liturgy
Meaning of “Assist at Mass”
March 2, 2011
Recently I composed an ebook with tips for newcomers at the Extraordinary Form. One of the topics I included was an explanation of the meaning of the phrase, “assist at Mass” because I’ve met so many Catholics who have never heard it. This post is an expansion of my short treatment in the ebook. You might find this explanation helpful and interesting, too.
One of the six precepts of the Church is “to keep the Sundays and Holy Days of obligation holy, by hearing Mass and resting from servile work” (New Advent Catholic Encyclopedia). We had to memorize these precepts when I was a child and I remember it as “to assist at Mass on all Sundays and holy days of obligation.”
Other sources use the words “attend Mass”, but that doesn’t really capture what the Church wants to accomplish with this precept. We can “attend Mass” in our bodies, but our minds and hearts could be at the office, the lake, on the golf course, or at soccer practice.
“Assist at Mass” has been used for many years, but the term has fallen by the wayside since the 1970s. You will hear people attending the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite use it to describe what they do when attending Mass. The term could equally be used to describe what people do when attending the Novus Ordo.
Assisting at Mass is bound to the Catholic concept of the priesthood. The theological meaning of the sacred priesthood is manifold, but a central point is that a man is ordained a priest specifically to offer sacrifice. In the Catholic religion that means the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass where the priest immolates the Sacred Victim (Christ) in an unbloody manner at the altar during the Consecration.
The other priesthood is the priesthood of the laity. One way we exercise this priesthood is by assisting at Mass. But what does this mean?
The laity “assist” at Mass not in that they “help” the priest because the priest needs no “help” – that is not the meaning of “assist.” Rather it means to participate mentally, spiritually, and physically in the sacred mysteries in the role proper to the non-ordained. This is the meaning of participatio actuosa which we find in the Vatican II document on the liturgy, Sacrosanctum Concilium.
We laity, through the sacrament of Baptism, are consecrated to a common priesthood. By virtue of this sacrament we share in the priesthood of Christ and along with the ordained priest at Mass we offer the Divine Victim to the Father. We offer ourselves to the Father as members of Christ’s mystical body as well. All the Faithful, both the immolating priest and the laity assisting, join ranks in completing the Holy Sacrifice by the priestly action of consuming the Victim through reception of Holy Communion.
This sheds new light on the Church’s precept: we are obliged to exercise our priestly role on all Sundays and Holy Days of obligation. A lot to ponder here.
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R. Now and forever. Amen.
(Click on the link above to read why I am ending my posts with this.)
St. John of Matha and the Captives
February 8, 2011
St. John of Matha, Laurent de La Hire (1606-1656, Paris), oil on canvas and wood, Musée du Louvre, Paris
Today’s 1962 calendar celebrates the feast of St. John of Matha (1160-1213). Pope Innocent III approved his founding of the Order of the Most Holy Trinity (the Trinitarians) in 1198 for the purpose of ransoming captives from the Muslims. His community spread throughout France, Italy, England, Spain, and into north Africa where they were able to free many slaves. The ones well enough to be sent home went, but the Trinitarians were allowed to remain in north Africa to care for the ones too old or ill to go home.
Today’s feast is a reminder that slavery is far from over. Not only is slave labor practiced in the Sudan, Niger, Somalia, Chad, Nigeria, Kenya, India, Pakistan, Nepal, and Indonesia to name a few states, sex slavery is rampant in those countries as well as Cambodia, Thailand, middle Europe, Africa and the Middle East to name a few more.
One of the most concerning developments in the saga of human trafficking is the heavy trans-Atlantic sex trade and the growth of sex slave hubs such as Houston, Texas where United States politics facilitates transporting illegal immigrants by illegal immigrants for the sole purpose of prostituting girls as young as 11 or 12. Murder of these women is not uncommon if they are a threat to discovery. Our country, therefore, belongs on the list of countries facilitating human trafficking.
The scams worked on the slaves to get them here and keep them hidden are as varied as the evil human heart can devise. If the full numbers were to be discovered, every decent person would fall to his knees in a collective wail of anguish on the spot.
The Corporal Works of Mercy
Our time is St. John of Matha’s time to the nth degree. If ever we needed the intercession of a saint opposed to slavery it is now, and he is one we can turn to. He is a great example of living a corporal work of mercy which, unfortunately, was left out of the Catechism of the Catholic Church – #2447. (Every Catholic family should have a copy of this in the home for study and reference.) But just because it isn’t there doesn’t mean it doesn’t apply. In fact, it applies now more than ever.
You can find the seven corporal works of mercy listed in the Baltimore Catechism and the Catholic Encyclopedia. These are the ones I memorized in second grade, thanks to those good nuns who made sure we kids knew Church teaching.
They are to:
- Feed the hungry
- Give drink to the thirsty,
- Clothe the naked,
- Ransom the captive
- Harbor the harborless (shelter the homeless)
- Visit the sick
- Bury the dead
We cannot buy people out of sex or hard labor slavery today. The people enslaving others keep it hidden as much as possible because it is so lucrative – really dirty money but they get to live very high. Sometimes their governments protect the slavers. Pimps are slavers, too, holding their slaves captive by hooking them on drugs and beating them.
Government policies not to negotiate with terrorists negates buying people out of captivity, though private businesses and families have ransomed Somali pirate captives in recent years. So how can we ransom the captives today?
Ransoming captives is not a thing of the past.
The answer is by fasting and praying, assisting law enforcement in discovering traffickers, pressuring governments to stop human trafficking, speaking out against it wherever we can, sealing our borders and obeying our immigration laws, and helping in rescue efforts if we are able. We might submit a Mass stipend for the Holy Sacrifice to be offered for an end to human trafficking. Most of us can at least do the fasting and praying part if God has not called us to other ways of combating this dehumanizing crime.
The other slavery we need to ransom others from is slavery to sin. We are all captives of sin unless we struggle daily against the wiles of the devil. Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, attendance at Mass whenever we can, offering up our pain and suffering for the salvation of souls, frequent Confession, daily prayer – all of these actions are spiritual almsgiving and a work of mercy.
St. John of Matha, pray for us and for all of God’s children who are enslaved physically or spiritually.
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R. Now and forever. Amen.
(Click on the link above to read why I am ending my posts with this.)
Sub Tuum Praesidium
February 4, 2011
Since we celebrated the Presentation this week, I want to bring you a gorgeous rendition of this ancient prayer to the Blessed Mother by Dimitri Bortniansky. I love the Byzantine liturgical music – so solemn and holy.
Sub Tuum Praesidium dates from between 250 and 280, predating the Hail Mary. It is found as an antiphon at the hour of Compline in the Divine Office. You can read more about this at New Liturgical Movement. I have unashamedly stolen this video from the wonderful article by Henri de Villiers, Paris. If you like Byzantine music, you may want to check out oiscandero’s submissions at YouTube.
The literal translation from the Latin:
Under your
patronage
we take refuge
Holy Mother of God;
our petitions,
do not despise
in necessities,
but of all dangers
deliver us always
glorious Virgin
& Blessed.
Choir directors: the article at New Liturgical Movement contains a downloadable page of Marc Antoine Charpentier’s (1643 † 1704) composition of this prayer.
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R. Now and forever. Amen.
(Click on the link above to read why I am ending my posts with this.)
Epiphany – Celebration of Three Manifestations of Christ’s Divinity
January 6, 2010
The Breslauer Epiphany - Don Simone Camaldolese, 1390s, Tempera and gold on parchment, Bernard H. Breslauer, New York
January 6 was a favorite feast day for me when I was a child. It was a holy day of obligation in those days, which made it a bid deal in my little kid’s mind.
The idea that three kings would make a long journey through the desert guided by a star on pure faith clicked a romantic spot in my brain. We were taught about the gold, frankincense, and myrrh they brought as gifts, but the significance of the gifts never registered in my child’s brain. It just seemed quite wondrous and exciting that three important men from far away somehow knew that Jesus was so important they embarked on a long and tiring journey to bring Him expensive presents fit for a king.
I could see them in their fine robes sitting on their camels with the bright light slowly moving through the night sky guiding them many miles to the stable of Bethlehem. The jaunty hymn “We Three Kings of Orient Are” was fun to sing, but we never got past the first verse to the symbolic meaning of the gifts, or if we did, the importance flew past me.
Threefold Epiphanies
To me, Epiphany meant only the three Kings bringing Jesus gifts. I didn’t know the meaning of the word, and the inclusion of the Baptism of Christ and the wedding at Cana as part of the feast went right over my head, even though there it was plain and simple in the sacred liturgy.
Now that I’m grown up, I understand that “epiphany” comes from a Greek word meaning “to manifest”, referring to an encounter with the Divine. The Church calls our attention not only to the three Wise Men visiting Jesus, she invites us in the antiphon of the Benedictus to contemplate Christ’s Baptism in the Jordan when the Holy Spirit appeared in the form of a dove and announced Jesus as the Son of God. The same antiphon mentions the wedding feast of Cana where Jesus revealed His power over all the earth by changing water into the finest wine. This occasion of Christ beginning His public ministry was the beginning of many epiphanies for those who encountered Him.
Baptism of Christ in the Jordan, 1716, Jacob de Wit (b. 1695, Amsterdam, d. 1754, Amsterdam), Chalk and pen drawing, Amstelkring Museum, Amsterdam
Takeaways from the Epiphany
In all three cases, God is doing the manifesting to us. He is the initiator. We are the receiver of the grace.
The Wise Men: They were the first gentiles to recognize Christ in His divinity. Jesus looked like an ordinary infant, but He revealed Himself as God. How many times a day does Jesus reveal Himself to us in the ordinary, and do we look for Him “undercover” as it were, quietly working His miracles for us?
Baptism in the Jordan: The Father reveals Jesus as His Son through the Holy Spirit. Everybody around saw and heard this manifestation. Today we see Christ by faith in the seven sacraments. By Baptism we are His brothers and sisters. Would our heavenly Father say to us individually through the Holy Spirit, “You are my beloved son (daughter) in whom I am well pleased”? If not, we have some work to do with the help of our Divine Brother.
Cana: Jesus reveals Himself as Lord of all, not with flashing lights, trumpet blasts and drum rolls. He did it quietly with a blessing of water, changing it into wine. Jesus works quietly in us. Do we take the time to recognize His work and celebrate what He is doing in our lives like the wedding guests at Cana? Or are we too busy being “in charge” and trusting ourselves only?
Today is a rich feast. I wonder if it really ought to have lost its status as a holy day of obligation.
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R. Now and forever. Amen.
(Click on the link above to read why I am ending my posts with this.)
O Antiphons
December 16, 2010
Tomorrow we begin the wonderful O Antiphons, chanted before and after the Magnificat at Vespers. Last Advent I posted the antiphon for each day with a short commentary. Please join me in using these links every day to pray the O Antiphons again this year.
December 17: O Sapientia – O Wisdom
December 19: O Radix Jesse – O Root of Jesse
December 20: O Clavis David – O Key of David
December 21: O Rising Dawn – O Oriens
December 22: O Rex Gentium – O King of the Gentiles
Most Catholics are familiar with the Advent hymn “O come, O come Emmanuel”. The O Antiphons are the source of this hymn. Here is the great Hungarian composer, Zoltan Kodaly’s rendering of the Gregorian chant with polyphony by L’Accorche-Choeur, Ensemble vocal Fribourg. Wouldn’t you love to hear this at your parish?
Thank you for stopping by and God bless you.
R. Now and forever. Amen.
(Click on the link above to read why I am ending my posts with this.)
Pie Jesu Domine
November 7, 2010
Since we are celebrating the Poor Souls in Purgatory throughout the month of November, I want to bring you a very beautiful prayer the Church offers on their behalf.
Many contemporary artists have recorded well-executed renditions of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s aria, Pie Jesu. However, many people don’t realize that this Latin prayer is more than a pretty aria. It is the final verse of the great Dies Irae, the sequence from the Requiem Mass. No prayer of the Catholic sacred liturgy has been set to music more often over the centuries than the Dies Irae.
I have a somewhat respectable collection of Requiem Masses that I like to listen to, composed by various greats from the 13th century on, but at the top of my favorites is Gabriel Fauré’s.
Fauré in his later years was widely acknowledged as the leading French composer of his day. He was deeply gifted with an ability to compose art songs, sacred choral music, piano, orchestral and organ works. For many years he was the organist for the famous Church of the Madeleine and head of the Paris Conservatory. So for those who have heard only Webber’s composition, I offer you the pure voice of a boy soprano from Kings College Chapel Choir, Cambridge, singing this masterpiece of an exceptional 19-20th century composer.
Collect, 17th Sunday After Pentecost
September 23, 2010
Basic image: (c)Tomo.Yun (www.yunphoto.net/en/)
The Church’s prayers always inspire me – short but full of meaning. In this one we are reminded how sneaky and underhanded the devil is and we plead for the wisdom and strength to turn our backs on him. Shunning the wiles of the devil means keeping good company and avoiding occasions of sin.
We ask for a pure mind – that single-mindedness that keeps us focused on our final destination, our desires uncluttered by distractions of the world.
Perhaps the most comforting phrase in this short prayer is “the only God”. We are so fortunate to know with absolute certainty that we follow the Him, the all powerful, all knowing, and all loving God Who desires only the best for us and keeps us through day and night as the apple of His eye. We adore the great “I Am” who showed Himself to Moses in the burning bush.
The beauty of the sacred liturgy is that it is the prayer of the whole Church for all. Even if we are prevented from assisting at Mass, the prayers are made on our behalf and we benefit from them.
R. Now and forever. Amen.
(Click on the link above to read why I am ending my posts with this.)
Prayer from 8th Sunday after Pentecost
July 20, 2010
The Church prays her sacred liturgy as the words of all true believers. We can never go wrong when we address God through her official prayers. They are chanted in the name of all in her Body, which is the mystical Body of Christ. The thought that all the baptized are members of this Body is truly awesome to contemplate, and we should do our best to help others to become part of it that they may find the great spiritual joy we have.
From the rising to the setting of the sun all over the earth, the Holy Sacrifice is re-presented to our heavenly Father and we benefit from all the graces that come from this perpetual offering. There is not one moment in time that the Church is not praying and there is not one prayer in the sacred liturgy that fails to show a right relationship with our Father. By praying these words attentively and with all our heart, we are imitating Christ just as much as we imitate Him by doing good to others.
When we pray the sacred liturgy we need never fear that our prayers are not good enough, or that we are praying for the wrong thing, or that our prayers lack sufficient merit, because it is Christ Himself offering the prayers. This is why our sacred liturgy is infinitely pleasing to the Father. With this in mind I take great comfort in the Sunday collect (prayer) which is prayed often in the liturgy throughout the week. This past Sunday’s prayer is much needed in our day.
Graciously grant to us, we beseech Thee, O Lord, the spirit to think and do always such things as are rightful: that we, who cannot exist without Thee, may be enabled to live according to Thy will. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, who lives and reigns with Thee in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God, world without end. Amen.
How can our heavenly Father not grant this to us? We are asking that our minds and bodies be infused with the Holy Spirit so that we do only that which is just in His eyes and think only of that which is in accord with His law. We can be confident that God will give us what we ask for because we are asking for exactly what He wants to give us. This prayer opens our hearts to Him, He who is deserving of all our love, honor, and worship.
In today’s age with the supreme arrogance of man wafting over airwaves and satellite day and night, the Church admits (and we with Her) that we cannot exist, and in fact would not exist at all without the power of our Creator. This humble acknowledgment is the simple truth, and when we pray in total humility, we honor our Father who is offended by those who act as if all power comes from themselves. Moreover, this just prayer benefits all humanity. We ask these things from God not only for ourselves, but for all our fellow men everywhere. As God was willing to spare Sodom and Gomorrah if Abraham could find only ten righteous men (Gen. 18), so the humble prayers of the few bring grace to the many.
We ask to be enabled to live according to the Father’s will. We can do this only if we practice daily surrender to His providence and keep our eyes fixed on Christ, our Teacher and Savior. The entire world becomes a better place when even one person becomes better at thinking and acting like Christ, doing the Father’s will. It’s the ripple effect of good that, if strong, can collide with and turn back the ripples of evil. The effects of this prayer will be hidden from those who have eyes that do not see (Ez. 12: 2, Jer. 5: 21, Ps. 135: 16, Ps. 115: 5) but will be obvious to those who strive towards God, trusting in His care.
The Pope as Liturgist
June 25, 2010
The May, 2010 issue of Inside the Vatican published Vincent Twomey’s opening address for the first International Liturgical Conference on the theme Pope Benedict XVI and the Sacred Liturgy. Held on Fota Island, Co. Cork, July 12th-13th, 2008, the conference marked a new beginning in the restoration of the Catholic sacred liturgy. Although this occurred two years ago, Twomey’s address titled “Pope as Leitourgos” is worth revisiting in light of the world’s current mad exaltation of every corrupt deviance in man which appears to be heading towards an explosive and disastrous crescendo.
Twomey first summarizes Pope Benedict’s commentary on Romans 15:16, which reveals St. Paul’s understanding of his own mission, quoting from the Pope’s sermon from the Solemnity of Saints Peter and Paul in 2008:
[Paul knows he has been called 'to be a leitourgos of Christ Jesus for the Gentiles, serving the Gospel of God as a priest, so that the pagans become an acceptable offering, sanctified by the Holy Spirit.' Only in this passage does Paul use the [Greek] word heirourgein – serving as a priest – together with leitourgos – liturgist. Paul speaks of the cosmic liturgy, in which the world of men itself must become worship of God, an offering in the Holy Spirit. When the whole world will have become the liturgy of God, when in its reality it will have become adoration, then it will have reached its goal; then it will be whole and saved. And this is the ultimate objective of St. Paul’s apostolic mission and of ours. It is to such a mystery that the Lord calls us. let us pray in this hour that he may help us carry it out in the right way, to become true liturgists of Jesus Christ. Amen.
In this statement Pope Benedict identifies his mission as Pope with St. Paul’s mission. Twomey then remarks that the above quote “sums up… the central concerns of the theology that Joseph Ratzinger had systematically developed over the course of his life as a theologian.” He says that even when speaking or writing on other subjects, especially creation, “the liturgy found a central place in his writings.”
Twomey addresses a core point in the Pope’s theology:
The first account of creation in Genesis has nothing to do with how we were created (such as is proposed by the scientific theory of evolution). its message, rather, is to convey to the reader why we were created. According to Ratzinger, the cosmos has been brought into existence for one thing only: worship.
More precisely, God called the cosmos into being so that humanity could share in God’s Sabbath rest and hence experience that life is good, and that creation, especially humanity, is very good. In the Old Testament, creation and covenant form a unity.
In other words, God created humanity so that he might enter into a covenant relationship with us, so that he might heal our infirmities and restore us to the relationship that he intended from the beginning of the world: union with him in Christ, the source of that joy which God intends for humanity and which is the object of the Church’s mission.
As Ratzinger reminds us, St. Paul expressed it in another way: “the whole of creation has been groaning in travail together until now.” Paul was acutely conscious that “the creation itself will be set free from bondage to decay and obtain the glorious liberty of the children of God” (Romans 8: 21-22).
After making a number of excellent points about the Pope’s writings on the liturgy, he closes with this:
But the Pope’s concern for a true reform of the liturgy is also expressed in the care and attention he gives to every celebration of Holy Mass according to the new rite over which he presides as Pope.
Today he teaches the Church not only by words but also by example.
As I was reading this address I couldn’t help being reminded of the core truth: that God created everything for the purpose of worship of Him. Unless and until we are willing to fall on our knees before Him with a clear interior disposition of awe and reverence, we deceive ourselves about our own importance and power. Moreover, the sacred liturgy is the work of the Body of Christ, designed to bring us individually and corporately into a right relationship with God. It belongs to no one individual but to the Mystical Body as a whole.
I also thought of the nonsense put out by various gurus of positive thinking. Things like telling people they should stand in front of the mirror and say “Every day in every way I am getting better and better”, and writing books with the theme: “Think and Grow Rich” and other topics designed to give the impression that we are our own masters. These promisers of earthly success and delights enrich themselves while never pointing to Christ Who is our only true hope. We achieve our highest calling when we lose ourselves in God in trustful surrender and praise. Nothing else matters that much in comparison.
St. Ephrem, Harp of the Holy Ghost
June 18, 2010
I was born in the way of Truth: Though my childhood was unaware of the greatness of the benefit, I knew it when trial came.
Today is the feast of St. Ephrem, the Prophet of the Syrians, Harp of the Holy Ghost, Father of Hymnody, Mary’s Own Singer, and other grand titles including Doctor of the Church. He lived from around 306-373 and we are very fortunate to still have large remnants of his writings.
You might think that anything he wrote so long ago be would be old-fashioned or irrelevant to today’s world, but like all the Doctors of the Church, St. Ephrem’s writings get down to the simplicity and truth of life as found in sacred Scripture. Here is part of a poem he wrote:
There lie those who improved their complexions,
And artfully disguised their faces;
There lie those who painted their eyelids,
And the worm corrodes their eyes…
There lie those who were enemies,
And their bones are mingled together.
The scroll St. Ephrem holds in the icon above says: “Take thou refuge in God, who passes not away nor is changed.” He wrote about the Holy Eucharist, Penance, the primacy of Peter, about the Blessed Virgin and the sufferings of Christ.
St. Ephrem is known as “The Deacon of Edessa” and is the only male Doctor of the Church who was not ordained a priest or bishop. He lived for some time as a hermit and wrote many poems illustrating the doctrines of Christianity. This beautiful work from the Nativity series gives words to Mary:
The babe that I carry carries me, saith Mary, and He has lowered His wings, and taken and placed me between His pinions, and mounted into the air; and a promise has been given me that height and depth shall be my Son’s… [O Lord Jesus,] In her virginity Eve put on the leaves of shame: Thy Mother put on in her virginity the Garment of Glory that suffices for all. She gave the little vest of the body to Him that covers all.
Blessed is she in whose heart and mind Thou wast! A King’s palace she was by Thee, O Son of the King, and a Holy of Holies by Thee, O High Priest!
St. Ephrem organized choirs of women and taught them verses to replace the heretical hymns of Bardesanes, a Syrian writer of the early 3rd century who had written 150 of them, while keeping the music. Today many of the hymns of St. Ephrem are part of the Syrian liturgy.
Pope Benedict XV proclaimed him a Doctor of the Church on October 5, 1920.
Below is a YouTube recording of John Tavener’s Ikon of the Nativity taken from St. Ephrem’s Nativity hymns. Tavener is a convert to the Orthodox Church and has written a great deal of music for its liturgy that I think is utterly heavenly. You can also find a recording of a Maronite choir singing St. Ephrem’s Hymn of Light. Unfortunately, embedding is impossible. Just type in “Hymns of St. Ephrem” and it will come up.
Given the deplorable and sometimes heretical hymns foisted upon Catholics since the 1960s, perhaps it would be wise to call on the patronage of St. Ephrem in the restoration of the sacred liturgy.
Good Friday Reproaches – Victoria
April 1, 2010
Tomás Luis de Victoria
The most spiritually impressive part of the Good Friday sacred liturgy for me as a child were the Reproaches, chanted during the adoration of the cross. This is not to say the chanting of the Passion and the Great Intercessions were not equally impressive, but the music and words of the Reproaches took the prayers of the liturgy to a much higher level for me.
As I was always in the choir from first grade on, the Gregorian chant is well engraved in my brain. However, some great composers have also written music for the Reproaches. Tomás Luis de Victoria and Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina are two well-known names representing the kind of music the fathers of Vatican Council II wanted to preserve.
The Reproaches, otherwise known as the Improperia or Popule Meus are twelve in number. I had intended to post each one with some commentary, but the death of my Mother last week intervened so the project will have to wait until next year.
Today I have the best partial recording (the first three Reproaches) I could find of Victoria’s composition with choir and cantor. Two choirs are traditionally used to sing alternately in Greek first and then in Latin the words most people today associate with the Chaplet of Divine Mercy and which are repeated throughout the Reproaches: O holy God! O holy mighty One! O holy immortal One, have mercy upon us! As was often done by composers of his time, Victoria alternated Gregorian chant with polyphony.
For those who are too ill to attend the traditional Good Friday liturgy, listening to Victoria’s Improperia and following along in a missal is a good option if you are able. In fact, carving out time to read the entire Good Friday liturgy and meditating on it would bring many graces to those who wish to join with Mary, the holy women, and John spiritually at the foot of the cross on this day.
A little about the composer: Victoria (c. 1548 – 27 August 1611) was one of the most important composers of the Renaissance along with Palestrina and Orlando de Lassus. He is a glory of Spain, having written music for many feasts including Marian solemnities. Victoria was ordained a priest in 1574 and served the Church in both Italy and Spain in various capacities. He died in 1611 and was buried at the Monasterio de las Descalzas de Santa Clara at Madrid but his grave unfortunately remains unidentified.
Last week I posted Popule Meus by Jose Angel Lamas which is also very beautiful and appropriate for the sacred liturgy.
Sixth Station: Veronica Wipes the Face of Jesus
March 15, 2010
Veronica Wipes the Face of Jesus
V. We adore Thee, O Christ, and we praise Thee.
R. Because by Thy holy cross Thou hast redeemed the world.
Lo, we have seen Him and there is no beauty in Him nor comeliness; He is despised and the most abject of men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with infirmity. His countenance is, as it were, hidden, whereupon we esteemed Him not. His appearance is inglorious among men, and His form among children of men. And yet, He is the beautiful one above all the sons of men, and by His bruises we are healed.1
V. Turn not Thy face away from us.
R. And withdraw not from Thy servants in Thine anger.2
Let Us Pray
O God, who dost renew us to Thine image / by the precious blood of Jesus Christ Thy Son: / lead our footsteps in Thy paths, / so that we may truly obtain the gift of Thy divine charity. / Through the same Christ our Lord. Amen.3
Hymn: Make me feel as thou hast felt; make my soul to glow and melt with love of Christ my Lord.
1 Third Responsory, Tenebrae of Holy Thursday, Is. 53: 3, 52: 14, Ps. 44: 3. 2 Ps. 26: 9. 3 Secret, “For Charity”.
Tenebrae, meaning “darkness”, is the name given to the liturgy of the Divine Office – Matins and Lauds – on the last three days of Holy Week. It is sung around 3 p.m. on the eve of the day to which it belongs. During this service, the lights are gradually put out, a practice dating from the fifth century. On Holy Saturday the church is in darkness from the beginning to the end of the service except for a single candle near the lectern to read by. These three days commemorate the death of Jesus and the time of His entombment with the liturgy conducted in a spirit and demonstration of mourning. Tenebrae is a lengthy service observed in monasteries and in a few parish churches or oratorios where the public may take part.
O Emmanuel
December 23, 2009
O Emmanuel, Rex et Legifer noster, exspectatio gentium, et salvator earum; veni ad salvandum nos, Domine Deus noster.
O Emmanuel, our King and Lawgiver, the Expectation and Savior of the nations, come and save us, O Lord our God.
Isaiah 7:14: Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign. Behold a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son and his name shall be called Emmanuel.
Isaiah: 33: 22: For the Lord is our judge, the Lord is our lawgiver, the Lord is our king: he will save us.
Emmanuel means “God with us”. Jesus promised He would be with us until the end of time. We find him in the Holy Eucharist. We receive Him into our hearts at Holy Communion. We ask him to come and rule over our hearts, to help us to live according to His laws. We await His coming this Christmas with great expectation.
And how will we know He has come? We see him in the arms of Mary, the virgin of virgins, the most holy and perfect virgin. She presents Emmanuel to us to bow down before and adore.
O Rex Gentium
December 22, 2009
O Rex gentium, et desideratus earum, lapisque angularis, qui facis utraque unum; veni, et salva hominem quem de limo formasti.
O King of nations, and their desired One, and the cornerstone that makest both one; come and save man whom Thou formed out of clay.
Isaiah 9:7: His empire shall be multiplied, and there shall be no end of peace: he shall sit upon the throne of David, and upon his kingdom; to establish it and strengthen it with judgment and with justice, from henceforth and for ever: the zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this.
Haggai 2: 7-9: And I will move all nations: and the Desired of all nations shall come: and I will fill this house with glory: saith the Lord of hosts. The silver is mine, and the gold is mine, saith the Lord of hosts. Great shall be the glory of this last house more than of the first, saith the Lord of hosts: and in this place I will give peace, saith the Lord of hosts.
Eph. 2: 14-16: For he is our peace, who hath made both one, and breaking down the middle wall of partition, the enmities in his flesh: Making void the law of commandments contained in decrees; that he might make the two in himself into one new man, making peace; And might reconcile both to God in one body by the cross…
Eph. 2: 19-20: Now therefore you are no more strangers and foreigners; but you are fellow citizens with the saints, and the domestics of God, built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone…
Gen. 2: 7: And the Lord God formed man of the clay of the earth: and breathed into his face the breath of life, and man became a living soul.
Jesus comes to unite all Israel and the Gentiles into one body by the Cross of salvation. He is the cornerstone upon which the family of God is built. In today’s antiphon, we ask Him to save us – to reshape us, reform us, take away our sins, to change us into what He wants us to be, we who were formed out of clay.
O Oriens
December 21, 2009
O oriens, splendor lucis aeternae, et sol justitiae; veni et illumina sedentes in tenebris, et umbra mortis.
O Orient, splendor of eternal light, and Sun of justice, come and enlighten them that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death.
Isaiah 9:2: The people that walked in darkness, have seen a great light: to them that dwelt in the region of the shadow of death, light is risen.
Oriens means dawn, the sun rising in the east. Sometimes it is called “Dayspring”. From the earliest days of the Church, Mass was celebrated ad orientem, that is, facing east from whence we know the Savior will come again.
We seek the light that is Christ in our daily lives – our prayer, our work, and our sufferings and joys. Jesus is waiting for us to ask Him to light the way.
We seek the Sun of justice. He is coming again to give all men their due. With His help we say “yes” to love and will merit eternal life.
John 8:12 …I am the light of the world: he that followeth me, walketh not in darkness, but shall have the light of life.
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