A Charming Blast from the Past: "My Name Day -- Come for Dessert"

Eighth Day Books celebrated its 32nd anniversary this weekend and offered a discount of 35% on all used books and 20% off new. I found this treasure, written by Helen McLoughlin and published in 1962 by the Liturgical Press. She provides prayers, hymns, recipes, lives of the saints, shopping and organizing tips, and a whole world of ideas for the celebration of children's name days. 

It's really a very dated book, with addresses of stores and other suppliers for the recipes and decorations she describes--Ye Olde Herb Shoppe on Dey Street in New York; Gourmet Magazine, the St. Leo Shop in Newport, RI where Ade Bethune sold her artwork, etc. Note that it's also based on the Roman Calendar before 1970.

EWTN provides the text of the book, and I think you know how happy I was when I saw that McLoughlin included the English Martyrs:

MARTYRS AND SAINTS OF GREAT BRITAIN

Martyrs of England! still be near us; Make us steadfast in hope and faith. Martyrs of England! let naught deride us From love of Jesus in life and death. Amen.

Four centuries ago an illustrious band of Englishmen sacrificed their lives because they would not deny the supremacy of the Pope. Said Blessed John Houghton, the first to be put to death: "Seeing that Jesus Christ gave spiritual power to His vicars by the words: 'I will give to thee the keys of heaven,' and no doctor has ever asserted these words to be spoken save to St. Peter only, which power is derived from him to the other apostles, and subsequently to the Pope and bishops--how could these words be so understood of a king, a layman and a secular person?"

The great Christian humanist Thomas More refused to recognize the king's sovereignty as spiritual head of the Anglican Church and died with a heroism full of good humor and simplicity. His friend Holbein has left a painting to show what a saint really looks like. For lawyers who claim him as their patron and for boys named after him, an excellent nameday gift is a color print from the Frick Collection (see FC, see Abbreviations). An 8 x 10 print costs only $.30; a 29 x 23 costs $15.00.

St. John Fisher, chaplain to the queen and chancellor of Cambridge University, was bishop of Rochester. His refusal to take the oath required of English bishops led to his imprisonment in the Tower of London, where he received the cardinal's hat shortly before his martyrdom.

Martyrs suffered in the reign of Henry VIII because they rejected his spiritual supremacy; in the time of Elizabeth they suffered for another reason. Not only was holy Mass prohibited, but it was treason for a priest to remain in England or for anyone to assist him. Consequently, many laymen and priests were martyred. (Only Thomas More and John Fisher have been canonized.) Among them were courageous women, such as Anne Line, hanged at Tyburn, and Margaret Clitherow, who was pressed to death at York.

Our favorite English martyr is Edmund Campion, S.J., who is immortalized in Robert Hugh Benson's book, "Come Rack, Come Rope." Children named Brian have patrons in Brian Lacey, a layman, and Brian Caulfield, a Jesuit. Another interesting name is Everard (Eberhard) after Blessed Everard Hanse, a converted Protestant minister who became a priest in Rheims and was butchered at Tyburn for his priesthood. An imported plaque of Edmund Campion costs $3.50 (AMS, see Abbreviations).

Other English martyrs include Oliver Plunkett, archbishop of Armagh, who was hanged, drawn and quartered in the persecution and whose relics are enshrined at Downside Abbey; Roger James, a Benedictine, whose given name is rendered for the Gaelic Rory and for the English Roy; George Gervase; Miles Gerard; Christopher Bales; Ralph Sherwin; Maurus Scott; David Lewis; Humphrey Middlemore; Walter Pierson; Robert Southwell, a Jesuit missionary to England and poet; Thurston Hunt; Arthur Bell; and Nicholas Owen, Jesuit lay-coordinator who saved countless priests by devising hiding places for them. Arthur Bell would be the patron for boys named Arthur since there is no saint having that name.

Boys called Howard, a name often given in families of Irish extraction, will be happy to find two patrons: Philip Howard, earl of Arundel, and his grandson, William Howard, viscount of Stafford. The crown dessert (see Crown Cake) carries a double significance on their feastday: their royalty and the reward of their martyrdom. Other beatified martyrs are Sidney Hodgson; Germain Gardiner; Eustace White; Richard Gwen, first martyr of Wales; and Sir Adrian Fortescue, Knight of the Bath and of St. John and a tertiary of St. Dominic.

Nameday desserts for these martyrs are Strawberry Frosted Layer Cake and Martyrs' Chiffon Dessert. A common symbol for them is the palm.

Prayer of the Beatified Martyrs

Father: Let us pray. Grant, almighty God, that we who admire in Your martyr N.... the courage of his glorious confession may witness in ourselves the power of his intercession. O God, who glorifies those who glorify You and who are honored in the honoring of Your saints, by the solemn judgment of Your Church glorify the blood of martyrs put to death in England for the testimony of Jesus, who lives and reigns forever.

All: Amen. Christ conquers, Christ reigns!

This book, and others Helen McLoughlin wrote including Family Advent Customs, Christmas to Candlemas, and Easter to Pentecost Family Customs, served as guides to bring the celebration of the liturgical year into the home. I've tried to find out more about the author but haven't had any luck on line. Please let me know if you have any for information.

The Triduum of the Dead

Tomorrow is Halloween--All Hallow's Eve--and the Liturgical Arts Journal has a post from the publisher of a prayer booklet for the day and evening of the beginning of these days of special remembrance for the faithful departed:

Halloween is a liturgical holiday. Anyone would be forgiven for not knowing that, because almost nobody keeps it that way anymore—to such a degree that some Catholics are of the opinion that we should wash our hands of the whole business. But Halloween has always belonged properly to the Church, and as such it should be made a key strategic objective in a cultural Reconquista. To help illustrate why, I’d like to walk through the day of October 31st, not as the world celebrates it now, but as the Latin Church celebrated it for centuries, listed in the Martyrology as Vigilia omnium Sanctorum.

The Thirty-first of October would traditionally have begun with the office of Matins before sunrise. Traditionally, weekdays in October Matins featured readings from the Books of Maccabees. But on the 31st, the readings switch to Luke 6 and Ambrose’s homily on the Beatitudes. These lessons appointed for Halloween come from the common “Of Many Martyrs”, and we will see this theme of the Beatitudes reappear not only later in the vigil day but also in the feast of All Saints to follow. . . .

Please read the rest there.

The booklet I referred to, published by Ancilla Press, helps restore Halloween as a liturgical holiday:

Traditional Catholic devotions for Halloween? Yes, you read that right! As neopagans try to co-opt this vigil day for themselves, we’re taking All Hallows Eve back for Holy Mother Church with this fantastic collection. It features liturgical propers of the Mass and the Divine Office for All Hallows Eve, including the full version of "Black Vespers", an old Breton tradition for the afternoon of Halloween. Combat the occult worship of the secular holiday with three powerful prayers against evil spirits, witchcraft, and spells. And transform your childrens' Halloween or All Saints trick-or-treating from mere indulgence to a spiritual work of mercy with the venerable practice of "souling"—praying for the dear departed of benefactors. Combining Celtic, English, and Latin traditions, this unique booklet provides adults and children with an unashamedly Catholic and  historically authentic way to celebrate the beginning of Hallowtide.

Features:
* Traditional Mass propers for All Hallows Eve
* Black Vespers (Vespers of the Dead)
* Little Vespers of All Saints
* St. Patrick's Breastplate
* Long form of the St. Michael Prayer by Pope Leo XIII
* A Deliverance Prayer
* Prayer for Those for Whom We are Bound to Pray
* Prayer for Those who Repose in a Cemetery
* Chaplet for the Souls in Purgatory, adapted for Halloween Souling
* Traditional Soul-Cake Recipe
* Cheshire Souling Song (music and lyrics)
* Another Souling Song (lyrics)

Whitsunday and the Vigil of Pentecost

A couple of weeks ago at Sunday Mass, our Parochial Vicar at Blessed Sacrament opined during his homily that many Catholics do not understand the Holy Spirit. As with many things in the Church today, I think part of the problem is that our liturgy has not celebrated the Holy Spirit as it should. For example, how many Catholics realize that the Solemnity of Pentecost is one of the greatest celebrations of the Church year--second only to Easter? How many realize that the Vigil Mass of Pentecost has different readings from the Mass of Pentecost Sunday? (Usually the evening Mass on Saturday has the same readings as the Mass on Sunday.) Since for many Catholics what they see and hear in Sunday Mass or in the parish bulletin is all they know of the Church's doctrine and tradition, it's essential that something at Mass this weekend makes these distinctions clear for those with eyes to see. The sequence that we will chant or recite on Sunday fulfills that role, for example.

As the Adoremus Bulletin website explains:

The Roman Missal’s most recent English edition includes several revised rites, new prayers, and adjustments to the rubrics. While many of these revisions require further explanation, one rite in particular deserves some special attention—the Vigil Mass for Pentecost. The two previous editions of the post-conciliar Roman Missal included only a proper Vigil Mass for Pentecost. However, the extended form of the Vigil proposed in the current Roman Missal brings forward to the present a part of our liturgical tradition that has both deep roots and contemporary value.

In our earlier tradition, Pentecost was a principal occasion, along with Easter, for the Church to carry out the baptism of adults. The mysteries of the Resurrection and Pentecost, in ways unique to their respective commemorations, express a sharing of divine life with those who belong to Christ, and especially so for those to be newly incorporated into his body, the Church. Over time these two days saw the development of vigils to watch for the following day’s solemn observance. The proclamation of the Word of God and a response to it would be the chief manner for keeping watch. Also, over time, these vigil days would be marked by fasting and penance in anticipation of the celebrations of the events of the Lord on the solemnity to follow. Likewise, during different periods, these commemorations had octave celebrations associated with them to give liturgical expression to the eternal reality of these same mysteries of Christ. The recently reformed General Roman Calendar sees Pentecost Sunday as the Eighth Sunday of Easter, the conclusion of the eight week celebration of the Resurrection. So, Pentecost brings to a fitting and final end the celebration of the Resurrection with the promised sending of the Holy Spirit, which in a sense completes the event of Easter. The day before Pentecost is no longer a day of fasting and penance and there is no longer an octave. And, it is no longer a principal day for the baptism of adults. However, it is Pentecost and the anamnesis found in the euchology and the biblical texts is compelling and vivid. With the today—hodie—of Pentecost, there is a new outpouring of the Holy Spirit upon the Church. It is fitting to keep watch—with urgent prayer—for this coming of the Holy Spirit!

As the possibly apocryphal story goes, Blessed Pope Paul VI wept when he realized that the Octave of Pentecost had been suppressed, with his approval, because he saw green vestments prepared in the sacristy for Holy Mass on Pentecost Monday instead of white vestments. He could have reversed the change then and there, deciding that it was a mistake that should not be allowed to stand. As Yves Congar writes in his book The Meaning of Tradition, the liturgy is one of the main ways the Church hands on Tradition, the teachings that Jesus told his Apostles to hand on when He ascended into Heaven.

EWTN's Register Radio

I recorded an interview with Jeanette DeMelo and Matthew Bunson for EWTN's Register Radio yesterday which will air this weekend on EWTN Radio (Saturday at 6:00 p.m. Central and Sunday at 10:00 a.m. Central)--and will also be linked on the National Catholic Register home page.

We discussed my latest blog post for the Register: "Septuagesima, Shrovetide, and Pancakes":

The Super Bowl is over and the next great commercial social event is St. Valentine’s Day, but Easter candy is already sharing shelf space with Valentine’s candy in our stories. We are in a transitional time in our liturgical year too. Last Christmas seems a long time ago.

Before the reform of the liturgical calendar in late 1960’s, there was a name for this transitional time: Septuagesima. For three Sundays, the Church adopted a pre-Lenten period and in parishes where the Extraordinary Form is celebrated today, those Sundays are observed. The priest wears violet vestments, the Gloria is omitted, and the Tract replaces the Alleluia before the Gospel. The loss of the Alleluia, as the liturgical scholar Dom Gueranger explains, reminds us of our situation: “During the rest of the year [the Church] loves to hear us chant the song of heaven, the sweet Alleluia; but now, she bids us close our lips to this word of joy, because we are in Babylon . . . We are sinners, and have but too often held fellowship with the world of God's enemies; let us become purified by repentance . . .”

I like the image the Register chose for the post: Pieter Aertsen's "The Pancake Bakery" which depicts a family preparing Shrovetide pancakes for sale. According to the Rijkmuseum:

Although Pieter Aertsen (1508-1575), known as ‘Lange Pier’, came from Amsterdam, he lived in Antwerp for many years. After he returned in 1556, various Amsterdam churches, his principal patrons, commissioned Aertsen to make large altarpieces. Soon, however, he abandoned religious art and started to paint scenes from peasant life. He was known above all for his paintings of market scenes and kitchen tableaux, which contained an abundance of fruit, fish, poultry, cheese, bread and much besides. His younger cousin and pupil Joachim Bueckelaer also painted in the same genre and developed it further.

The Wikipedia article on this artist, however, provides greater context to his career:

Later in life, he also painted more conventional treatments of religious subjects, now mostly lost as during the iconoclasm of the beeldenstorm several paintings that had been commissioned for Catholic churches were destroyed. Several of his best works, including altarpieces in various churches in Amsterdam, were also destroyed during the days surrounding the event known as the Alteratie, or "Changeover", when Amsterdam formally reverted to Protestantism from Catholicism on 26 May 1578 at the start of the Eighty Years' War. One surviving religious work is the Crucifixion in the Royal Museum of Fine Arts Antwerp.

Aertsen was a member of Antwerp's equivalent of the Accademia di San Luca. In the official books of the Academy he is known as "Langhe Peter, schilder" (Tall Peter, painter). His sons Pieter, Aert, and Dirk became acclaimed painters, and other notable pupils trained in his workshop included Stradanus and Aertsen's nephew, Joachim Beuckelaer, who continued to develop Aertsen's formula.

Aersten's exact formula of still life and genre figures in the foreground, with small scenes from history painting in the background only persisted for the next generation (or two, as Joachim Wtewael painted some similar works), but history paintings with very prominent and profuse still life elements in the foreground were produced by Rubens and his generation, and in the 17th century both Flemish Baroque painting and Dutch Golden Age painting developed important genres of independent still life subjects, which were just occasionally produced in Aertsen's day.

Candlemas and St. Anne Line

Please see my blog post for The National Catholic Register in which I first discuss the greatness of the Feast of the Presentation of Our Lord in the Temple and how that is partially obscured by the liturgical calendar using the term "Ordinary Time" for this period between Christmas and Lent.

Then I tell the story of St. Anne Line's arrest on February 2, 1601, just before Father Francis Page, SJ was beginning the celebration of the Feast with the blessing of candles and Mass. He was able to escape capture while she was held in Newgate Prison until her trial and execution later that month.

Now it's time to put away the creches and take down the greenery: the 40 days of Christmas are over and Lent is just a short month away. As Robert Herrick wrote:

DOWN with rosemary and bayes,
Down with the mistleto,
Instead of holly, now up-raise
The greener box, for show.
The holly hitherto did sway;	5
Let box now domineere,
Until the dancing Easter-day,
Or Easter’s eve appeare.
Then youthful box, which now hath grace
Your houses to renew,	10
Grown old, surrender must his place
Unto the crisped yew.
When yew is out, then birch comes in,
And many flowers beside,
Both of a fresh and fragrant kinne	15
To honor Whitsontide.
Green rushes then, and sweetest bents,
With color oken boughs,
Come in for comely ornaments,
To re-adorn the house.	20
Thus times do shift; each thing his turn does hold;
New things succeed as former things grow old.

George Herbert and Advent: "My God, no hymn for thee?"

Richard J. Janet, PhD, professor of history, and director of the Thomas More Center for the Study of Catholic Thought and Culture at Rockhurst University, Kansas City, Missouri writes about George Herbert and Advent for Homiletic and Pastoral Review:

Advent, with its focus on beginnings and endings, the coming of Christ at Christmas, and the Second Coming at the end of time, holds the same lesson. Preparing for life is preparing for death, and vice-versa. Do not count the time, count the blessings and the beauty and the love generated during the time. Herbert sensed that. He died in 1633 at the age of 39 years. Shortly before he died, he sent his poems to a friend with instructions to publish them only if he thought they might “turn to the advantage of any dejected poor soul.” Even in death, Herbert looked to the needs of others, and to his own need to share love.

Before he died, however, Herbert celebrated. He noted the turn of the seasons, and the passage of time marked by the liturgical calendar. Nature and prayer came together for him, as reflected in his Christmas poem. The poem begins with Herbert taking a pleasant horseback ride in the country, until he tires and seeks rest in a local inn. There he finds Christ, “wrapt in night’s mantle, stole into a manger.” Herbert longs to brighten his own “dark soul” to provide a home for Christ, and at the end of the poem offers a play on words as he looks for a Sun/Son to illuminate his world. As he does so, he sings and compares his soul to the shepherd and his flock. The country parson in Herbert comes out as he likens his hymn to nature, and praises Christ as the true Sun/Son and candle-holder for the universe.

The shepherds sing: and shall I silent be?
My God, no hymn for thee?
My soul ’s a shepherd too: a flock it feeds
Of thoughts, and words, and deeds.
The pasture is thy word: the streams, thy grace
Enriching all the place.
Shepherd and flock shall sing, and all my powers
Out-sing the day-light hours.
Then we will chide the sun for letting night
Take up his place and right:
We sing one common Lord: wherefore he should
Himself the candle hold.

Please read the rest there.

More about the  Thomas More Center for the Study of Catholic Thought and Culture at Rockhurst University here.

Septuagesima: Easing Into Lent

I have been reading through many of Blessed John Henry Newman's Lenten Sermons for my Cardinal Newman Lecture at Newman University on Ash Wednesday, February 18. This sermon is for Septuagesima Sunday, and in it, Newman balances the real need for self-denial and even sorrow in the world with the joy and gratitude we should always feel for God's great blessings:

Gloom is no Christian temper; that repentance is not real, which has not love in it; that self-chastisement is not acceptable, which is not sweetened by faith and cheerfulness. We must live in sunshine, even when we sorrow; we must live in God's presence, we must not shut ourselves up in our own hearts, even when we are reckoning up our past sins.

These thoughts are suitable on this day, when we first catch a sight, as it were, of the Forty Days of Lent. If God then gives us grace to repent, it is well; if He enables us to chasten heart and body, to Him be praise; and for that very reason, while we do so, we must not cease rejoicing in Him. All through Lent we must rejoice, while we afflict ourselves. Though "many be called, but few chosen;" though all run in the race, but "one receiveth the prize;" though we must "so run that we may obtain;" though we must be "temperate in all things," and "keep under our body and bring it into subjection, lest we be castaways;" yet through God alone we can do this; and while He is with us, we cannot but be joyful; for His absence only is a cause for sorrow. The Three Holy Children are said to have stood up in the midst of the fire, and to have called on all the works of God to rejoice with them; on sun and moon, stars of heaven, nights and days, showers and dew, frost and cold, lightnings and clouds, mountains and hills, green things upon the earth, seas and floods, fowls of the air, beasts and cattle, and children of men,—to praise and bless the Lord, and magnify Him for ever. We have no such trial as theirs; we have no such awful suspense as theirs, when they entered the burning fiery {272} furnace; we attempt for the most part what we know; we begin what we think we can go through. We can neither instance their faith nor equal their rejoicing; yet we can imitate them so far, as to look abroad into this fair world, which God made "very good," while we mourn over the evil which Adam brought into it; to hold communion with what we see there, while we seek Him who is invisible; to admire it, while we abstain from it; to acknowledge God's love, while we deprecate His wrath; to confess that, many as are our sins, His grace is greater. Our sins are more in number than the hairs of our head; yet even the hairs of our head are all numbered by Him. He counts our sins, and, as He counts, so can He forgive; for that reckoning, great though it be, comes to an end; but His mercies fail not, and His Son's merits are infinite.

Let us, then, on this day, dwell upon a thought, which it will be a duty to carry with us through Lent, the thought of the blessings and mercies of which our present life is made up. St. Paul said that he had all, and abounded, and was full; and this, in a day of persecution. Surely, if we have but religious hearts and eyes, we too must confess that our daily and hourly blessings in this life are not less than his.

Newman then outlines five blessings: 1) the gift of life; 2) the gift of sleep; 3) the blessings of Christian brotherhood; 4) the present peace of the Church, and 5) the privileges of daily worship and weekly Communion. Read the rest here!

Happy Epiphany SEASON

The verse for this Parochial and Plain sermon is, "This beginning of miracles did Jesus in Cana of Galilee, and manifested forth His glory; and His disciples believed on Him." John ii. 11.--

THE Epiphany is a season especially set apart for adoring the glory of Christ. The word may be taken to mean the manifestation of His glory, and leads us to the contemplation of Him as a King upon His throne in the midst of His court, with His servants around Him, and His guards in attendance. At Christmas we commemorate His grace; and in Lent His temptation; and on Good Friday His sufferings and death; and on Easter Day His victory; and on Holy Thursday His return to the Father; and in Advent we anticipate His second coming. And in all of these seasons He does something, or suffers something: but in the Epiphany and the weeks after it, we celebrate Him, not as on His field of battle, or in His solitary retreat, but as an august and glorious King; we view Him as the Object of our worship. Then only, during His whole earthly history, did He fulfil the type of Solomon, and held (as I may say) a court, and received the homage of His subjects; viz. when He was an infant. His throne was His undefiled Mother's arms; His chamber of state was a cottage or a cave; the worshippers were the wise men of the East, and they brought presents, gold, frankincense, and myrrh. All around and about Him seemed of earth, except to the eye of faith; one note alone had He of Divinity. As great men of this world are often plainly dressed, and look like other men, all but as having some one costly ornament on their breast or on their brow; so the Son of Mary in His lowly dwelling, and in an infant's form, was declared to be the Son of God Most High, the Father of Ages, and the Prince of Peace, by His star; a wonderful appearance which had guided the wise men all the way from the East, even unto Bethlehem.

This being the character of this Sacred Season, our services throughout it, as far as they are proper to it, are full of the image of a king in his royal court, of a sovereign surrounded by subjects, of a glorious prince upon a throne. There is no thought of war, or of strife, or of suffering, or of triumph, or of vengeance connected with the Epiphany, but of august majesty, of power, of prosperity, of splendour, of serenity, of benignity. Now, if at any time, it is fit to say, "The Lord is in His holy temple, let all the earth keep silence before Him." [Hab. ii. 20.] "The Lord sitteth above the waterflood, and the Lord remaineth a king for ever." "The Lord of Hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our refuge." "O come, let us worship, and fall down, and kneel before the Lord our Maker." "O magnify the Lord our God, and fall down before His footstool, for He is Holy." "O worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness; bring presents, and come into His courts."

Blessed John Henry Newman is here reflecting on the manifestations of Jesus: to the Magi; at His Baptism in the Jordan River, and at the Marriage Feast of Cana. The Feast of Epiphany has been moved to Sunday in the Ordinary Latin Rite calendar; otherwise it is celebrated as the 12th day after Christmas--"Twelfth Night", the last burst of festivity before the return of workaday efforts. On the calendar of the Extraordinary Form of the Latin Rite, the season of Epiphany lasts until the end of January, as Septuagesima, the pre-Lenten season, begins on Sunday, February 1.

It's a tradition to announce the dates of movable feasts of the Church Year on Epiphany:

Know, dear brethren (brothers and sisters), that, as we have rejoiced at the Nativity of our Lord Jesus Christ, so by leave of God's mercy we announce to you also the joy of his Resurrection, who is our Savior.

On the eighteenth day of February will fall Ash Wednesday, and the beginning of the fast of the most sacred Lenten season.

On the fifth day of April you will celebrate with joy Easter Day,the Paschal feast of our Lord Jesus Christ.

[In those places where the Ascension is observed on Thursday:
On the fourteenth day of May will be the Ascension of our Lord Jesus Christ.]

[In those places where the Ascension is transferred to the Seventh Sunday of Easter:
On the seventeenth day of May will be the Ascension of our Lord Jesus Christ.]

On the twenty-fourth day of May, the feast of Pentecost.

On the seventh day of June, the feast of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ.

On the twenty-ninth day of November, the First Sunday of the Advent of our Lord Jesus Christ, to whom is honor and glory for ever and ever.

Amen.

At the Name of Jesus

Yesterday in the Ordinary Form and today in the Extraordinary Form, the Church honors the Name of Jesus. It makes such good sense that we honor His Name during the Christmas season. He was given the name Jesus when conceived in the womb of the Blessed Virgin Mary by the Holy Spirit (Luke 1:31); He was given in the name Jesus when He was circumcised (Luke 2:21).

The Introit for Mass yesterday and today is taken from St. Paul's Epistle to the Philippians:" at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father."

This Feast had been suppressed after the Second Vatican Council but was restored in 2002. It is common in Catholic piety to devote the month of January to the Holy Name. The Fish Eaters website notes that we should be ready to pray in reparation when this Name, the only name by which we may be saved (Acts 4:8-12) is taken in vain, used as swear word, or otherwise disrespected:

the Catholic in the room will (or at least should) make reparation by crossing himself and praying "Sit nomen Dómini benedíctum!" ("Blessed be the Name of the Lord!"), to which another Catholic who might be in the room replies, "Ex hoc nunc, et usque in sæculum!" ("from this time forth for evermore!") or "per ómnia saecula saeculórum" ("unto ages of ages").

St. Bernard of Clairvaux wrote a prayer to the Holy Name commonly used as a hymn for the Feast:

Jesus, the very thought of Thee With sweetness fills the breast! Yet sweeter far Thy face to see And in Thy presence rest.

No voice can sing, no heart can frame, Nor can the memory find, A sweeter sound than Jesus' name, The Savior of mankind.

O hope of every contrite heart! 0 joy of all the meek! To those who fall, how kind Thou art! How good to those who seek!

But what to those who find? Ah! this Nor tongue nor pen can show The love of Jesus, what it is, None but His loved ones know.

Jesus! our only hope be Thou, As Thou our prize shalt be; In Thee be all our glory now, And through eternity. Amen.

In the fifteenth century, St. Bernardine of Siena promoted devotion to the Holy Name, using the initials IHS as an image for veneration. Devotion to the Holy Name of Jesus spread to England in the fifteenth century and was at its height in popular devotion before the English Reformation, with a fraternity and parish guilds, chapels dedicated to the Name, the practice of special votive Masses, specific prayers, and use of the IHS initials. Since it was a devotion based so firmly on the Holy Bible, some aspects of devotion survived the English Reformation, and the feast of the Holy Name was included in The Book of Common Prayer. 

The imagery of the IHS initials, however, was too Catholic for many in the Church of England and was associated with High Church Anglo-Catholicism as practiced by Bishop Lancelot Andrewes and Archbishop of Canterbury William Laud, so the cult of devotion to the Holy Name was suppressed, according to this article. The IHS symbol became a mark of recusant Catholicism, especially since the Society of Jesus used the initials as an emblem. Since Englishmen who studied for the priesthood on the Continent and returned as Jesuit missionaries to the Catholics of England were singled out from Elizabeth's reign to the Popish Plot as traitorous spies and instigators of rebellion, it could not be an acceptable sign in England.

Father Rutler on Chesterton and Advent

Father George Rutler comments in his weekly column from the Church of St. Michael in New York City:

It would be hard to think of any writer in the last several generations who celebrated Christmas as heartily as G. K. Chesterton. It was precisely because of this, and not in spite of it, that he said with a severity not characteristic of his benign personality: “There is no more dangerous or disgusting habit than that of celebrating Christmas before it comes.”

Dangerous, that is, because the rush neglects the deepest mysteries of life which are the stuff of Advent meditations: Death, Judgment, Heaven and Hell; and by that neglect we are abandoned to a life of anxiety, unable to know why we were made or what we are to become. Disgusting, that is, because rushing Christmas spoils the appetite for higher things and tries to replace holy joy with entertainments that quickly become boring.

Our Chesterton Christmas at Eighth Day Books in right in the heart of Advent, but our focus is on preparing for Christmas--since our group has been meeting at Eighth Day almost every third Friday of the month to read and discuss Chesterton's Father Brown Stories, essays, The Everlasting Man, The Ballad of the White Horse, and The Thing: Why I Am a Catholic, we wanted to celebrate Eighth Day Books and Chesterton when it would do Eighth Day Books the most good, during the Christmas shopping season. After all, part of the Advent season preparation is buying the gifts we want to give on Christmas day.

After an early December vacation, however, I need to rededicate myself to Advent preparations. While in an elegant cabin at the Big Cedar Lodge, I worked on my Newman Lecture for Newman University, and my husband and I did say our daily prayers, but we were relaxing and eating some very nice food, so I need to buckle down! I'll also be preparing for our Chesterton Christmas with posts the rest of this week about Chesterton and Dickens.

Passiontide: Two Weeks Leading up to Easter Sunday

In the liturgical calendar of the Extraordinary Form of the Latin Rite, today is Passion Sunday and we begin the two week period of Passiontide. It is traditional to veil all the statues and crucifixes in church, and in our homes, starting today and through Holy Week until the Easter Vigil on Holy Saturday. Even in the Ordinary Form, the statues are often veiled on the Fifth Sunday of Lent. From Passion Sunday to Palm Sunday, as Dom Gueranger notes, the readings at Mass are focused on the ever increasing danger Jesus faced from His opponents, as even Lazarus, whom he raised from the dead, is targeted:

The miracle performed by our Savior almost at the very gates of Jerusalem, by which He restored Lazarus to life, has roused the fury of His enemies to the highest pitch of frenzy. The people's enthusiasm has been excited by seeing him, who had been four days in the grave, walking in the streets of their city. They ask each other if the Messias, when He comes, can work greater wonders than these done by Jesus, and whether they ought not at once to receive this Jesus as the Messias, and sing their Hosanna to Him, for He is the Son of David. They cannot contain their feelings: Jesus enters Jerusalem, and they welcome Him as their King. The high priests and princes of the people are alarmed at this demonstration of feeling; they have no time to lose; they are resolved to destroy Jesus. We are going to assist at their impious conspiracy: the Blood of the just Man is to be sold, and the price put on it is thirty silver pieces. The divine Victim, betrayed by one of His disciples, is to be judged, condemned, and crucified. Every circumstance of this awful tragedy is to be put before us by the liturgy, not merely in words, but with all the expressiveness of a sublime ceremonial.    

In the Extraordinary Form, more liturgical changes indicate the growing tension and even fear: the Glory Be to the Father is omitted from the prayers at Mass:

Such are the sublime subjects which are about to be brought before us: but, at the same time, we shall see our holy mother the Church mourning, like a disconsolate widow, and sad beyond all human grief Hitherto she has been weeping over the sins of her children; now she bewails the death of her divine Spouse. The joyous Alleluia has long since been hushed in her canticles; she is now going to suppress another expression, which seems too glad for a time line the present. Partially, at first, but entirely during the last three days, she is about to deny herself the use of that formula, which is so dear to her: Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost. There is an accent of jubilation in these words, which would ill suit her grief and the mournfulness of the rest of her chants.

The opening psalm of the Mass, the Judica Me (Psalm 50) is also omitted, and the great hymns of Venantius Fortunatis, Bishop of Poitiers, are appropriate for the period of Passiontide: Vexilla Regis and Pange Lingua. The Friday of Passion Week is dedicated to the Seven Sorrows of Mary, so the Stabat Mater is also sung, as it often is between the stations of the Stations of the Cross, usually in the translation by Edward Caswall, Oxford Movement convert. Next Sunday is Palm Sunday, and Holy Week begins, culminating in the greatest days and nights of the liturgical year: Holy Thursday, Good Friday, and Holy Saturday.

Forty Days of Christmas? Oh, Yeah!

I agree with A Clerk of Oxford:

As a lover of carols, I'm much in favour of the medieval practice of keeping Christmas celebrations going all through the dark days of January, so today I thought I would post a carol which encourages us to keep singing throughout this season. It runs through not just the twelve days of Christmas but also the forty days of the Christmas season, all the way up to Candlemas, the Feast of the Purification, on February 2. It's a fifteenth-century carol (from Bodleian MS Eng. poet. e. I), and the unmodernised text can be found on this site, which also lists the various feasts mentioned: St Stephen on the 26th, St John on the 27th, the Holy Innocents on the 28th, St Thomas Becket on the 29th (check back soon for more carols about him!), the Circumcision of Christ on January 1st, Epiphany and Candlemas.

Make we mirth
For Christ's birth,
And sing we Yule til Candlemas.

1. The first day of Yule have we in mind,
How God was man born of our kind;
For he the bonds would unbind
Of all our sins and wickedness.

2. The second day we sing of Stephen,
Who stoned was and rose up even
To God whom he saw stand in heaven,
And crowned was for his prowess. [bravery]

3. The third day belongeth to Saint John,
Who was Christ's darling, dearer none,
To whom he entrusted, when he should gone, [when he had to die]
His mother dear for her cleanness. [purity]

4. The fourth day of the children young,
Whom Herod put to death with wrong;
Of Christ they could not tell with tongue,
But with their blood bore him witness.

5. The fifth day belongeth to Saint Thomas,
Who, like a strong pillar of brass,
Held up the church, and slain he was,
Because he stood with righteousness.

6. The eighth day Jesu took his name,
Who saved mankind from sin and shame,
And circumcised was, for no blame,
But as example of meekness.

7. The twelfth day offered to him kings three,
Gold, myrrh, and incense, these gifts free,
For God, and man, and king was he,
Thus worshipped they his worthiness.

8. On the fortieth day came Mary mild,
Unto the temple with her child,
To show herself clean, who never was defiled,
And therewith endeth Christmas.

Read the rest of the commentary here.

And this year, Candlemas is on Sunday!

Lepanto and the Feast of the Holy Rosary

White founts falling in the courts of the sun,

And the Soldan of Byzantium is smiling as they run;
There is laughter like the fountains in that face of all men feared,
It stirs the forest darkness, the darkness of his beard,
It curls the blood-red crescent, the crescent of his lips,
For the inmost sea of all the earth is shaken with his ships.
They have dared the white republics up the capes of Italy,
They have dashed the Adriatic round the Lion of the Sea,
And the Pope has cast his arms abroad for agony and loss,
And called the kings of Christendom for swords about the Cross,
The cold queen of England is looking in the glass;
The shadow of the Valois is yawning at the Mass;
From evening isles fantastical rings faint the Spanish gun,
And the Lord upon the Golden Horn is laughing in the sun.
              --G.K. Chesterton's "Lepanto"

Today is the Feast of Our Lady of the Rosary, which was previously called "Our Lady of Victory" in thanksgiving for the victory of the combined naval forces of The Holy League against the Ottoman Turks in one of the great naval battles of the era.

Christopher Check has told this great story on a CD set from Ignatius Press, which includes a reading of G.K. Chesterton's poem, "Lepanto":

On October 7, 1571, the most important sea battle in history was fought near the mouth of what is today called the Gulf of Patras, then the Gulf of Lepanto. On one side were the war galleys of the Holy League and on the other, those of the Ottoman Turks, rowed by tens of thousands of Christian galley slaves. Although the battle decided the future of Europe, few Europeans, and even fewer European Americans, know the story, much less how close Western Europe came to suffering an Islamic conquest.

On October 7, 1911, English poet and theologian G.K. Chesterton honored the battle with what is perhaps the greatest ballad of the 20th century. He wrote this extraordinary poem while the postman impatiently waited for the copy. It was instantly popular and remained so for years. The ballad by the great GKC is no less inspiring today and is more timely than ever, as the West faces the growing threat of Islam.

 

Our Wichita branch of the American Chesterton Society is reading Chesterton's other great narrative poem, The Ballad of the White Horse, and an essential feature of our first meeting, which I'm sure we'll continue, was our reading the poem aloud. In addition to praying the Rosary on this feast, I think reading "Lepanto" aloud would be appropriate!

The Triumph of the Cross

If you subscribe to OSV's The Catholic Answer Magazine, you could be reading my article on "The Cross Triumphant: What are the Feasts of the Holy Cross and Our Lady of Sorrows?" today on this Feast of the Exaltation of the Cross. If you don't subscribe to that magazine, you could instead read this article from last year's edition of PraytheMass.org, on which The Catholic Answer Magazine article was based (Dr. Bunson requested I rewrite the article for him).

The Church presents us with another beautiful matching of a Feast of Our Savior and a Memorial of Our Mother Mary this month (like the pair of Hearts, Sacred and Immaculate, following the Solemnity of Corpus Christi in June). The Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross is on September 14; the memorial of Our Lady of Sorrows follows on September 15. The pairing of these celebrations, even in their different levels on the liturgical and sanctoral calendars, properly guides us in our devotion and love of Our Savior and Our Lady. Both celebrations have a long history and are worthy of meditation.

The Feast of the Triumph of the Cross was observed in Rome in the late seventh century to commemorate the recovery of the Holy Cross by the Byzantine Emperor Heraclius in 629. St. Helena, Constantine’s mother, had found the True Cross in Jerusalem in the fourth century but the Persians had captured it and returned it after Heraclius defeated the Persian king Khosrau. The emperor returned it to Jerusalem, and this feast recalls that event.

But on a deeper level, of course, the Feast recalls Jesus’ triumph over death and the fulfillment of His great statement, “When I am lifted up from the earth, I will draw everyone to myself.” (John 12:32, which serves as the Communion Antiphon). The liturgy of the Mass for this Feast includes both triumph and sorrow in the readings and prayers, since Jesus both suffers His Passion and defeats sin and death. From the Book of Numbers, the First Reading recalls the story of Moses and the bronze Seraph, raised on a pole—when the people Israel who had been grumbling against God for their sufferings, looked up to the serpent, they were healed of the serpent bites God had sent to afflict them.

Read the rest here.

The painting above is one of Ruben's depictions of the Descent from the Cross. During one of our visits to Belgium, I went on a day tour to Antwerp and saw the great Raising of the Cross, Descent from the Cross, and Resurrection paintings in the Cathedral of Our Lady.

July 1 and the Precious Blood: DOMINE JESU REX ET REDEMPTOR PER SANGUINEM TUUM SALVA NOS

Before the 1969 reforms of the Roman Calendar, today was the Feast of the Most Precious Blood. One of the hymns for the feast was:

Salvete Christi vulnera,
Immensi amoris pignora,
Quibus perennes rivuli
Manant rubentis Sanguinis.

Nitore stellas vincitis,
Rosas odore et balsama,
Pretio lapillos indicos,
Mellis favos dulcedine.

Per vos patet gratissimum
Nostris asylum mentibus,
Non huc furor minantium
Unquam penetrat hostium.

Quot Jesus in Pretorio
Flagella nudus excipit!
Quot scissa pellis undique
Stillat cruoris guttulas!

Frontem venustam, proh dolor!
Corona pungit spinea,
Clavi retusa cuspide
Pedes manusque perforant.

Postquam sed ille tradidit
Amans volensque spiritum,
Pectus feritur lancea,
Geminusque liquor exilit.

Ut plena sit redemptio
Sub torculari stringitur,
Suique Jesus immemor,
Sibi nil reservat Sanguinis.

Venite, quotquot criminum
Funesta labes inficit:
In hoc salutis balneo
Qui se lavat, mundabitur.

Summi ad Parentis dexteram
Sedenti habenda est gratia,
Qui nos redemit Sanguine,
Sanctoque firmat Spiritu.

Which Henry Nutcombe Oxenham translated. According to the old Catholic Encyclopedia, Oxenham, although attracted to the Catholic Church, and defintely High Church, had troubles after his conversion, although he never reverted or left:

An English controversialist and poet, born at Harrow, 15 Nov., 1829; died at Kensington, 23 March, 1888; was the son of the Rev. William Oxenham, second master of Harrow. He was educated at Harrow School and Balliol College, Oxford, taking his degree in 1850. After receiving Anglican orders, he became curate first at Worminghall, in Buckinghamshire, then at St. Bartholomew's, Cripplegate. While at the latter place, he was received into the Church by Monsignor (afterwards Cardinal) Manning. For a time he contemplated becoming a priest, for which purpose he entered St. Edmund's College, Old Hall, but after receiving minor orders, he left: it is said that his reason was that he believed in the validity of Anglican orders, and considered himself already a priest. He continued to dress as an ecclesiastic and in this anomalous position he spent the remainder of his life. His ambition was to work for the reunion of the Anglican with the Catholic Church, with which end in view, he published a sympathetic article, in answer to Pusey's "Eirenicon", in the shape of a letter to his friend and fellow-convert, Father Lockhart . After the Vatican Council his position became still more anomalous, for his unwillingness to accept the doctrine of Papal Infallibility was known. Though influenced by the action of Dr. Döllinger, with whom he was on intimate terms, he never outwardly severed his connexion with the Catholic Church, and before his death received all the sacraments at the hands of Father Lockhart. His published works include: "The Sentence of Kaires and Poems" (3rd ed., London, 1871); Translation of Döllinger's "First Age of Christianity" (London, 1866, 2 vols: two subsequent editions) and "Lectures on Reunion" (London, 1872); "Catholic Eschatology" (1876; new edition, enlarged, 1878); "Memoir of Lieut. Rudolph de Lisle, R. N." (London, 1886); numerous pamphlets and articles, especially in "The Saturday Review", over the initials X. Y. Z.

He tried his vocation at the London Oratory and travelled to Germany for a long stay. Oxenham never married and was 58 when he died. As an aside, it is interesting that Balliol produced some other famous converts to Catholicism: Gerard Manley Hopkins, Hilaire Belloc, Ronald Knox, Graham Greene, and Christopher Hollis. Don't forget that Lord Peter Wimsey attended Balliol too, according to Dorothy L. Sayers!

Westminster Cathedral in London is dedicated to the Precious Blood of Jesus: DOMINE JESU REX ET REDEMPTOR PER SANGUINEM TUUM SALVA NOS (Lord Jesus, King and Redeemer, save us by your blood) !

In Honor of Corpus Christi @ The Morgan Library in NYC

Thanks to the Ad Imaginem Dei blog, I found out about a fascinating exhibit at the Morgan Library in New York City, focused on The Eucharist in Medieval Life and Art:

When Christ changed bread and wine into his body and blood at the Last Supper, he instituted the Eucharist and established the central act of Christian worship. For medieval Christians, the Eucharist (the sacrament of Communion) was not only at the heart of the Mass—but its presence and symbolism also wielded enormous influence over cultural and civic life. Featuring more than sixty-five exquisitely illuminated manuscripts, Illuminating Faith offers glimpses into medieval culture, and explores the ways in which artists of the period depicted the celebration of the sacrament and its powerful hold on society.

The exhibition presents some of the Morgan's finest works, including the Hours of Cardinal Alessandro Farnese, one of the greatest of all Books of Hours; the exquisite Preparation for Mass of Pope Leo X, which remained at the Vatican until it was looted by Napoleon's troops in 1798; a private prayer book commissioned by Anne de Bretagne, queen of France, for her son the dauphin, Charles-Orland; and a number of rarely-exhibited Missals. Also on display will be objects used in medieval Eucharistic rituals, such as a chalice, ciborium, pax, altar card, and monstrances.

This exhibition is made possible by Virginia M. Schirrmeister, with further generous support from the Janine Luke and Melvin R. Seiden Fund for Exhibitions and Publications, and from James Marrow and Emily Rose.

You can see selected images from the exhibition here and follow Margaret Duffy's detailed examination and interpretation of the exhibition on the Ad Imaginem Dei blog:

The exhibition is presented in a respectful and serious way, with wall cards and labeling providing orthodox explanations of the meaning of the Eucharist, including some words, such as transubstantiation, that are seldom heard in today’s culture. The more than sixty-five items in the show, drawn almost entirely from the Morgan’s own collections, offer views of many aspects of the iconography of the Eucharist, and go well beyond images of the Last Supper. It is organized around six themes: The Institution of the Eucharist; The Introduction of the Elevation; The Eucharist and the Old Testament; Domestic Devotion to the Eucharist; The Feast of Corpus Christi and Eucharistic Miracles. I will be discussing several of these themes in the next few days.

I don't know how many of the images might come from English sources, but it is important for me to note that before the English Reformation, as demonstrated by Eamon Duffy and others, Catholics in England were most devoted to the Holy Eucharist. As Peter Marshall notes:

Late medieval religion was profoundly sacramental, that is, it held that God's cleansing power (his ‘grace’) became available to people by being channelled through particular ritual actions, and forms of words, through special material objects and sacred places. There were seven official sacraments (baptism, confirmation, marriage, the ordination of priests, the anointing of the sick and dying, penance and the eucharist). The first five of these were essentially ‘rites of passage’, performed once to sanctify particular moments in an individual's life cycle. The other two – penance (the confessing of one's sins to a priest) and the eucharist (the ritual re-enactment of Christ's Last Supper in the ceremony known as the mass) – were endlessly repeated, serving continually to renew grace in the penitent sinner. The mass had a special place in the contemporary religious imagination. Here, uniquely, Christ became physically present among his people. Mass was said in Latin by a priest standing with his back to the congregation at a high altar situated at the far east end of the church (the chancel). He was separated from the lay people in the body (the nave) of the church by an elaborately carved semi-solid ‘rood screen’ (so-called because of the great crucifix or rood which surmounted it). When the priest repeated Jesus' words ‘This is my Body … This is my Blood’, the ‘elements’ used in the ritual ceased to be bread and wine and became the real body and blood of Christ, a daily miracle which the theologians referred to as transubstantiation. Lay people received the body of Christ in the form of a fine wheaten disc or ‘host’, but this communion was for most people infrequent, taking place usually once a year at Easter time. For the rest of the year there was greater emphasis on seeing the sacrament – at the moment of consecration when the priest elevated the host above his head, bells would be rung, candles lit and (according to later Protestant accounts at least) people would jostle with each other for the privilege of ‘seeing their Maker’. Popular belief held that people would not go blind or die suddenly on a day when they had gazed upon God.

The mass was not just an occasion for intense individual devotion, but also for the expression and restoration of social harmony. No one ‘out of charity’ with their neighbours was to be admitted to receive communion. The custom of annual confession in the week before Easter was designed to impel people to make amends to those they had wronged, as well as to clear their consciences before God. During the mass an engraved plate known as a pax (literally, peace) was passed round for the worshippers to kiss as a sign of being at peace with each other. The consecrated host was itself the most powerful symbol of unity (an idealized microcosm of the totality of Christian believers who, according to St Paul, constituted ‘one body in Christ’). On Corpus Christi, the special summer feast day of the body of Christ, the host was carried in elaborate procession through the streets of Bristol, Coventry, York and other places, a means of demonstrating, and of restoring, the social unity of towns all too given to faction and internal conflict.

And certainly after the English Reformation, especially after the great via media of Elizabeth I's reign was established, and attending Mass made illegal, and then being a priest in England being made an act of treason, the Catholic Mass was the emblem and desire of being a Catholic in England--and Catholics' desire to receive Holy Communion was so great that they would risk capture, arrest, imprisonment, torture, trial, and even execution to assist a Catholic priest (and the Catholic priest risked greatly himself of course)--but those Catholics were exceptional in that age--and would be or are in ours.

Rogation Days Before the Feast of the Ascension

Like Ember Days, the Rogation Days were taken out of the Catholic Church calendar after the Second Vatican Council. In a sad way, both of these omissions reflect our separation or alienation from nature. I've heard a commercial for a radio station's severe weather coverage that asks, "Don't you think the weather has just gotten out of control?" Out of whose control? We certainly do not have control of the weather--and even listening to that station's severe weather coverage does nothing to control it! As this site reminds us, and these Rogation Days before the Solemnity of the Ascension of our Lord would remind us, we are definitely not in control:

"Rogation" comes from the Latin "rogare," which means "to ask," and "Rogation Days" are days during which we seek to ask God's mercy, appease His anger, avert His chastisements manifest through natural disasters, and ask for His blessings, particularly with regard to farming, gardening, and other agricultural pursuits. They are set aside to remind us how radically dependent we are on Mother Earth, and how prayer can help protect us from nature's often cruel ways.

It is quite easy, especially for modern city folk, to sentimentalize nature and to forget how powerful, even savage, she can be. Time is spent focusing only on her lovelier aspects -- the beauty of snow, the smell of cedar, the glories of flowers -- as during Embertides -- but in an instant, the veneer of civilization we've built to keep nature under control so we can enjoy her without suffering at her hand can be swept away. Ash and fire raining down from great volcanoes, waters bursting through levees, mountainous tidal waves destroying miles of coastland and entire villages, meteors hurling to earth, tornadoes and hurricanes sweeping away all in their paths, droughts, floods, fires that rampage through forests and towns, avalanches of rocks or snow, killer plagues, the very earth shaking off human life and opening up beneath our feet, cataclysmic events forming mountains and islands, animals that prey on humans, lightning strikes -- these, too, are a part of the natural world. And though nature seems random and fickle, all that happens is either by God's active or passive Will, and all throughout Scripture He uses the elements to warn, punish, humble, and instruct us: earth swallowing up the rebellious, power-mad sons of Eliab; wind destroying Job's house; fire raining down on Sodom and Gomorrha; water destroying everyone but Noe and his family (Numbers 16, Job 1, Genesis 19, Genesis 6). We need to be humble before and respectful of nature, and be aware not to take her for granted or overstep our limits. But we need to be most especially humble before her Creator, Who wills her existence and doings at each instant, whether actively or passively.

As this website notes, as individuals, we can keep these minor Rogation Days, the Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday before Ascension Thursday (except that we instead celebrate Ascension Sunday), by praying the Litany of Saints, exploring the boundaries of our parishes, blessing our own gardens, and praying for good weather, good harvests, and good stewardship of our natural resources--all the while remembering Who is really in control! As Gerard Manley Hopkins reminds us:

THE WORLD is charged with the grandeur of God.
It will flame out, like shining from shook foil;
It gathers to a greatness, like the ooze of oil
Crushed. Why do men then now not reck his rod?
Generations have trod, have trod, have trod;
And all is seared with trade; bleared, smeared with toil;
And wears man’s smudge and shares man’s smell: the soil
Is bare now, nor can foot feel, being shod.
And for all this, nature is never spent;
There lives the dearest freshness deep down things;
And though the last lights off the black West went
Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs—
Because the Holy Ghost over the bent
World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.

Happy Octave of Easter! with John Mason Neale

Just like Christmas, Easter is not just a day--it is a season of the Church's Liturgical Year. There are forty days between Easter and the Ascension and ten more until Pentecost. Liturgically, each day in the Octave of Easter is Easter Sunday, and so the hymnology of the Easter Season warrants some posts. And just as I did last Christmas, I'll focus on John Mason Neale's hymns and translations. He translated this hymn from the Greek by Saint John of Damascus, the great defender of Icons:

The day of resurrection! Earth, tell it out abroad;
The Passover of gladness, the Passover of God.
From death to life eternal, from earth unto the sky,
Our Christ hath brought us over, with hymns of victory.

Our hearts be pure from evil, that we may see aright
The Lord in rays eternal of resurrection light;
And listening to His accents, may hear, so calm and plain,
His own “All hail!” and, hearing, may raise the victor strain.

Now let the heavens be joyful! Let earth the song begin!
Let the round world keep triumph, and all that is therein!
Let all things seen and unseen their notes in gladness blend,
For Christ the Lord hath risen, our joy that hath no end.

Holy Week Break

I'm taking a break the rest of this week to observe Holy Week and the Triduum.

I'll be back during the Easter Octave!

God bless you all.

Music For Holy Week

Stile Antico has another new CD, which I'll be listening to starting tomorrow, called Passion & Resurrection:

Stile Antico's seventh recording focuses on the dramatic events of Holy Week, retracing in music the journey from Palm Sunday to Easter Sunday. Twelve different composers are represented in an enthralling programme encompassing the English, Flemish and Spanish Renaissance. At the heart of the disc are twin settings of the mediaeval carol Woefully Arrayed: one by William Cornysh (1465-1523), and one commissioned in 2009 especially for Stile Antico by British composer John McCabe (b. 1939) and recorded here for the first time.

The CD contains performances of:

1. Cornysh: Woefully Arrayed
2. Gibbons: Hosanna to the Son of David
3. Tallis: O sacrum convivium
4. Lassus: In monte Oliveti
5. Morales: O crux, ave
6. Victoria: O vos omnes
7. John McCabe: Woefully Arrayed
8. Taverner: Dum transisset
9. Guerrero: Maria Magdalene
10. Byrd: In resurrectione tua
11. Lheritier: Surrexit pastor bonus
12. Gibbons: I am the Resurrection
13. Crecquillon: Congratulamini mihi

The CD folder and booklet are beautifully illustrated, with pictures of the Risen Christ, Christ the Man of Sorrows, and border details from fifteenth century English Books of Hours.

First Things featured William Cornysh's "Woefully Arrayed" yesterday:

Woefully arrayed
My blood, man for thee ran, it may not be nayed;
My body, blo and wan;
Woefully arrayed.

Behold me, I pray thee
with all thy whole reason
and be not hard-hearted,
and for this encheason,
sith I for thy soul sake
was slain in good season,
Beguiled and betrayed
by Judas’ false treason,
unkindly entreated,
with sharp cord sore freted,
the Jews me threated,
they mowed, they grinned,
they scorned me,
condem’d to death as thou may’st see;
Woefully arrayed.

Thus naked am I nailed.
O man, for thy sake;
I love thee, then love me,
why sleepst thou, awake,
remember my tender heartroot for thee brake;
with pains my veins constrained to crake;
thus tugged to and fro,
thus wrapped all in woe,
whereas never man was so entreated,
thus in most cruel wise
was like a lamb offer’d in sacrifice;
Woefully arrayed.

Of sharp thom I have worn
a crown on my head.
So pained, so strained, so rueful, so red,
thus bobbed, thus robbed,
thus for thy love dead;
unfeigned, not deigned,
my blood for to shed,
my feet and handes sore
the sturdy nailes bore;
what might I suffer more,
than I have done, O man, for thee?
Come when thou list, welcome to me!
Woefully arrayed.

John McCabe comments on his version of "Woefully Arrayed" here:

Woefully arrayed is a supreme choral setting by William Cornysh, Junior, who died in 1523, of a text usually regarded as of anonymous composition, though there have been some attributions to John Skelton. It is a thoughtful, powerful meditation on Christ on the Cross, and though Cornysh's setting has remarkable intensity and contrapuntal artistry, I felt a strong wish to add my own response to this fine text. The different versions of it have different verses - that used by Cornysh has three verses (plus the refrain), while there are others with four or even five (one attributted to Skelton has five). I have chosen to restrict myself to the three used by Cornysh, using my own adaptation of the modernised words which yet incorporates some archaisms - a deliberate choice for reasons of rhythm and verbal sound.