Category: Liturgy

March 23, 2015 Liturgy, Spirituality

Sancti Gabrielis Archangeli

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Tomorrow, March 24, should be the decorated feast of my namesake St. Gabriel the Archangel. After having his feast extended to the universal Church by Pope Benedict XV in 1921, it lasted for a mere four decades; then the liturgical reformers, in their “wisdom,” knocked St. Gabriel’s Day down to a mere commemoration. By the time the Novus Ordo Missae was promulgated by Paul VI, he was practically pushed off the calendar altogether, forced to share space with his fellow archangels on the day once known as Michaelmas. Apparently declaring the coming of our Lord and, later, authoring Axion Estin doesn’t cut the mustard anymore in our modern, enlightened, and thoroughly de-mythologized Roman Church. The Christian East, in its actual wisdom, not only retains the Feast of St. Gabriel on November 28, but gives him two additional commemorations on March 26 (for his role in the Annunciation) and July 13 (in honor of his many miracles).

If you get the chance, you might recite this hymn to St. Gabriel from the old Dominican breviary tomorrow. Given the many graces St. Gabriel has bestowed upon the Christians of the East throughout the centuries, perhaps a good intention would be for this Holy Archangel, and all his compatriots in Heaven, to bestow protection on our brothers and sisters in Christ who have been left to suffer unspeakable persecution at the hands of men driven mad by a false religion.

Gabriel, Angel of light, and strength of God! whom our Emmanuel
selected from the rest of the heavenly princes,
that thou shouldst expound
unto Daniel the mystery of the savage goat.
Thou didst joyfully hasten to the prophet as he prayed,
and didst tell him of the sacred weeks,
which were to give us the birth of the King of Heaven,
and enrich us with plenteous joy.
‘Tis thou didst bring to
the parents of the Baptist the wondrous and gladsome
tidings that Elizabeth, though barren, and Zachary,
though old, should have a son.
What the prophets had foretold from the beginning of the world,
this thou didst announce in all the fullness of the
mystery to the holy virgin,
telling her that she was to be the true Mother of God.
Thou, fair spirit, didst fill the Bethlehem shepherds with joy,
when thou didst tell them the heavenly tidings;
and with thee a host of Angels sang the praises of the newborn God.

As Jesus was in prayer on that last night, when a bloody sweat bathed His limbs,
thou didst leave Heaven to be near Him, and offer Him the chalice
that His Father willed Him to drink.

O blessed Trinity! strengthen Catholic hearts with the heavenly gift of faith. Give us grace, as we to thee give glory for ever. Amen.

March 17, 2015 Church, Eastern Orthodox Church, Liturgy

Russian Orthodoxy and the SSPX

Ross Douthat’s recent New York Times blog post on Pope Francis’s critics contained an unfortunate but all-too-common mischaracterization of the Society of St. Pius X (SSPX) as “schismatic.” Like many who suggest that charge, Douthat backed it up with neither an argument nor a citation to an official decree. Both Frs. John Zuhlsdorf and John Hunwicke—two canonically regular priests in good standing with the Catholic Church—have explained why the “schismatic” label is improper; so, too, has the Society. The thing is, if the SSPX were truly schismatic, Catholics like Douthat (and countless others) would likely have no problem with Rome playing nice, as evidenced by the adulation and cheers which accompanies the brief, insubstantial, and soon-forgotten meetings between a pope and hierarchs of the Eastern Orthodox Church. Never mind of course that unlike the SSPX, the Orthodox do not accept concrete tenets of the Catholic Faith such as Papal Primacy and appear hostile (though not absolutely so) toward others (e.g., Immaculate Conception, Purgatory, and the Filioque). The Society’s “crimes,” according to its critics, are threefold: rejecting modern liturgical reform; criticizing Vatican II’s teaching on religious liberty; and opposing ecumenism. But where does Eastern Orthodoxy come down on these three issues? A brief, but informative, glance at Orthodoxy’s largest canonical body, the Russian Orthodox Church, reveals no measurable deviation from the Society’s positions.

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March 5, 2015 Eastern Catholicism, Eastern Orthodox Church, Liturgy

Feria Quinta infra Hebdomadam II in Quadragesima

A priest—an Eastern Orthodox priest—once told me that the devil rides us extra hard during Lent. It is an observation I have repeated many times, probably because it is the most accurate thing any cleric has ever told me. All of my Orthodox Lents save one were difficult personally and professionally. That was enough to ensure I reaped very little spiritually during the 40 Days plus Holy Week. Then came Holy Saturday, the Book of Jonah, a long nap on the couch, and, finally, the Paschal Homily of St. John Chrysostom. If my spirit didn’t lighten at that moment, it did shortly thereafter amid cries of Christ is risen! (English, Greek, Slavonic, etc.) and the chanting of “The Angel Cried.” Each year I would think to myself how wonderful it would be if, by next Lent, I might be that man from the homily who labored from the ninth or sixth hours rather than the eleventh. It never quite happened that way. I may have started out at the first hour, but it was inevitable that I’d go AWOL for a time before the gate was shut. And then one Lent, some four years ago, I went missing and never came back. The gate—the eastern gate that looks particularly wide and inviting compared to all the other eastern gates—was shut, never to be opened to me again.

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March 2, 2015 Eastern Catholicism, Eastern Orthodox Church, Liturgy

Second Sunday

Liturgical calendars across rites and usages are such a bother to follow, but knowing something about them helps spare one such terrible embarrassments like wishing an Orthodox friend, “Blessed feast of St. Gregory Palamas!” when, in fact, yesterday was “Triumph of Orthodoxy” Sunday. By the liturgical light of those Eastern Catholics who hold to both the Byzantine Rite and the Gregorian calendar, Palamas was up for praise over the weekend; processing with icons had already come and gone.

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February 26, 2015 Eastern Catholicism, Eastern Orthodox Church, Liturgy, Theology

A Postscript on St. Gregory of Narek and the New Coptic Martyrs

All good things must come to an end, including my accidental series of posts on St. Gregory of Narek and the 21 New Coptic Martyrs (see here, here, and here). Before taking leave of this topic, I must state in no uncertain terms that neither my belief that the 21 men murdered by the Islamic State over a week ago are genuine martyrs, nor my unwillingness to descend into hysterics over St. Gregory of Narek’s elevation as a Doctor of the Church, is indicative of indifferentism. That all of the Apostolic churches — Orthodox and non-Orthodox — should be one with the See of St. Peter is a point of hope and prayer from which I have never reneged. The failure of some to draw a simple distinction between how the Catholic Church treats matters related to these separated churches and, say, Protestant and non-Christian sects is baffling. As Fr. Aidan Nichols, O.P has argued in Rome and the Eastern Churches (2d ed. Ignatius Press 2010) and elsewhere, the Orthodox — and by extension the other Oriental churches — should be Rome’s primary ecumenical partner. Although I remain critical of the way in which Rome has, at times, approached one or more of these separated churches, particularly when these approaches have come at the expense of the sui iuris Catholic churches already in full communion with her, I see no point in waging an endless polemical battle against the Orthodox and Oriental churches. Yes, there are genuine doctrinal, theological, and ecclesiological disagreements which have to be dealt with. Yes, some of these are more complicated than others. However, if real progress toward reunification is to be made, it must be made with charity and humility, not invective and triumphalism.

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January 28, 2015 Liturgy

Blessed Charlemagne

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On this day, the 28th of January, in the Year of Lord 2015, we commemorate the passing of Blessed Charlemagne, Imperator Romanorum and Father of Europe.

The Collect of Blessed Charlemagne from an older edition of the Missale Romanum (H/T Fr. Benedict Anderson):

Omnipotens et misericors Deus, qui a gloria tua nullam conditionem excludis: te suppliciter exoramus, ut sicut beato Carolo confessori tuo, post terreni culmen Imperii, caelestis regni solium contulisti: ita meritis ejus et precibus nobis quoque famulis tuis aeternae felicitatis praemia largiaris. Per dominum nostrum.

For more on Charlemagne’s cult and his status as “Blessed,” see Reliquarian‘s entry, “Charlemagne: Saint of the Holy Roman Empire?“

Addendum 1/28/15: The Duplex office for the feast of S. Caroli Magni, including the proper readings at Matins, can be found in the Breviarium Romanum via Google Books here.

December 28, 2014 Humor, Liturgy

1962 > 1954

St. Lawrence Press has done a great service in the mighty cause of exonerating, nay, privileging the Missale Romanum and Divine Office of 1962 over the manifestly inferior “1954 books” (or — *shudder* — “1939 books”). As I flipped through the Press’s 2014 Ordo Recitandi for one of the last times this year, I was appalled to discover that there was a dark time, not too many decades ago, when this, the Sunday in the Octave of the Nativity, was displaced by the Feast of the Holy Innocents. Imagine my relief when, just before hearing today’s Mass, the priest ascended the pulpit to calm the crowd by reminding them that in the holy, indefectible, and manifestly superior 1962 liturgy, we would indeed be celebrating the Lord’s Day while commemorating the Holy Innocents. On this point even the Byzantines agree as they today celebrate the Sunday After Nativity; they would never countenance preempting and transferring such a day as this, even for  a venerable body of witnesses like the Holy Innocents.

Moreover, the faithful who had made the trek and sacrifice to attend Mass today could breathe a sigh of relief that unlike their forebears, they would not have to endure the abomination of seeing a Sunday Mass celebrated on the next available feria, which is December 30. No, sir; no church of mine “is going up on a Tuesday.”

So, at last, we need not hear anymore of this 1954 (1939) contra 1962 nonsense. The matter has been settled. The controversy is closed. While I look forward to thumbing through my freshly received copy of the 2015 Ordo Recitandi, reflecting on the celebratory horrors and confusions my poor ancestors once endured, that pales in comparison to the mirth which now consumes my soul over the knowledge that never again shall I bear witness to trad-on-trad polemical violence stirred up by such a minor, indeed hardly noticeable matter, as the perfect books of sweet, sweet ’62.