with Stephen Brannen
Ad te levavi animam meam, or “Unto thee lift I up my soul” is the first chant of the first Sunday of the first season of the liturgical year in the West. This Introit (Entrance Chant) comes from Psalm 25 (24) and is meant to set the tone not just for this Sunday’s Mass, but for the whole season of Advent. What is it about the character of this psalm that makes it appropriate for this season?
Continue reading “Ad te levavi”
The heavens declare the glory of God. The skies proclaim his handiwork. Trees and mountains can sing to God together, and even the rocks could start crying out. But I can’t seem to open my mouth to pray.
The phenomenon, I’m assured, is not unique to me. Prayer is hard to do. I could take the time to compile a list of saints, divines, and other luminaries throughout history who struggled with prayer for seasons or throughout their lives, but it would only be a slight comfort in reassuring us that the struggle is common—which we already know. On the other hand, I could list people who have prayed so well that they would glow with the uncreated light. Again, that’s interesting, but little comfort, at least to me.
Continue reading “Open Thou My Lips”
As the faithful of the Western Rite enter in our church buildings on the Sunday before Palm Sunday, our eyes search for the familiar and holy images that we have become accustomed to seeing there, but instead we find violet veils. Those experiencing this for the first time may be confused—and hopefully, disturbed—at not seeing the holy images. The cross and the icons are veiled from our sight on the fifth Sunday of Lent, traditionally called “Passion Sunday,” and it marks a distinct turning toward the end of this Lenten journey. But why are the icons veiled, and why is this called “Passion” Sunday if the Gospel passage (St. John 8:46-59) isn’t the account of Christ’s passion?
Continue reading “The Passiontide Veiling”
In the Western Tradition, Septuagesima Sunday kicks off the Easter cycle of the Church Year (like beginning the Triodion in the Eastern Rite). As the first of the three Sundays which make up the Pre-Lent season in the West, Septuagesima (the Sunday nearest the 70th day before Easter) makes it clear liturgically that we have turned a corner: all “alleluias” are suppressed until Easter, as well as other exuberantly joyful hymns and canticles, and the liturgical color is changed to violet. The lectionary also shifts gears to themes appropriate to this new path: themes of repentance, renunciation, and works of mercy.
Continue reading “The Secret Current: Lectionary Lessons and the Way to Easter”
In the carol “Good King Wenceslas“, we sing that the good king went out to serve a peasant gathering firewood “on the feast of Stephen”. The feast of Stephen is the day after Christmas in the Western calendar [two days after Christmas on the Eastern calendar] and celebrates St. Stephen, the first martyr for Christ (and my Patron Saint). In Acts, chapters 6 and 7, we read that Stephen was chosen to be a special servant of the Church in Jerusalem because he was full of faith and of the Holy Spirit. It was in the context of his role as a servant that he was enabled to do miracles among the people, and this drew attention to him both among those open to the Truth of Christ and among those opposed to it. The enemies of the Church soon had Stephen arraigned before a hostile court that threw him out of the city and put to death by stoning.
The proximity of the feast of St. Stephen to Christmas reminds us that the coming of the Prince of Peace is no guarantee of an untroubled life for his followers. Just the opposite in fact: Jesus promised his followers that they would have struggles, that they would have to pick up and carry crosses, just like him. St. Stephen’s example shows us that the way of martyrdom is the prototypical way of the Christian.
Continue reading “On the Feast of Stephen”
One of the oldest and most enduring features of Advent in the Western tradition of the Church is the special set of antiphons sung with the Magnificat at Vespers in the days leading up to Christmas Eve. Usually called the “Greater Antiphons” in liturgical books, they’re more colloquially called the “O Antiphons” because each begins with the interjection “O” (O Emmanuel…, etc.).
The oldest and most traditional set of O Antiphons address Christ by seven titles, in this order: Sapientia (Wisdom), Adonai (Lord), Radix Jesse (Root of Jesse), Clavis David (Key of David), Oriens (Dayspring/Dawn), Rex Gentium (King of the Nations/Gentiles), and Emmanuel (God-with-us). The first letters of each title going back from Emmanuel (Dec 24) to Sapientia (Dec 17) form the Latin words Ero cras, meaning “Tomorrow I come.” The content of these antiphons was paraphrased as the verses to the Latin hymn Veni Emmanuel, translated into our familiar English hymn, O Come, O Come Emmanuel. While the history of the antiphons and their use is fascinating in itself, the most wonderful thing about them is the theology and spiritual learning that can be unpacked from these pithy poems.
Continue reading “The Great O Antiphons”
The season of Advent has arrived. But nothing kicks the legs out from under our observance of Advent like premature Christmas songs. Advent, of course, is the season leading up to Christmas, designed to focus us on the hope and expectation of Christ’s future advent (arrival) and the celebration of his first advent. The spirit of Advent, then, is of watchfulness and waiting. Because of this, Christmas songs are inappropriate to the spirit of the Advent season. They don’t jive; they’re incongruous.
Continue reading “Advent Music”
I’m not the biggest college football fan in the world, but I had the privilege of attending the Georgia vs. Georgia Tech game recently with my dad, uncle, and cousin with free tickets from a friend of the family. It’s only the second game I’ve ever been to in person, and the experience is definitely very immersive. And this game just happened to be a rivalry game in UGA’s 80,000 person stadium that was packed out. It was a lot to take in.
But something occurred just before the two teams ran out onto the field that gave me pause and made me experience the whole thing in a different frame of mind: on the giant screen a dramatic video of home team highlights played while an audio clip of the late Larry Munson, legendary Georgia football radio announcer, boomed through the stadium proclaiming boldly that, “There is no tradition more worthy of envy, no institution worthy of such loyalty, as the University of Georgia.” Continue reading “The Human Need for Liturgy”
Halloween is scary — apparently. From every corner of digital Christendom is sounding the quaking alarm that participation in Halloween is tantamount to inviting the devil into your house. Hearsay about pagan origins and evil practices abounds. Even cooler-headed writers skeptical of the dubious beginnings of trick-or-treating and jack-o-lanterns warn that the overall character of Halloween is unprofitable at best and harmful at worst. But there’s a countering voice among Christians (and among people of other religions or none) that Halloween is totally innocent fun, that it’s inconsequential, vacant amusement. I personally think Halloween may be more complex and interesting than either of those positions make it out to be. It may even be a source of sanity in an increasingly insane world. Continue reading “Halloween as Sanity in the Modern World”
The Exaltation of the Holy Cross on the 14th of September marks the lifting up of the True Cross before the Christians in Jerusalem after the consecration of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in 335 AD. The lifting up of the Cross as a sign or standard to follow and venerate has been a long-established concept in Christian history. In virtually every depiction of Christ’s descent into hades and his resurrection, he carries the Cross as a scepter or banner. And from ancient prayers and chants to modern Christian hymnody, “the Cross is lifted over us, we journey in its light.“
But in Western tradition, there’s one hymn that for its antiquity, universality, and ubiquity stands above the others in its appropriateness on the Feast of the Holy Cross and as a processional song as the Cross is marched before us: The Royal Banners Forward Go. Continue reading “Under the Standard of the Cross”