.” (Click here for the provisional list of speakers.)

Registration for the Fota VII International Liturgy Conference is now open. (Click here for registration form.) Those intending to participate in the Conference are asked to complete registration forms and return them by e-mail: colman.liturgy@yahoo.co.uk Text Ends. Further details may be obtained from the Secretary of St. Colman’s Society for Catholic Liturgy at the same address.
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Solemn First Mass in the Cathedral Basilica of SS. Peter and Paul, Philadelphia

May 23, 2014, 1:44 pm
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New Liturgical Movement is pleased to welcome Fr. Robert Pasley, KCHS, as a new contributor. Fr. Pasley is rector of Mater Ecclesiae Parish in Berlin, New Jersey, and serves as chaplain to the Church Music Association of America.

God has abundantly blessed Mater Ecclesiae Chapel in Berlin, NJ, Diocese of Camden over these last 14 years. We are pleased to announce that our native son, the Reverend Mister Joseph G. Heffernan, FSSP, will be ordained to the sacred priesthood on Saturday, May 31, 2014 at St Cecilia's Cathedral in Omaha, Nebraska.
Father Heffernan will return to the Delaware Valley and celebrate two Masses of Thanksgiving. His First Solemn Mass, of course in the Extraordinary Form, will take place at the Cathedral Basilica of Saints Peter and Paul, Philadelphia, PA, on Trinity Sunday, June 15, at 2:00 PM. He will then return to Mater Ecclesiae to celebrate his second Solemn Mass of Thanksgiving on the Feast of Corpus Christi, Thursday, June 19 at 7:30 PM, followed by the traditional Eucharistic Procession.
If you are anywhere near Philadelphia and you love the Traditional Latin Mass, please make every effort to attend the First Mass at the Cathedral Basilica. It is hoped that this Mass will be a great manifestation of congratulations to Father Heffernan, an expression of love and support for the sacred priesthood, and a manifestation of the enthusiasm, strength, and vibrancy of the Traditional Latin Mass movement. Of course, you are also invited to the Mass on Corpus Christi.
There is more good news to share about vocations at Mater Ecclesiae. Over the past several years two young ladies and one young man have entered the Carmelite Order. Marissa Consoli, now Sister Maravillas of the Eucharistic Heart of Jesus, is a member of the Carmel in Elysburg, PA, Kathleen Gilbert, now Sister Mary Magdalene of Jesus Crucified, is a member of the Carmel in Buffalo, NY, and a young man, Thomas Heffernan, now Brother Seraphim of the Assumption, and also the brother of Father Heffernan, is a professed choir monk at the Carmelite Monastery in Wyoming. Finally, even though he was a seminarian before joining Mater Ecclesiae, Father Michael Magiera, FSSP, who just celebrated his 9th anniversary as a priest, is counted as one of our native sons.
A prayer for vocations has been said publicly, every day, since the foundation of Mater Ecclesiae. It was composed by the great Msgr. Richard Schuler of Saint Agnes, in St. Paul, Minnesota. Please accept this adaptation of the prayer and consider saying it at your parish every day:


Priest:
Let us pray for vocations:
All:
O God we earnestly beseech Thee/
To bless the Church with many priests, brothers, and sisters,/
Who will love Thee with their whole strength,/
Be faithful to their vocation,/
And gladly spend their entire lives
To teach Thy truths,/ serve Thy Church,/
And to make Thee known and loved.

Priest:
Bless our families, bless our children.
All:
Choose from our homes those who are needed for Thy work.

Priest:
O Mary, Queen of the Clergy,
All:
Pray for us./ Pray for our priests, seminarians and religious./
Obtain for us many more. Amen.


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“A Renaissance Will Come”: Dr. de Saventhem's Prophetic Words in 1970

May 25, 2014, 9:00 pm
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Dr. Eric de Saventhem (1919-2005), first President of the International Federation Una Voce, spoke these prophetic words in a speech in New York City in 1970—words all the more remarkable in the face of the escalating victories of philistinism and modernism, the total devastation and hopelessness of the situation emerging at that time.
A renaissance will come: asceticism and adoration as the mainspring of direct total dedication to Christ will return. Confraternities of priests, vowed to celibacy and to an intense life of prayer and meditation will be formed. Religious will regroup themselves into houses of strict observance. A new form of Liturgical Movement will come into being, led by young priests and attracting mainly young people, in protest against the flat, prosaic, philistine or delirious liturgies which will soon overgrow and finally smother even the recently revised rites.
       It is vitally important that these new priests and religious, these new young people with ardent hearts, should find—if only in a corner of the rambling mansion of the Church—the treasure of a truly sacred liturgy still glowing softly in the night. And it is our task, since we have been given the grace to appreciate the value of this heritage, to preserve it from spoliation, from becoming buried out of sight, despised and therefore lost forever. It is our duty to keep it alive: by our own loving attachment, by our support for the priests who make it shine in our churches, by our apostolate at all levels of persuasion.
All this has been fulfilled before our eyes, and there is not the slightest sign that the "new form of Liturgical Movement" will back down just because of the new threats and intimidations and the premature swaggering of the anti-Ratzinger faction. Indeed, if history tells us any lesson, it is that unjust persecution makes the flame burn more intensely and then, as soon as opportunity arises, blaze out more vehemently.

And yet, so much more is waiting to be done; there is fire—the fire of the Catholic Faith in its totality and integrity, its tradition and beauty—to be kindled on the earth, in every place, every community, every church. In this connection we might do well to meditate on and draw courage from the noble words of the Book of Nehemiah:
Then I said to them, "You see the trouble we are in, how Jerusalem lies in ruins with its gates burned. Come, let us build the wall of Jerusalem, that we may no longer suffer disgrace." And I told them of the hand of my God which had been upon me for good, and also of the words which the king had spoken to me. And they said, "Let us rise up and build." So they strengthened their hands for the good work.
       But when Sanballat the Horonite and Tobiah the servant, the Ammonite, and Geshem the Arab heard of it, they derided us and despised us and said, "What is this thing that you are doing? Are you rebelling against the king?"
       Then I replied to them, "The God of heaven will make us prosper, and we his servants will arise and build; but you have no portion or right or memorial in Jerusalem." (Neh 2:17-20)
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The Feast of St Philip Neri at the London Oratory

May 26, 2014, 1:36 pm
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High Mass was celebrated at the London Oratory this evening for the Feast of St Philip Neri. The Preacher was Bishop Athanasius Schneider, Auxiliary Bishop of Astana, Kazakstan, Titular Bishop of Celerina. The Choir of the London Oratory sang the Mariazellermesse by Haydn and Pangamus Nerio by Wingham. Happy Feast to Oratorians everywhere!



























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For the Feast of St Philip Neri: The Oratory of Naples

May 26, 2014, 7:00 pm
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The Naples Oratory was founded in 1586 by three disciples of St. Philip Neri, Antonio Talpa, Giovanni Giovenale Ancina (later bishop of Saluzzo, beatified in 1889) and Francesco Maria Tarugi (later cardinal), only 11 years after the Congregation of the Oratory was officially approved by Pope Gregory XIII. It was the Congregation’s first house outside of Rome, and since the founders came from the church where St Philip lived, San Girolamo della Carità, the Neapolitans have always called them the “Girolamini”. (“Girolamo” is Italian for “Jerome.”) It was immediately a tremendous success, and for centuries one of the most important religious institutions in Naples; the complex of buildings (including a huge church, two cloisters, one of which is also very large, and several smaller oratories) occupies a full hectare of land right in the middle of the city, across the street from the Cathedral. In its heyday, it was patronized by most of the important families in the city, which was then the capital of a large independent kingdom; it became famous for its art collection and magnificent sacristy. Like many of the great cultural and religious institutions of the former Kingdom of Naples, the Oratory has suffered much from various acts of suppression and confiscation; the center of Naples was also bombed during World War II, and a part of the complex which was damaged, the Oratory of the Assumption, is still in need of restoration over 70 years later. Nevertheless, the Girolamini remains one of the great monuments of St Philip’s apostolic labors, and those of his sons throughout the world.
The façade of the church, seen from the via dei Tribunali, the ancient decumanus maximus of Naples in Roman times.
The central nave seen from the door.

The coffered ceiling (partly missing) with an image of St. Philip.

The high altar.

An angel holding a candlestick at the corner of the sanctuary, carved by the Neapolitan sculptor Giuseppe Sanmartino, better known for the famous image of the veiled Christ in the nearby Sansevero Chapel. (see linked article)

The right side-aisle. As in many Italian Counter-Reformation churches, the side-aisles are deliberately arranged as a kind of blind that separates the side chapels from the central nave, so that the faithful would not be distracted from the principal ceremony at the main altar.

A side altar dedicated to St Charles Borromeo. St Philip and St Charles knew each other personally, and the latter made generous donations towards the building of the Chiesa Nuova, the Oratory of Rome; they are pictured together in the altarpiece. In the statue, St Philip is shown trampling on a cardinal’s hat, a symbol of the many ecclesiastical dignities offered him, and always refused. The two busts on either side may be Ss. Cosmas and Damian, since a church named for them was pulled down to make way for the Girolamini; when this was done in the Counter-Reformation period , it was often on such terms that the new foundation was required to preserve devotion to the titular saints of the old one.

The main side-altar of the left transept contains relics of St Ignatius of Antioch, and the Roman martyrs Ss. Nereus and Achilleus. Another disciple of St Philip, the renowned historian Cesare Baronius, was made cardinal of the church of Ss Nereus and Achilleus in 1596, and presumably donated these relics. (It was Baronius who read the commendation prayers for St Philip as he lay dying.) I have never before seen a sepulcher in an altar decorated like this.

An emblem representing the heart of St Philip, enflamed with the love of God, in the floor close to the main door. Neapolitan Baroque churches are often filled with this elaborate kind of mosaic known as entarsia, in which the pieces of stone are cut as much as possible in the shape the artist wishes to make, rather than into lots of tiny pieces which are then used to build the images. (Some kinds of stone, however, are too brittle for this to be very practical, and more, smaller pieces are used, as with the yellow stone around the heart.)

The small cloister though which one now enters the church, with the dome above.

The great cloister.

The dome of the chuch seen from the great cloister.

The façade of the cathedral, seen from the former buildings of the community.

On the right side of the Duomo is the large chapel of Naples’ Patron Saint, Januarius (San Gennaro), the relic of whose blood famously liquifies on his three feast days. The chapel houses over 40 silver busts of various Saints, including this one of St. Philip; these are often carried in procession though the heart of the city by various confraternities on the three feasts.
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The Lumen Christi Simple Gradual - from Adam Bartlett

May 26, 2014, 10:00 pm
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This is a wonderful new resource for the Mass in the vernacular...and perhaps the EF too?

Adam Bartlett is the composer who created the Simple English Propers that have been featured on this site regularly and I am an enthusiast of his past work. I was pleased to learn, therefore, that he had produced a new set of chant propers and to receive a copy of the new Lumen Christi Simple Gradual recently.

It comes attractively bound with one version for choir and one for congregation. It turned out to be more than just propers: it has three sections. The first is the Order of the Mass in which there are scores for all parts that could be sung by priest or congregation. When some of those parts that might commonly be sung in Latin even in a predominantly English Mass, the chants in Latin are given as well - eg dominus vobiscum/ et cum ...

The second has eighteen Mass settings - most of which are the commonly sung gregorian Masses in Latin covering the main seasons and feasts of the year. There are four English chant Masses, the first is the ICEL Mass, there are two composed by Bartlett and one by his mentor Columba Kelly. This inclusion of the Latin chants is consistent with the mission of not only producing something that is good in itself for English, but something that is derived from and points to the greater tradition of chant of the Church. My hope for the future is that we see a true flowering both of the vernacular liturgy and the traditional Latin.

The third section is a set of propers, more complex than the Simple English, for the complete liturgical year - Introit, Offertory and Communion antiphons, with psalm meditations.

There is also a very well written introduction in which Bartlett explains the reasons for the production of the book and gives very helpful suggestions as to how to sing the chants for those with relatively little experience; and practical ways to introduce them gradually in congregations that might have had no exposure to chant at all.

In the end, the test of quality of this music will be time. If the music it contains is beautiful enough then congregations and choirs will want to sing it, and if it is simple enough for them to do so, they will. I can only give my personal sense so far in this regard, but for what it is worth, I think Bartlett has hit the mark here. I have had a chance to sing some of the propers in a Mass. The response of my choir and the congregation where was sang it has been positive so far.

I sing in a choir run by my friend Tom Larson, which he calls his Catholic Basics Choir. We are a choir of adults and children from our families and most of us had little experience in singing chant before they joined the choir. Until recently, we have had a program of singing the Simple English Propers and then the Latin gregorian. Our experience of this has been very good. The SEPs are easy to learn, allow for a clear articulation of the text so that the congregations can understand it, and are modal so that they connect musically to the gregorian which follows in Latin. Doing it in this way, we found that congregations are introduced to the Latin in such a way that they are less likely to feel intimidated by being presented with text they don't understand, and instead meditate on the English they have just heard, while listening to the gregorian.

Recently we have been singing these new propers. Compared to SEPs they are a step up in both complexity and beauty. They retain the advantages of the SEPs, they are still easier to learn than the gregorian if you have not done chant before; and the melodies fit the text very naturally and easily allowing for clear articulation.

In these new propers I was struck particularly by how the examples we sang anticipated the gregorian proper, not just by being in the same mode but also by using echoes of the patterns of the melody in the gregorian chant. In our case it is 'anticipated' because we learn and sing the English first. I mentioned this to Tom afterwards and he agreed. He put it like this: these are perhaps 25% more difficult to sing, but the return on the effort in terms of beauty is much more than that. 'He has nailed it with these! ' he said. Tom is not easily impressed and has been a proponent of Latin chant for years. He actually said to me that for the first time, if he went somewhere and they only did English, if they did these chants he would be happy. There is an even greater endorsement, and that is to see our soprano section, average age 7, singing both the English and then the gregorian Latin and picking them up very quickly under Tom's guidance with the help of these chants; and enjoying it!

St Augustine famously said (in his commentary on Psalm 32) that the beauty of the music can communicate a truth that words alone cannot. This is only true when the melody is of the highest calibre and when music and text are in harmony. I dare to suggest based upon my experience of these so far that these propers do this. There is as sense that the melody itself is an interpretation and illumination of the meanings of the words. 

Resources such as this used well in our parishes will not only deepen our active participation in the Ordinary Form of the Mass, but by their connection to the Latin tradition, will also open the way to a greater appreciation of the Extraordinary Form. However, as I sang these I wondered if there might be another possibility also. In a sung Mass, there places where choir directors are permitted to choose additional hymns and motets and often they will chose English texts - I have heard Victorian hymns or Anglican music (for example Tallis's If Ye Love Me). If there were a full selection of propers in the vernacular that could be sung at the appropriate juncture (in the way that the texts of the readings are read from the pulpit prior to the homily for example) of the quality of these these, I think that singing these as well would help to de-mystify and so add to the mystery. There is some overlap of course, so already it could be done partially, but there are many gaps too, so there's your next project Mr Bartlett....

You can purchase the Lumen Christi Simple Gradual here.



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Rogation Days and Ascension Photo Request

May 27, 2014, 8:23 pm
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My sincerest apologies for delaying in this post. Nevertheless, if any readers took pictures of their processions and/or Masses during these Rogation days we currently are in (for those who attend the EF or follow the 1962 calendar), please submit them for inclusion in our photopost!



Also, with Ascension coming up, we will also be accepting photos for an Ascension photopost. As always, please submit to: photopost@newliturgicalmovement.org and please place either "Rogation" or "Ascension," respectively, in the subject.
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Blessed Sacrament Procession in central London

May 28, 2014, 3:49 am
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There will be a Procession of the Blessed Sacrament on the Solemnity of Corpus Christi, Sunday 22 June in London which is being organised jointly by the Parishes of Spanish Place and Farm Street. It is hoped that the Procession will become an annual event. The Procession will begin at the Immaculate Conception, Farm Street at 5:15pm, walking via the Ukrainian Cathedral on Duke Street, over Oxford Street and past Selfridges to St James's, Spanish Place, concluding around 6:30pm with Solemn Benediction.

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The Apodosis, or Leavetaking, of Pascha

May 28, 2014, 8:00 am
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Today is the last day of Pascha for Christians of the Byzantine tradition.  Each major feast on the Church calendar has an Apodosis that comes, normally, at the end of the octave.  The hymns for Matins, the hours, Vespers, Compline, and the Divine Liturgy are repeated as on the first day of the feast.  For Pascha, however, the Leave-Taking is on the vigil of the Ascension, but, with the exception of the changed lectionary, the services are the same as for Easter Sunday.

Two years ago, Orthodox blogger, John Sanidopoulos, had a nice reflection on the reason for an Apodosis:

Every major feast has its Apodosis.  Why? The main reason is that the Church once again gives us the opportunity to celebrate the beauty of the feast.  When we see or experience something beautiful, it is human nature to desire to have that experience again.  When we taste delicious food, we desire to eat it again.  The feasts of Christ and the Theotokos are a sweetness to the soul which arouses the desire to celebrate more than once.
I have found this to be true in my own experience.  The beauty and richness of the Paschal Canon and the Paschal Stichera, the joy of the chants on Sunday morning are so marvelous that I am thrilled to repeat them every day of the first Bright week, and then repeat echoes of them each Sunday of the Easter season.  But there is a special delight on this day of Pascha in being able to re-pray all of the services one last time, forty days later.  It is like an anniversary party for a happily married couple, hosted at the same site as the original celebration.

At the same time, in every remembrance there is a sense of incompleteness, a yearning for a future that more perfectly embodies that original greatness.  And so today, the Apodosis is on a Wednesday, a fast day.  For those who observe the fasting rules in all their rigour, ordinarily today would be no meat, dairy, fish, wine or oil.  But every Wednesday and Friday of Pascha are allowed wine and oil, and today fish is allowed as well.  But even for those keeping a more minimal fasting observance, today is a meatless Easter.  We sing the hymns, but our fasting reminds us that it is not Pascha Sunday, and we are at the beginning of the end of this feast of feasts.

After today's end, we cease chanting the Paschal hymns.  The canon, the stichera, even the ubiquitous tropar: Christ is Risen... all come to an end.  Today, is the last day to rejoice in the pure Paschal joy in the presence of the Risen Lord before his Ascension.  For the next nine days there is a kind of silence hovering over the Church's liturgy.  There is still a certain pascal joy and expectation for Pentecost; for example we still do not kneel...but there is an air of waiting, of not quite full Paschal joy...  But for today, sing your heart out!  It is the last chance till next year.

To help you, here is a link with the Paschal Tropar chanted in different melodies and languages:  Christ is Risen from the dead, trampling down death by death, and to those in the tombs, granting life.

CHRIST IS RISEN!  INDEED HE IS RISEN!




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