Holy Saturday 2017 Photopost (Part 1)

Our Holy Week photopost series continues with images of the liturgies of Holy Saturday. Many thanks once again to those who sent them in - Evangelize though beauty!

St Vincent Ferrer - New York City

Prince of Peace - Steelton, Pennsylvania

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CMAA Ward Method Courses – Summer 2017

Have you wondered about the Ward Method? Thought it might change the way you teach music with children? For the better? Did you do the basic course and you want to take it further?

The Church Music Association of America (CMAA) is offering you a chance to find out about Ward and take your practice deeper this summer at Duquesne University in Pittsburgh, June 26-30, 2017.

There will be two courses offered.

Ward Method I - That All May Sing will be taught by Scott Turkington. Participants will learn the basic principles and the practice of this method developed by Justine Ward in the early 20th century and how it can be used with our 21st century children. Its fundamental principle is that all children can learn to sing, not just those with natural gifts.

Ward Method II - Intermediate moves beyond the first year. Wilko Brouwers will share his expertise and experience with the method to pass on more advanced techniques. It will expand on the training in Ward Method I.

Both Scott Turkington and Wilko Brouwers are experienced and gifted teachers, not only of children, but of teachers as well.

The CMAA is convinced that this method has great value for developing future generations of singers, both those in the choirs and those in the pews. You can be part of that project.

Participants in CMAA Ward courses will receive a copy of the newest CMAA publication, Now I Walk In Beauty, a new songbook collection by Wilko Brouwers for use with Ward teaching.

You can learn more details about the courses and register at musica.sacra.com by following this link: CMAA Summer Courses. Help the past and the present build our musical future!

(Please note that CMAA Ward courses are not affiliated with the Ward Centre.)

Photos from last year’s courses.

The Fraction Rite of Good Friday

This article concludes this series on the rites of Good Friday. The previous articles may be read at the following links: part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4.

In 1956, Fathers Annibale Bugnini and Carlo Braga published in the Ephemerides Liturgicae a commentary on the Holy Week reform which Pope Pius XII had promulgated late in the previous year. Considering that it is supposed to explain changes which were by far the most significant made to the Tridentine Missal since its first publication in 1570, it is weirdly (one might almost say ‘oppressively’) reticent about what exactly was done and why.

Nowhere is this more the case than where it treats of the last part of the Good Friday liturgy, the so-called “Mass of the Presanctified.” The commentary concerns itself almost entirely with the question of distributing Holy Communion to the faithful, which before 1956 had not been done for centuries. However, even assuming that it was wise, opportune or necessary to restore this, it has nothing to do with the ceremony itself. There is no reason why Communion could not be given on Good Friday within the traditional rite; one could simply consecrate an extra ciborium on Holy Thursday, bring it to the Altar of Repose along with the chalice containing the large celebrant’s Host, and bring it back to the main altar on Good Friday.

What the commentary does say is that the presence of the fraction rite “seems (my emphasis) to accept the theory of consecration by contact: ‘But the wine that is not consecrated is sanctified by the sanctified bread.’ (Sanctificatur autem vinum non consecratum per sanctificatum panem.)” The words “But the wine…” are given as a quotation; the reason for this will be explained below. Further on, they note that “the rites which form ‘the Mass of the Presanctified’ of the Roman Missal are all found in the ordines written in the 14th century.”

In 1948, Fr Ferdinando Antonelli had written a “Memo on liturgical reform” (Memoria sulla riforma liturgica), together with several collaborators; he attributes “the bulk of the work” to Fr Joseph Löw. The Memo outlines the many issues which the newly-appointed liturgical commission of Pope Pius XII might discuss; it was circulated only among a very small number of people, and not published until 2003 in La riforma liturgica di Pio XII, Centro Liturgico Veneziano. (Antonelli would later play a major role in the post-Conciliar reform.) In it, he states the same idea about the Mass of the Presanctified more categorically. “Since there existed at the beginning of the Middle Ages the belief that simply putting the consecrated bread in the wine was sufficient to consecrate also the wine itself, this rite (i.e., the fraction and commingling) was introduced; when the Eucharist had been better studied, it was realized that this belief was groundless, but the rite remained.” (p. 65)

Later on, Mons. Mario Righetti, who was one of the persons originally privy to the “Memo”, and served as a peritus at Vatican II, expresses the same opinion in the section of his Manual of Liturgical History that deals with the liturgical year. The fraction on Good Friday “harkens back to the Eucharistic doctrine which predominated in the Middle Ages, and already declared in the 9th century by Amalarius and other liturgists, that mere contact with the consecrated Bread was sufficient to consecrate the wine as well.” (vol. II, p. 212, ed. Àncora, Milan, 1969)

The “Memo” also states that the entire matter of reforming the Good Friday rite “should be studied by specialists and discussed by the Commission.” In point of fact, the fraction rite on Good Friday had already been studied exhaustively (and exhaustingly) by Michel Andrieu (1886-1956), in a series of eight articles titled “Immixtio et Consecratio” published in the Revue des Sciences Religieuses. (From vol. 2, no. 4 (1922) to vol. 4 no. 3 (1924))

The sum of Andrieu’s study as it regards the Mass of the Presanctified is as follows. Originally, the Blessed Sacrament was reserved on Holy Thursday under both species for Communion on Good Friday. By the beginning of the 9th century, this custom had changed, and only the Body was reserved. A description of the ceremony which was already old by that period says that the celebrant performed a fraction while “saying nothing”, into a chalice previously prepared by the subdeacon with “unconsecrated wine.” It is first attested in Codex Sangallensis 614 (ca. 800 A.D.), and subsequently in “innumerable” missals and sacramentaries. But these ordines merely describe the ceremony, without giving any explanation of it, and it is “difficult” for us to know if the explanation later given by Amalarius of Metz corresponds to the ideas that originally inspired the rite. This is a radical understatement on Andrieu’s part; there is no reason whatsoever to believe that Amalarius’ theory had anything to do with the creation of the rite.

A 12th-century manscript of Amalarius of Metz’ treatise Liber officialis. (Bibliothèque nationale de France, Département des manuscrits, Latin 2401. folio 34r) The words “Sanctificatur enim...” are seen in the penultimate line of the main text.

Amalarius himself, writing in the 9th century, originally believed that in this rite, “the unconsecrated wine is sanctified by the sanctified bread.” (Sanctificatur enim vinum non consecratum per sanctificatum panem.) However, he later revised his opinion on the basis of a letter of St Gregory the Great (Ep. XII ad Joannem Episc. Syracusan., PL 77, 956A) which states that the Apostles had effected the consecration of the Mass by the recitation of the Lord’s Prayer alone. This convinced Amalarius that the Good Friday ceremony was a relic of this “apostolic consecration.” (Andrieu cites a 12th century missal that also expresses this idea in a rubric before the rite of the Presanctified, “Here follows the Mass of the Apostles.”)

This notion of “the Mass of the Apostles” was still considered worth discussing by liturgical scholars such as Sicard of Cremona and Durandus centuries later. But regardless of its merits or acceptance, it cannot possibly be an explanation for the origin of the rite; if the bread and wine were consecrated on Good Friday solely by reciting the Lord’s Prayer, there would be no need at all to reserve the Eucharistic species on the previous day, an incongruity which Amalarius himself recognized. “Were it not commanded by the Roman ordo that the Body of the Lord be reserved … there would be no need to reserve it, since the Lord’s Prayer would suffice to consecrate the Body, as it suffices to consecrate the wine and water.” This mistake really should have suggested to modern scholars that Amalarius might also have been wrong in supposing that the Fraction rite originated as a form of “consecration by contact.”

Despite this change of opinion as to how the rite works, Amalarius’ first notion, that the wine is consecrated by the particle of the Host dropped into it, was widely diffused. His formulation of it is repeated in the same or very similar words in liturgical books though the Middle Ages and into the early years of printing, right up to the 16th century and the Tridentine reform. It is even included, with minor variations, in the Ordo of Pope Innocent III at the beginning of the 13th century, the ancestor of the Missal of St Pius V, and in two of the later Ordines Romani (XIV and XV). This is also the text cited by Frs Braga and Bugnini in their 1956 commentary on the Holy Week reform.

The rubrics of the Mass of the Presanctified, from the 1502 Missal of Augsburg, Germany. In the left column, immediately after the last black text, is Amalarius’ formula “Santificatur autem vinum...” There follow the words “On this day is recalled the memory of the Apostles, who would say only the Lord’s Prayer over the Body of the Lord and the Blood of the Lord.”

No one will be surprised to learn that this is not the whole story.

The sixth article of Andrieu’s “Immixtio et Consecratio” series is entitled “Liturgical books which contradict the theory of consecration by contact.” As a result of the writings of Hugh of St Victor (1096-1141) and Peter Lombard (1100-60), and later theologians informed by them, “from the 12th century, we find missals, ordinaries and pontificals in which the liturgy of the Presanctified is described in terms incompatible with the theory of consecration by contact.” Even in Amalarius’ own city of Metz, a 13th century ordinary of the church of St Arnoul prescribes that the celebrant of the Good Friday liturgy “drink the wine, and not say the prayer May the Blood of our Lord, Jesus Christ etc., because although the wine is sanctified by the Body of the Lord put into it, there is no consecration, and it is not the Blood of Christ.”

The distinction between “sanctify” and “consecrate” in this rubric (which, as Andrieu had documented earlier in his articles, was not a strict one in the writings of the Fathers and the early Middle Ages), is also elaborated by the liturgical writers of this later era. Sicard of Cremona says at the end of the twelfth century “Is the wine consecrated by contact? … Not consecrated, but sanctified, for there is a difference (between them.) ‘To consecrate’ is to transubstantiate the consecration; ‘to sanctify’ is understood in a similar sense, but broadly, for ‘being sanctified’ means being made an object of reverence by contact with a sacred thing.” (Mitrale 6, 13. We may note here in passing his beautiful explanation that the Agnus Dei is omitted “because it is not fitting to call upon one who is seen dying in agony.”)

About a century later, Durandus writes that after the fraction, “the prayers Lord Jesus Christ, son of the living God and Thy Body, o Lord, which I have received are omitted (on Good Friday), because mention of the Blood is made in them.” Here, it must be remembered that Durandus is not just any schoolman expressing a theological opinion; his Rationale Divinorum Officiorum stands in relation to the earlier commentaries on the liturgy as St Thomas’ Summa theologica does to earlier Summae. Furthermore, he created the edition of the Pontifical which ultimately formed the basis of the Pontifical of Clement VIII; it is partly through the diffusion of that work that these words became the rubric which “triumphs definitively” in the liturgical books of the era, “denying any power of consecration to the rite of commingling.” (Andrieu’s sixth part, p. 87)

Even before Durandus incorporated them into his Pontifical, a slightly different version of the rubric had been included in the Franciscan Missal, the famous missal by which the proper use of the Roman Curia was spread throughout Western Europe: “the prayer Lord Jesus Christ, son of the living God being omitting, because it makes mention of the Blood.” This was also included in the original version of the Missal of St Pius V, where it appears as follows: “(After the fraction), omitting the prayer Lord Jesus Christ, who said to Thy Apostles, because it makes mention of the Peace, and the prayer Lord Jesus Christ, son of the living God, because it makes mention of the Blood, he says only the following prayer, The receiving of Thy body etc.” (Pope Clement VIII’s 1604 edition of the Missal then simplified this rubric to “omitting the first two prayers…”)

The rubrics of the Mass of the Presanctified, from the Missal of St Pius V. The rubric described in the preceding paragraph begins in the third to last line of the left column with the words “Postmodum, praetermissa oratione...”

It hardly needs stating that the Missal of St Pius V is a product of the Counter-Reformation. It was published to guarantee that Catholics everywhere would celebrate the Eucharist in accord with the tradition of the Fathers and the Church’s perennial teaching, as reinforced by the decrees of Trent, against the Protestants’ rejection of that tradition. If the fraction rite of Good Friday had been thought to contain even a hint of Eucharistic heresy, it most certainly would have been removed.

To sum up: while the theory of consecration by contact was known and widely accepted from Amalarius’ time, there is no reason to believe that it is the origin of the fraction rite on Good Friday. The theory itself was repudiated 300 years before the Council of Trent, and this repudiation was definitively accepted. Nevertheless, the fraction rite was retained as the Church’s immemorial custom; clearly, no one thought that in and of itself, it intrinsically expressed the idea of consecration by contact. The editors of the Missal of St Pius V, who would have every reason to remove it if it were perceived in any way to bring the Church’s Eucharist doctrine into disrepute, retained it, and on the same terms in which it had been accepted by the medieval schoolman so hated by the Protestants. And so it remained until 1956.

One is left wondering, then: why the sudden change in that year? It cannot be supposed that those responsible for the Holy Week reform were unfamiliar with the work of Andrieu, a well-known and extraordinarily productive scholar; Righetti cites the Immixtio et Consecratio series in his footnotes, and Andrieu’s work on the Pontifical is cited in the 1956 commentary in Ephemerides.

“Since there existed … the belief that simply putting the consecrated bread in the wine was sufficient to consecrate also the wine itself, this rite was introduced; when the Eucharist had been better studied, it was realized that this belief was groundless, but the rite remained.” This asks us to believe that at the very heart of the Church’s liturgy, on one of the most solemn days of the year, there exists a rite which originated with a material heresy, and which endured for centuries solely as the result of a blind and unthinking conservatism. If we accept this idea, would we not logically have to ask ourselves what else might be lurking in the pages of the Missal solely as the result of the same blind and unthinking conservatism?

“Don’t you worry, we’ll take care of that.”

The Solemnity of St Joseph, Patron of the Universal Church 2017

There is no doubt but that this Joseph, to whom the Mother of the Savior was betrothed, was a good and faithful man; a faithful servant, I say, and prudent, whom the Lord made the solace of His Mother, his foster-father according to the flesh, and indeed, the single most trusted helper of His great counsel upon the earth.

The Holy Family, by Bartolomé Esteban Murillo (1617-82), ca. 1650

To this we add that he was said to be of the house of David. For truly did this man Joseph descend from the house of David and the royal lineage, noble in his origin, but nobler of mind. Clearly a son of David, in no way lesser than his father; wholly, I say, a son of David, not only in the flesh, but in faith, in holiness, in devotion, whom the Lord found like a second David according to His heart, to whom He might safely entrust the most sacred and secret mystery of His heart, and, as to a second David, make known the uncertain and hidden matters of His wisdom, and gave him to know of that mystery which none of the princes of this world recognized. What many kings and prophets wished to see, and did not see, to hear, and they did not hear it, to him at last was it given not only to see and hear, but to carry, to lead, to embrace, to kiss, to raise and to guard. (From a sermon of St Bernard read at Matins during the Octave of St Joseph.)

The feast of St Joseph, Patron of the Universal Church, was originally called “the Patronage of St Joseph,” and fixed to the Third Sunday after Easter. It was kept by a great many dioceses and religious orders, particularly promoted by the Carmelites, before it was extended to the universal Church by Bl. Pope Pius IX in 1847, and later granted an octave. When the custom of fixing feasts to particular Sundays was abolished as part of the Breviary reform of Pope St Pius X, it was anticipated to the previous Wednesday, the day of the week traditionally dedicated to Patron Saints. It was removed from the general Calendar in 1955 and replaced by the feast of St Joseph the Worker; the new feast itself was then downgraded from the highest of three grades (first class) in the 1962 Missal to the lowest of four (optional memorial) in 1970.

EF Mass This Sunday in Bally, Pennsylvania

On Sunday, May 7 at 3:00 p.m., Most Blessed Sacrament Church in Bally, Pennsylvania will have its first public EF Mass since the post-Conciliar reforms. Founded as a mission outpost in 1741 by the Rev. Theodore Schneider (who called it St Paul’s Chapel), it was the third Catholic church in the colony of Pennsylvania. This original chapel still exists, accessible behind the sacristy of the current church, which was expanded in 1796 and again in 1837 when it was renamed Most Blessed Sacrament. Two years after founding the church, Schneider started a school, the St Aloysius Academy, which persists today at St Francis Academy and is the oldest continuously operated Catholic school in Pennsylvania. The town in which it resides was renamed Bally in honor of the Rev. Augustin Bally, a Belgian Jesuit who ran the parish from 1837 until his death in 1882. The church is located at 610 Pine Street.

The sanctuary of the church (click to enlarge.)

Good Friday 2017 Photopost (Part 2)

Once again, I feel I must apologize for the slowness with which our Holy Week photoposts are coming out; we’ve had a lot of other things going on, and I’ve been pretty busy since Easter. Part of the delay also has been the embarrassment of riches; we have received more beautiful photos of liturgies from the Triduum than we can post, and it has been painful to make a selection. I do think you will find this one particularly nice; we have a great selection of churches, a bit of the Byzantine Rite once again, and a few processions. Evangelize through beauty!

Parish of the Holy Family - Diocese of Cubao, Philippines

Holy Innocents - New York City

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Be a Benedictine Monk for 48 Hours!

Thank you to Fr Dunstan and Fr Gregory of St Mary’s Benedictine Monastery in Petersham, Massachussetts, for dropping me a line about their next monastic experience weekend, in which they hope to give people an experience of monastic life, and men the opportunity to explore a vocation to the religious life. I am happy to pass on the information; I was delighted to hear that one of the attendees from the last one is now novice, so let’s hope for more.

It takes place on the weekend of June 2-4. For further information you can contact Father Gregory at monks@stmarysmonastery.org, or call him at 978–724–3350. For a printable flyer, click here.

 St. Mary’s Monastery is a contemplative Benedictine community of monks in Petersham, in central Massachusetts. They pray the office in Latin and...

live monastic life as described in the Rule of St. Benedict -- an ancient and proven way still vibrant in today’s world. It is a life of prayer and work within the monastery, radically centered on Christ, and structured around the Seven Hours of the Divine Office. We sing this great prayer in Latin using Gregorian Chant with the nuns of St. Scholastica Priory, our “twin community”. We are inviting single men (18-40 years old) for an opportunity to experience from within the rhythm and balance of Benedictine monastic prayer and community life in a house of Benedictine monks.

The Danger of Activism, for the Feast of St. Joseph the Worker

painting by Michael O'Brien

It may seem paradoxical to assert that the feast of St. Joseph the Worker is not a glorification of work. Whenever we celebrate the saints in glory, we remember their valiant labors on earth, but we celebrate their eternal rest in God and the most intense activity of all, that face-to-face vision of the Most Holy Trinity in which the saints, without ceasing to be enraptured in the First and Last and All, see our needs and intercede for us in union with the High Priest of our confession. As even Aristotle saw, this supreme contemplation cannot be described as work or even as a human occupation at all. That which is highest in man, that towards which we are striving, is the sabbath of resting in God.

To say this is no pagan exaltation of leisure or Jewish legalism about avoiding labor: it is the clear teaching of the Epistle to the Hebrews, which sums up the newness of Christian revelation better than any other single text in the New Testament. The surmounting of our finite labors in beatific leisure, where God is all in all and we are immersed in His peace, is the end we believe in, hope for, pray for, long for.

In a magnificent sermon on Ecclesiasticus 24:11, In omnibus requiem quaesivi (“In all things I have sought rest”), Meister Eckhart beautifully unfolded this truth:

[E]ternal Wisdom says to the soul: ‘In all things I have sought rest’, and the soul replies: “He who created me rested in my tent”. And thirdly Eternal Wisdom says: “My rest is in the holy city”. If I were asked to say to what end the Creator has created all creatures, I would say: rest. If I were asked secondly what the Holy Trinity sought altogether in all its works, I would answer: rest. If I were asked thirdly what the soul sought in all her agitations, I would answer: rest. If I were asked fourthly what all creatures sought in their natural desires and motions, I would answer: rest.
          In the first place let us note and observe how the divine nature makes all the soul’s desires mad and crazy for Him, so as to draw her to him. For the divine nature tastes so well to God and pleases him so much—that is: rest—that He has projected it out of Himself to stir up and draw into Himself the natural desires of all creatures. Not only does the Creator seek his own rest by projecting it and informing all creatures with it, but He seeks to draw all creatures back with Him into their first beginning, which is rest. Also, God loves Himself in all creatures. Thus as He seeks His own love in all creatures, so He seeks His own rest.
          Secondly, the Holy Trinity seeks rest. The Father seeks rest in His Son, in whom He has poured out and formed all creatures, and they both seek rest in the Holy Ghost, who has proceeded from them both as eternal and immeasurable love.
          Thirdly, the soul seeks rest in all her powers and motions, whether a man knows it or not. He never opens or shuts an eye without seeking rest by doing so: either he seeks to reject something that hinders him, or he seeks to draw in something on which to rest. These are the two motives of all human action. I have also said before that a man could never feel love or desire for any creature, unless God’s likeness were in it. My love is placed where I most clearly see God’s likeness, but nothing in all creatures so resembles God as rest. [...]
          In the fourth place, all creatures seek rest by a natural tendency: whether they know it or not, they prove it in their works. A stone is never free of motion as long as it is not on the ground—it always seeks the ground. The same applies to fire: it strives upwards, and every creature seeks its natural place. Thus they confirm the truth of divine rest, which God has injected into all of them.
          That we may thus seek the equality of divine rest, and find it in God, may God help us. Amen.[1]

If this ultimate and eternal divine rest is not the aim of human work — and it cannot be denied that our culture is programmatically against this transcendent orientation — our work becomes counterproductive and pernicious, a distraction, a snare, an apprenticeship to the busy father of lies rather than a discipline by which to ascend above the stars.

The modern period has witnessed several waves of greedy iconoclasm against the monastic life, as we see in Henry VIII’s dissolution of religious houses, or the “secularizations” imposed by anticlerical regimes of more recent vintage. Stratford Caldecott saw in this fact an X-ray, as it were, of the bone structure of modernity:

The destruction of the monasteries is particularly poignant as a symbol of what was taking place. It is as though our modern world was actually built on and presupposed the destruction of contemplation—or at least the destruction of that (largely Benedictine) ideal, the synthesis of contemplation and action that lay at the heart of Christendom.[2]

Pope Benedict XVI frequently warned against the vice of activism, which he saw as destructive of the spiritual life and therefore of the very mission of the Church in the world:

Activism, the will to be “productive,” “relevant,” come what may, is the constant temptation of the man, even of the male religious. And this is precisely the basic trend in the ecclesiologies . . . that present the Church as a “People of God” committed to action, busily engaged in translating the Gospel into an action program with social, political, and cultural objectives. But it is no accident if the word “Church” is of feminine gender. In her, in fact, lives the mystery of motherhood, of gratitude, of contemplation, of beauty, of values in short that appear useless in the eyes of the profane world. Without perhaps being fully conscience of the reason, the woman religious feels the deep disquiet of living in a Church where Christianity is reduced to an ideology of doing, according to that strictly masculine ecclesiology which nevertheless is presented—and perhaps believed—as being closer also to women and their “modern” needs. Instead it is the project of a Church in which there is no longer any room for mystical experience, for this pinnacle of religious life which not by chance has been, through the centuries, among the glories and riches offered to all in unbroken constancy and fullness, more by women than by men.[3]

The separation of active life from contemplative life, which separation had been proceeding slowly for centuries and suddenly took a giant leap forward after the Council, is a fatal separation, like that of nature from grace, reason from faith, science from piety. It has superficialized the Church’s activity, making it a kind of “busy work” rather than the extension of Christ’s saving presence into the world around us. The twin temptations mentioned by Ratzinger — the reductionism of relevance and the preoccupation with productivity — finally found their nesting place in the liturgy, which they colonized and dominated.

In words that have the passionate clear-eyed intensity of an Old Testament prophet, Cardinal Sarah has been warning us about what happens to the human spirit and to religion itself when silence and meditation dry up, when busyness replaces the contemplative surrender of adoration. In such a world, getting a taste of (and for) contemplation is difficult — and not surprisingly, we hear everywhere the glib sentiment, originating perhaps in an uneasy conscience, that “everything can be a form of contemplation.” It may well be the case that for a man or woman already deeply immersed in the Trinitarian life, let us say Catherine of Siena or Teresa of Jesus, anything they do will be an extension of that burning fire of interior prayer, and they will actually find God in everything. But that is not where we begin; we must take what the Psalmist calls the vias duras, the hard and narrow roads of disciplined personal and liturgical prayer, if we wish to reach the high plateau, the city of Jerusalem, the city of peace, the kingdom of contemplation. Being able to see God in everything and everything in God is the destination, not the point of departure. It is, moreover, a gift, something for which we must beg, not something we can instantly produce.

This, I believe, is the primary lesson that St. Joseph, the man of silence, the man of prompt obedience to the divine word for which he was intently listening, would wish to teach us today. Perhaps he would say: “Given a choice between another hour at the human office and the recitation of part of the Divine Office, choose the latter. It will be better for you, for your work, for the Church, and for the world.”

Notes
[1] Sermon 45. The full text may be found here.
[2] Not as the World Gives, 231.
[3] The Ratzinger Report, 103.
[4] Deus Caritas Est, 37.

Blessed Carino, the Assassin of St Peter Martyr

One of the most unusual true stories in the annals of Catholic hagiography is that of Bl. Carino, the assassin of the Saint whose feast is traditionally kept today, Peter the Martyr. Carino was one of the two men hired to kill Peter for his work against the Cathars, as he was traveling in the area of Milan; the other, Albertino, fled in fear at the moment of the attack, and it was Carino who dealt the martyr his death-blow with a knife to the skull, and fatally wounded his companion, brother Dominic. Carino was taken to Milan, where he would certainly have been tried and executed, if not lynched by popular uprising beforehand; the mayor of the city, however, was involved in the plot against St Peter, and arranged for Carino’s escape.

Intending to make his way to Rome and obtain a Papal pardon, he took gravely ill at Forlì, where he confessed his sin to the local Dominican prior. After recovering, he respected the promise made as part of his penance, to enter a religious house as a “conversus”; he then lived forty years in the Dominican house of Forlì. The totality of his conversion after his terrible deed, and the humility of his life of penance, were popularly recognized after his death in 1293. The story is told that at his own insistence, he was buried in the unconsecrated ground reserved for violent criminals, but the people of Forlì prevailed upon the Dominican Fathers to move him into their church, first in the sacristy, and later in a chapel with two other blesseds of the same house, James Salomoni and Marcolino Amanni.

In 1879, before the Dominican house of Forlì was confiscated by the Italian state, the relics of Bl. Carino were moved to the cathedral. In 1934, at the behest of the Blessed Ildefonse Schuster, his head and part of his body were translated to the church of St Martin in Balsamo, his native town, to be followed by the rest of the relics thirty years later. The seminary of Seveso, close to where the actual martyrdom took place, retains one of the most particular relics in history, the weapon which he used to kill St Peter.

The knife which Carino used to kill St Peter the Martyr

From Italian Wikipedia, two images of the translation of Carino’s relics in 1934, before their transfer, and newly arrived at San Martino in Balsamo.

A New Gregorian Chant App

A reader has written in let us know about a new Gregorian chant app for mobile devices called Square Note, published by the Oblates of St Joseph, and available via iTunes and Googleplay. According to their website, it includes a repertoire of over 600 chants, cataloged for both the OF and EF, including Gregorian Mass propers, the Ordinary, and a variety of supplementary chants. I must admit (and Ben will bear witness to this) that I am pretty useless with technology, and I don’t actually own a device on which I could test this out; perhaps our readers can suggest in the combox whether they have used it and what they think of it.

Good Friday 2017 Photopost (Part 1)

One of the things I like most about doing these photoposts is how they show the variety of our Catholic liturgical life. For this one, we have a bit of the Byzantine Rite and the Ordinariate Use, as well as processions in Portugal and the Philippines. A second post will go up tomorrow; as always, thanks to all those who sent these photos in, for your help in the work of evangelizing through beauty.

St John the Baptist Ukrainian Catholic Church - Fall River, Massachusetts
Good Friday Vespers

Paris of Bl. John Henry Newman - Irvine, California (Ordinariate)

Real Irmandade do Santissimo Sacramento - Mafra, Portugal

Continue Reading this Article. . .

Solemn Mass in Honor of St Francis di Paola in Brooklyn, April 29

The American Delegation of the Sacred Constantinian Military Order of St George will be making a pilgrimage to the church of St Francis of Paola in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, New York on Saturday, April 29th. The Very Rev. Msgr. Joseph Ambrosio will be celebrate a Solemn High Traditional Latin Mass, beginning at 5:00 p.m, and preach; after Mass, there will be veneration of a very rare first class relic of the saint and distribution of souvenir holy cards.

St Francis of Paola was the founder of the Order of Minims, though he himself was never ordained to the priesthood. He was renowned for curing the sick, performing miracles, the gift of prophesy and his personal holiness. He died in 1507 and was canonized in 1519. He is the principal patron saint of Calabria, and a patron saint of both the city of Naples and the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, one of the most revered saints in all of southern Italy.

A Vestment Maker’s Birthday Present for Pope Benedict XVI

We are very grateful indeed to Mrs Clare Short of DiClara Vestments for sharing with NLM this account of her recent meeting with Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI; on this occasion, she presented him with a new set of vestments as a present for his 90th birthday, which he celebrated on Easter Sunday, April 16th.

To have Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI hold your hand and thank you, and describe your vestments as “…wonderful, beautiful…” is something I never dreamed could happen 18 months ago when I started my vestments business - Di Clara.

With my husband recovering from long-term illness and unable to work, I knew I had to do something to provide our family with some income. And with 3 young children, I knew the only viable option was to work from home.

Running a small business from home wasn’t a new thing for me. I had experience of working from home before with a wedding cake business that I was forced to close due to the change in the marriage laws. And after a priest friend suggest I “have a go at making some vestments…” I realised that there was a need in the market for good quality, affordable vestments that brought beauty and reverence to the liturgy.

Making the front section of the chasuble.

I share Pope Benedict’s belief that beauty is a highly important and spiritual thing in the liturgy; as he once said, “Beauty, then, is not mere decoration, but rather an essential element of the liturgical action, since it is an attribute of God himself and his revelation. These considerations should make us realize the care which is needed, if the liturgical action is to reflect its innate splendour.”

Beauty is something that draws us out of ourselves into an encounter with the transcendent. C.S. Lewis gets to the heart of the matter when he says that “created beauty provokes in us a longing to be united with, to receive into ourselves, and to enter into that infinite Beauty of which all created beauty is but a reflection.”

It was my aim with this 90th Birthday set of vestments to surpass anything I have ever made previously. For the design of the embroidery, I was inspired by one of Pope Benedict’s favourite Marian shrines – Our Lady of Altötting. On her dress you can see a sunflower, edelweiss and vines.

Our Lady of Altötting

I managed to incorporate these into my own design, which was then embellished with fresh water pearls and garnet. At the base of the back of the chasuble I embroidered his Papal coat of arms.

The full set includes a Roman style chasuble, spade end stole and maniple, chalice veil, burse and pall.

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Choir Books

À propos of nothing in particular, just because I like these images and thought you might too. The first comes from Shawn Tribe, an old photo of a young monk at the monastery of San Millán de la Cogolla in La Rioja, Spain, looking at the Introit of the Assumption Gaudeamus omnes.

The second comes from Philippe Guy: antiphonaries and other choir books in the library of the monastery of St Mary in Paris.

St Mary’s Schola Issues Recording of Christmas Dawn Mass Lux Fulgebit

The Schola Cantorum of St Mary’s Church in Norwalk, Connecticut, and the St Cecilia Society announce the release of the CD Lux Fulgebit, a recording of the Christmas Mass at Dawn, featuring the premiere recording of the 16th century English composer William Rasar’s Mass Christe Jesu. The Schola is under the direction of St Mary’s organist and choir master David Hughes. 

Taking its title from the first words of the Introit of the Mass at Dawn, the CD includes motets by William Byrd, Alfonso Ferrabosco, and Walter Lambe. The entire CD presents a Mass “in context,” including all the Gregorian propers, as well as the Scripture lessons, Preface, Collect and Post-Communion.

“Not only is this the first recording made by the St Mary’s Schola Cantorum, to our knowledge it is the only William Rasar composition ever recorded. If not for the manuscript of his Mass, this gifted composer might have been lost to history. In addition, the Propers for the Mass at Dawn of Christmas Day are beautiful but not frequently recorded, and we believe they deserve a wider audience.

“Pre-Reformation English composers are widely recognized as having produced extraordinary music,” said Charles Weaver, associate director of music at St Mary’s  and a Schola musician. “The Tallis Scholars and other ensembles, for example, have popularized music from English composers such as John Taverner and Robert Fairfax. We believe Rasar’s Mass deserves to be ranked among pieces by the great composers of this period.”

The Schola: Front row -- Elizabeth Baber Weaver and Judith Malafronte.
Back Row -- Terrence Fay, Charles Weaver, David Hughes and Richard Dobbins.

The cover art of Lux Fulgetbit.

Lux Fulgebit captures the musical splendor of the traditionally-oriented liturgical life at St Mary’s, recognized as a leading parish in renewing the worship of the Church. The Schola Cantorum is the heart of a multi-faceted sacred music program at the parish, that includes a children’s choir, adult volunteer choir and Spanish-speaking ensemble. All are geared toward enhancing the many Masses at the church, done in English, Latin and Spanish, and all at the High Altar, facing East.

St Mary’s pastor, the Rev. Richard G. Cipolla, believes the recording will not only be appreciated by those who are music lovers, but help open up the traditional form of the Roman Rite to those who might not be familiar.

“One of the most important ways of restoring beauty to the Mass is through the use of music. The music of the Mass must be sacred music, not merely religious music, because the Mass is the icon of the worship of God in heaven. At St Mary’s, we offer Mass adorned with music written specifically for it by some of the greatest composers in history. Lux Fulgebit will help more people experience the beauty of Rasar’s music and the ancient and venerable Tridentine Rite.”

The St Mary’s Schola Cantorum is a professional ensemble of five talented musicians, proficient in singing the most complex polyphony in the canon of Western sacred music: soprano Elizabeth Baber Weaver, mezzo-soprano Judith Malafronte, countertenor Terrence Fay, tenor Richard Dobbins and bass Charles Weaver. The St Cecilia Society is the support organization tasked with funding the program, and is under the chairmanship of Thomas B. Heckel.

The release of Lux Fulgebit was celebrated Sunday, April 23, with a reception at the church. It can be purchased by logging onto the church’s website, www.stmarynorwalk.net/cd, and through Amazon.com and iTunes. The package includes a complete text of the Mass in English and Latin.

For further information, contact the church at www.stmarynorwalk.net.