Thursday, February 06, 2025

The Feast of St Agatha in Catania, Sicily

Yesterday was the feast of St Agatha, the patron Saint of her native city of Catania in Sicily. Dr Kwasniewski is currently there with a pilgrimage group, and took these pictures of the procession with her relics on the eve of the feast. The local custom is to carry decorated candles during the procession, and with the classically southern Italian idea that if a thing is worth doing, it’s worth overdoing, some of these candles are absolutely enormous, weighing about a hundred pounds. There are also some very lovely photos of the very tall floats made by various confraternities and religious for the processions.

Peter wrote about attending this event, “I saw today in Catania one of the most extraordinary sights of my life: hundreds of thousands of Sicilians paying homage to their patroness St Agatha—in the carrying of hundred-pound (and more) enormous candles; in the offering of countless individual candles and bouquets of flowers; in waiting for hours for the Saint’s relics to pass by, borne on a gigantic silver reliquary float pulled by hundreds of devotees wearing white garments and medallions; in the elaborate carved representations of each historic guild; in shouting ‘Viva Sant’ Agatha!’," and fireworks—an ENTIRE CITY completely given over to a three-day ritual of devotion that has been repeated for centuries. NOTHING like this exists in the Anglo world. I have serious civilizational envy. My eyes welled with tears several times. How could one not be moved to the depth of one’s being?”

The cathedral decorated and lit up for the feast.
Illuminated arches set up over the streets along the processional route.

The giant silver reliquary carried in the procession.

LOTS of candles!
An honor guard stays with the reliquary when it is in the cathedral. The military unit providing the guard is called the Carabinieri (riflemen), which is a kind of national police force, but is legally part of the Italian army. It originated as a company within the army of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, and retains a colorful parade uniform from the 19th century.
 
Parade floats of various confraternities.

Wednesday, February 05, 2025

The Legend of St Agatha

Like many of the ancient virgin martyrs, Saint Agatha was made to suffer for the faith because she refused to marry a pagan who wished to marry her. In her case, it was a man of consular rank named Quintianus, who tried to use the Emperor Decius’ edict of persecution against her. The story of her martyrdom is summed up thus by the 1529 Breviary of the Roman Curia, the predecessor of the Breviary of St Pius V. When Agatha was sent to prison, after various torments and interrogations,
She stretched out her hands to the Lord and said, “O Lord who made and created me, and have kept me from my infancy, … who took from me the love of the world, who have kept my body from pollution, who made me to overcome the executioner’s torments, iron, fire and chains, who gave me the virtue of patience in the midst of torments, I pray Thee to receive my spirit. For it is time, Lord, that Thou command me to leave this world, and come to Thy mercy. Saying this, she sent forth her blessed spirit. The Christian people, taking away her holy body, set it in a new sepulcher, after anointing it. And when she was being laid to rest, there came a young man dressed in silken garments, … and he entered the place where the holy virgin’s body was being laid, and set there a small marble plaque on which it was written, “A holy mind, willing, honor to God, and the liberation of the fatherland.” And he stood there until the sepulcher was diligently closed, and then departing was seen no more in all the province of Sicily; whence there is no doubt that he was and Angel of God.
St Peter Heals St Agatha in Prison, by Giovanni Lanfranco, 1614 
The words on the plaque described above in Latin are “Mentem sanctam, spontaneam, honorem Deo, et patriae liberationem.” They are a grammatical fragment, consisting of three nouns in the accusative (objective) case, and their modifiers, without a verb or subject. “Spontaneam” can be read as if it modified “mentem”, but the Blessed Jacopo da Voragine in the Golden Legend explains the inscription thus. “It means ‘She had a holy mind, she offered herself willingly, she gave honor to God, and brought about the liberation of the fatherland.’ ”

These words were set to music, and commonly sung as the antiphon for the Magnificat at First Vespers of the feast of St Agatha. This antiphon was removed from the Roman Breviary in the Tridentine reform, which also no long mentions the plaque or the angel in the Matins lessons; it was retained, however, by the Dominicans and Cistercians. The motive may have been that the story itself was thought to be unlikely, and it is certainly true that the acts of St Agatha are not considered to be historically reliable; or it may have been simply because it is a grammatical fragment.

An antiphonary from the Franciscan convent of Fribourg, Switerland, 1488, with the antiphon “Mentem sanctam.” (source)
This story was also known to the composer of her liturgical texts in the Byzantine Rite, in which the following hymn is sung at Vespers of her feast. (In this case, the words ‘A holy mind etc.’ are in the nominative case, but are still a grammatical fragment.)
An unexpected wonder took place in the contest of Agatha, the all-glorious Martyr of Christ our God, something to rival Moses; for he, in giving the Law to the people on the mountain, received the divinely-written Scriptures engraved upon a tablet, but here an Angel bore a plaque from heaven to the grave, on which was written, ‘A holy mind, acting of free will; honor from God; the liberation of the fatherland.’
Vice versa, the composer of her Latin legend borrowed one of the most famous texts of the Byzantine Rite. The words cited above, “The Christian people, taking away her holy body, set it in a new sepulcher, after anointing it”, are a partial quotation of the troparion sung at the Shroud Vespers of Good Friday, the principle commemoration of the Lord’s Passion: “The noble Joseph, when he had taken Thy spotless body down from the Cross, and wrapped it in a shroud with sweet spices, and laid it in a new grave.”   

The inscription may also be seen on many church bells, which were often rung to warn people of some impending danger. The blessing of a bell traditionally included a prayer which asked that
when its melody shall sound in the ears of the peoples, may the devotion of their faith increase; may all the snares of the enemy, the crash of hail-storms and hurricanes, the violence of tempests be driven far away; may the deadly thunder be weakened, may the winds become salubrious, and be kept in check; may the right hand of Thy strength lay low the powers of the air, so that hearing this bell they may tremble and flee before the standard of the holy cross of Thy Son…(Pontificale Romanum)
The inscription of St Agatha on a bell in the Italian city of Laurino.
This may derive from the tradition that St Agatha repeatedly delivered the city of Catania where she was martyred from the dangers posed by the eruption of Mt Etna, a fact to which the Golden Legend also refers.
When a year had passed, around the day of (Agatha’s) birth into heaven, a very great mountain near the city burst and belched forth a fire, which coming down from the mountain like a flood, and turning both stones and earth to liquid, was coming toward the city with a great rush. Then the multitude of pagans went down from the mountain and felling to her sepulcher, took the veil with which it was covered, a set it against the fire; and immediately on the day of the virgin’s birth, the fire stood and proceeded no further.
This story appears in the Office of St Agatha in the antiphon of the Benedictus.
The multitude of pagans, fleeing to the to the virgin’s grave, and took her veil against the fire; that the Lord might prove that he delivered them from the dangers of the fire by the merits of the blessed Agatha, His Martyr.
St Agatha’s veil drives the fires of Mt Etna away from Catania, by Cesare Nebbia and Girolamo Muziano, 1580-83; from the Hall of the Maps in the Vatican Museums.
Relics displayed in the Cathedral of Catania on the feast of St Agatha, including her veil, the red piece of cloth in the tallest reliquary in the middle. It is still frequently carried in processions in the city and environs.
A 13th-century reliquary of the Saint, crusted over with jewels that have been donated to her over the centuries. In her left hand she holds a plaque with the famous inscription on it.

The Rhythms of Day and Night in the Rule of St. Benedict - Guest Article by a Monk

The following article was given to NLM by a monk of the Order of St. Benedict who writes under the pen name Placidus. Any reader who would like to get in touch with him may write to placidus12986@gmail.com.

I have often wondered how a monk would have spent his day in the time of St. Benedict. An overview of his Rule for Monasteries shows that he would typically divide his time between five things: praying, studying, working, eating, and sleeping. The way that these activities where distributed throughout the day, however, depended upon the amount of daylight available for artisanal or outdoor agrarian work, and the amount of darkness from which one could profit a full night’s sleep.

In St Benedict’s day, an hour was not counted by a division into 24 equal parts of the period from one solar noon to the next. Rather, one solar hour of the day was counted as one twelfth part of the period from sunrise to sunset, and a nocturnal hour was likewise one twelfth of the period between sunset and sunrise. At Montecassino, the total duration of the twelve daylight hours varies from about 15 conventional hours at the summer solstice to a bit more than 9 conventional hours at the winter solstice.

How one calculates an hour is somewhat arbitrary in the end, but the main principle is that it be based on some fixed law of motion, if, indeed, time is the numbering of motion according to an order of before and after. Whether one calculates time according to the daily motions of the sun, or the vibrations of a caesium atom, is a matter of taste and practicality. In a technocratic culture dependent upon world-wide commerce, communication, and travel, a system of time-keeping that admits of no variation anywhere in the world makes sense. But in an agrarian culture that is without such dependencies, as was that of rural Italy in the time of St. Benedict, the daily motion of the sun was the natural choice for tracking the day.

A Roman solar day near the summer solstice

A Roman solar day near the winter solstice

One of the reasons why St. Benedict calculates the hours according to the amount of daylight is because the liturgical day ends at sunset, and so the daily requirement of praying to God seven times a day (cf. Ps. 118, 164) was to be completed before then. Hence, for St. Benedict, a monk’s prayer was to be distributed according to evenly spaced solar hours between sunrise and sunset. Lauds, therefore, is generally prayed at first-light, such that it concludes near the moment of sunrise, Prime is one solar-hour after sunrise, Terce is around three later, Sext is at solar-noon, None is around nine solar-hours later, and Vespers occurs about an hour or so before sunset, whereas Compline is sung at sunset, during the twilight period, so as to close off the day. [1] All of these, St. Benedict says, must be sung while there is still some light in the sky.

However, Scripture also tells us to pray at night (Ps. 118, 62), and so St. Benedict prescribes that the office of Matins (or Vigils) be prayed after a full night’s sleep in winter (eight hours after sunset), and just before Lauds in Summer, since the time between sunset and sunrise for most of this season is not enough for a full night’s sleep. [2] To make up for these short nights, a siesta is added before None so that the monk still gets his total of eight hours of sleep each day.

In winter (October 1st to Easter), St. Benedict has his monks spend any available time between Matins and Terce and between None and Vespers doing lectio divina, the prayerful study and meditation on Sacred Scripture and the Church Fathers, or else the monks are to memorize those Psalms that have not yet been learned by heart. But the warmer and brighter hours between Terce and None during this season are spent outside doing manual labor. However, in summer (Easter to October 1st), the inverse occurs. The monk spends the hottest hours in the middle of the day between Terce and None inside the monastery doing his lectio divina, whereas he spends the cooler hours in the morning between Prime and Terce or in the evening between None and Vespers doing manual labor outside, or he spends it doing artisanal labor in one of the monastery’s workshops.

Yearly solar horarium according to the Rule of St. Benedict, chs. 8, 41, 48

In any medieval monastery, study was easily done in summertime within the cool, stone interior of the monastery’s scriptorium or cloister-walk, but in wintertime, it was done by candlelight at the fireside of the calefactory. However, indoor artisanal work requires at least daylight coming through the workshop windows, and agrarian labor also requires bearable outdoor temperatures, determined by the passing of the sun. The day is arranged, then, to make the most efficient use of light and temperature.

The taking of meals also reflects this harmony with and dependence upon the sun and seasonal changes. In fall and winter (beginning on September 14t), when there is less manual work to do outside, the monk eats less, taking his one main meal after None, or after Vespers during Lent, but in summer (beginning at Easter), when the manual work is more intense, the monk eats his main meal after Sext and also takes supper after Vespers. However, in accord with his Italian heritage, St. Benedict makes no mention of breakfast in the early morning.

Now, if we compare the total amount of time given to each activity, mentioned above, we can see that the monk spends an average of 5½ hours a day in manual labor and 4 hours in study. These vary inversely so that there is more work in the summer, but more study in the winter. The monk also has the option of replacing his siesta in summer with more study, if he wishes.

Likewise, the monk spends from around 4 to 5 hours a day in liturgical prayer and about ¾ to 1¼ hours at meals. These are similarly related inversely so that the extra time during the monastic fast between September 14th and Easter, when only one meal is taken rather than two, is replaced by more time in liturgical prayer, i.e. at Matins. The monk also has the option here of adding more time for personal prayer in the chapel on his own, perhaps during the long period between Matins and Lauds in Winter. Hence, as the night hours increase, study and prayer increase, but when the daylight hours increase, work and bodily nourishment increase.


There are many things that we can learn from this contemplative rhythm of life that is built around this daily ebb and flow of light and warmth. The monk sees the rising of the sun each day as he comes out from Lauds, having just admonished all creation to divine praises: “Praise him sun and moon, praise him every star and light” (Ps. 148, 3; cf. Dan. 3, 56-88), and thus he is reminded by the dawn of God’s loving Providence over all things. In the hymn at Lauds the monk praises God for having created night and day:
Maker of all, eternal King / Who day and night about dost bring / Who weary mortals to relieve / Dost in their times the seasons give.

Now the shrill cock proclaims the day / And calls the sun’s awakening ray / The wandering pilgrim’s guiding light / That marks the watches night by night. . . .

O let us then like men arise / The cock rebukes the slumbering eye / Bestirs who still in sleep would lie / And shames who would their Lord deny. [3]
The Creator of the day speaks to us through nature, both by the rising light of dawn as by the rooster’s crow, which both attest to the ordered celestial laws that govern the days, months, and years, as well as to the necessary submission of nature to those same laws. If the rooster is obedient to the rising light and announces on time its maker’s glory, all the more are we encouraged to do so. Hence, St. Benedict rouses his monks to wakefulness in the Rule, saying,
Let us then rise at length, since the Scripture arouseth us, saying: “It is now the hour for us to rise from sleep” (Rom. 13, 11); and having opened our eyes to the deifying light, let us hear with awestruck ears what the divine voice, crying out daily, doth admonish us, saying: “Today, if you shall hear his voice, harden not your hearts” (Ps. 94, 8) . . . “Run whilst you have the light of life, that the darkness of death overtake you not” (John 12, 35). [4]
The urgency of his admonition is all the more apparent when the time one has for daily work is clearly marked by the unchanging laws of the sun. “Are there not twelve hours in the day? If any one walks in the day, he does not stumble, because he sees the light of this world” (John 11, 9). All that we have is today for our conversion; no man knows if the sun will rise for him again. “Night is coming when no man can work” (John 9, 4). The Scripture that is read each day at Lauds also warns us to cast off the night of our sins and to put on Christ.
The night is far gone, the day is at hand. Let us then cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light; let us conduct ourselves becomingly as in the day (Rom. 13, 12-13).
Singing Lauds just before sunrise reminds us that Christ himself is coming: “Awake, O sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give you light” (Eph. 5, 14). Nearly every day the monk is reminded in song of this rising light, which he sees with his own eyes and knows in his own soul: the physical light that casts off the shadow of night, and the spiritual light that breaks through the darkness of sin. The rising light of day recalls to mind that we are given yet another chance to return to Christ: “Therefore, our days are lengthened to a truce for the amendment of the misdeeds of our present life.” [5]

Dusk on the mountain in November

At Vespers, the monks recalls again the ordered harmony of the celestial motions:
O God, whose hand hath spread the sky / And all its shining hosts on high / And painting it with fiery light / Made it so beauteous and so bright.

Thou, when the fourth day was begun / Didst frame the circle of the sun / And set the moon for ordered change / And planets for their wider range. [6]
These ordered laws that govern the heavenly motions are continually proposed to the monk for contemplation: the circuit of the sun, the phases of the moon, the wheeling stars and wandering planets. All of these point in their constant change to something changeless and eternal: the Divine Will and Providence, unchanging in its firmness, but which governs all things with love and sweetness, bringing them to their preordained consummation. Meditating on this divine rule in the ordered changes of the seasons, the great St. Boethius declared shortly before his execution,
Thou short the days dost make / When Winter from the trees the leaves doth take,
Thou, when the fiery sun / Doth Summer cause, makest the nights swiftly run.
Thy might doth rule the year / As northern winds the leaves away do bear . . .
None from Thy laws are free, / Nor can forsake their place ordained by Thee.
Thou to that certain end / Governest all things. [7]
Living by the rhythms of the sun, the monks of old were compelled to assent to its benign governance, and through submitting to its care, they were made to acknowledge the One who created it, and who is ever over all things, supreme.

NOTES 

[1] St. Benedict has Terce and None vary slightly according to the season, depending on the exigencies for outdoor manual labor and the time given to study or lectio divina.

[2] Lauds follows shortly after Matins from Easter to November. However, since Matins is longer from November until Easter by as much as ½ an hour due to lengthier readings, Lauds moves back to just before sunrise.

[3] From the hymn Ætérne rerum Cónditor, from Lauds on Sunday.

[4] Rule of St. Benedict, Prologue.

[5] Rule of St. Benedict, Prologue.

[6] From the hymn Cæli Deus sanctíssime, from Vespers on Wednesday. Cf. Gen. 1:14-19.

[7] St. Severinus Boethius, The Consolation of Philosophy, 1.5.

Tuesday, February 04, 2025

Blessed Rabanus Maurus

The proper calendar for the Catholic dioceses of Germany marks February 4th as the feast of one of the most interesting figures of the Carolingian era, the Bl. Rabanus Maurus, who died on this day in the 856. (His first name is also written as Hrabanus or Rhabanus.)

Bl Rabanus, together with Alcuin, presents his poem “On the praises of the Holy Cross” to Otgar, archbishop of Mainz. (Alcuin’s presence here is symbolic, since he was dead by the time Rabanus finished the work. Image from a manuscript of the 9th century copied out at Fulda, now in the National Library of Vienna.)
He was born around the year 780 to a noble family in Mainz, where St Boniface, the Apostle of the Germans, had been archbishop. As a child, he was sent to the monastery of Fulda, which Boniface had established as one of the centers of his mission. Fulda was already an important seat of learning, but would become widely renowned for this only later, under Rabanus’ own leadership. When his education was completed, he went to the court of Charlemagne at Aachen, and came under the tutelage of the famous Englishman Alcuin of York, who gave him his second name “Maurus” in remembrance of one of St Benedict’s favorite disciples. Rabanus followed Alcuin to the abbey of St Martin of Tours, where he studied the Bible, liturgy and canon law. In 801, he was ordained a deacon, and sometime before his teacher’s death in 804, returned to Fulda to become a master in his own right at the monastery’s school.

In 814, the year of Charlemagne’s death, he was ordained a priest, and four years later, the head of the school at Fulda. Many of the men who would perpetuate the legacy of learning encouraged by Charlemagne through the rest of the 9th century were students of Rabanus.
During his life as a scholar, he wrote an astonishing amount on a very wide variety of topics: commentaries on nearly every book of the Bible; treatises on theological topics and the liturgy, including an important revision of the Roman Sacramentary and a martyrology; works on canon law, clerical life and discipline, history, grammar; an encyclopedia based on the earlier work of St Ididore of Seville, as well as hymns and sermons. The Pentecost hymn Veni, Creator Spiritus, is traditionally attributed to him (this is now disputed by many), as is the original version of the common hymn for the feast of St Michael and All Angels, Christe, sanctorum decus Angelorum. The sermon read for the feast of All Saints in almost every version of the Divine Office before the Tridentine reform is also attributed to him, with great uncertainty. All this was done while maintaining frequent correspondences; he was on close terms and a valued counselor to both Charlemagne’s son, the emperor Louis the Pious, and his grandson Lothair, and with their wives.
In June of 822, he was elected abbot of Fulda, a position which he would hold for 20 years. Already at the time of his election, Fulda had several dependent monasteries, with a total population of around 600 monks. Rabanus worked tirelessly to expand the monastery’s library and its collection of relics, organized the administration of its considerable property holding, and built several churches and chapels for the benefit of the peasants who worked its many farms. In his later years, he was often called away from the abbey on imperial business, but as Louis the Pious became involved in a series of political disputes with his sons, Rabanus chose to withdraw by resigning as abbot, and returning to the life of a scholar.
Despite this, in 847, Louis’ son, known as Louis the German, whose lands included the territory of Fulda, had him elevated to the archbishopric of Mainz. He took office exactly 25 years and one day after his abbatial election, and proved himself to be as effective and energetic in his new position as he had been as abbot, despite his (for that era) advanced age. He ruled until his death less than nine years later, and was originally buried at the monastery of St Alban outside Mainz, another one of the most important centers of monastic life in western Germany. In 1515, his relics were transferred by the archbishop of Mainz, but they seem to have to have been lost during the disturbances of early protestant reformation, and so he has no known grave or relics. He has never been formally canonized, and is still known as the Blessed Rabanus.
One of his most famous writings is a cycle of poems, “De laudibus sanctae Crucis – On the Praises of the Holy Cross’, completed in 814. Six copies of this almost unfathomably complex work produced directly under his supervision still survive, including one with notes in his own hand, which is now in the Vatican library. (Vat. lat. reginensis 124). Each poem is written out in a grid, and within each grid, several letters are highlighted by their inclusion within various geometric shapes, larger letters, or drawings. The highlighted letters form their own independent verses; some of these verses form dedication poems to various people, including St Martin of Tours and Pope Gregory IV, while the most elaborate is a portrait of the emperor Louis the Pious. Here is a selection of some of the more complex images, beginning with one of the Lord.
The Lamb of God with the symbols of the Evangelists. 
Rabanus himself, kneeing in front of a cross.
Various angels.
The Latin word Crux (cross) crossed with Salus (salvation). It would be fair to note that this is a little clumsy (crlux), and Rabanus is extremely free with his use of meter, but nevertheless, one can only admire the mind that was able to plan such a thing at all. 
The portrait of the emperor Louis the Pious.

A Recorded Version of My Recent Articles in Response to Dr Brant Pitre

For the benefit of those who might prefer to listen to such a thing all at one go, Dr Kwasniewski has made a recording of my recent articles in response to Dr Brant Pitre’s video about active participation in the liturgy. (Links below.) There are just a few small editorial changes to turn them into a single presentation, and a few comments at the beginning and end. We hope you find this useful.

Monday, February 03, 2025

Ave Regina Caelorum

In the Breviary of St Pius V, the four Marian antiphons for the end of Compline are each assigned to a specific part of the year; Alma Redemptoris Mater is said in Advent and the Christmas season, Ave, Regina caelorum from the evening of February 2nd until Spy Wednesday, Regina caeli in Eastertide, and Salve Regina from Trinity Sunday to the end of the liturgical year. Before the Tridentine reform, however, there was a lot of variation in their use. In a Roman Breviary printed for the Franciscans in 1529, the Regina caeli is assigned to the Easter season, but there are no rubrics about when to sing the others, and there is also a fifth antiphon, Quam pulchra; the same arrangement is found in the post-Conciliar Liturgy of the Hours, with Sub tuum praesidium added to the traditional group of four.

There were also variations in the text of the Ave Regina Caelorum, which originally had a less regular rhyme; the more regular version currently used dates from the revision of the Breviary promulgated by Pope Clement VIII (1592-1605) in 1602. Prior to that, the Roman version read as follows:

Ave, Regina caelorum,
Ave, Domina Angelorum,
Salve, radix et porta (or ‘Salve, radix sancta’)
Ex qua mundo lux est orta.
Gaude, gloriosa,
Super omnes speciosa;
Vale, valde decora
Et pro nobis semper Christum exora.

From a Roman Breviary printed in Venice in 1582
With an occasional variation, this is the version known to composers working before the 1602 revision, such as Gaspar van Weerbeke, a contemporary of Josquin des Prez, and representative of the same Franco-Flemish school of polyphony (ca. 1445-1516).


and Tomás Luis de Victoria (ca. 1548-1611).


Here is the newer text, in a polyphonic setting with instruments by Juan Gutiérrez de Padilla, a Spanish composer born around 1590, who served as master of the chapel at the cathedral of Puebla, Mexico, from 1628 until his death in 1664.

Sunday, February 02, 2025

Liturgical Notes on the Purification of the Virgin Mary

The medieval liturgical commentator William Durandus, writing at the end of the 13th century, describes the Purification as a “double feast.”
In regard to Him that is born, the feast is called “Hypapante”, that is “the meeting” (in Greek), because in that solemnity Anna the prophetess and Simeon met the blessed Mary as She came into the temple to offer Her Son, Christ. … The Lord’s coming into the temple signifies His coming into the Church, and into the mind of each faithful soul, which is a spiritual temple. The Lord foretold this coming through the prophet Malachi, “Behold, I send my Angel before thy face etc.” (chap. 3, 1-4, the epistle of the feast.) Secondly, in regard to Her that gave birth, it is also called the feast of the Purification, because the Blessed Virgin, although She had no need of purification, and was not held liable to the law of purification, … wished nevertheless to fulfill the precept of the Law (in Leviticus 12, 1-8). – Rationale Divinorum Officiorum 7.7
This precept states that 40 days after giving birth, a woman “shall bring to the door of the tabernacle of the testimony, a lamb of a year old for a holocaust, and a young pigeon or a turtle for sin, and shall deliver them to the priest, who shall offer them before the Lord.” For this reason, the Purification serves as the formal end of the Christmas season, being celebrated exactly forty days after it.

The Presentation in the Temple, by Pieter Jozef Verhaghen, 1767; Museum voor Schone Kunsten, Ghent, Belgium
Its connection with Christmas is expressed most clearly at First Vespers, at which the antiphons are repeated from the Octave of Christmas. Each of them speaks of the Virgin specifically in reference to the Savior’s birth, as for example the second, “When Thou wast born ineffably of a Virgin, then were the Scriptures fulfilled; Thou camest down like the dew upon the fleece of wool, to save the human race; we praise thee, our God!” In the Breviary of St Pius V, these are sung with the Vesper psalms for feasts of the Virgin, but in other places, the psalms of Christmas Vespers were used instead. At Liège and elsewhere, the Lauds hymn from the Office of Christmas, A solis ortus cardine, was sung at these Vespers in place of the Marian hymn Ave Maris Stella. In many churches, the liturgical color of the Christmas season, white, was used in the Masses of the season for the period between the octave of Epiphany and the Purification, and the use of green began only after February 2nd. (At Paris, this custom continued until 1870.)

The liturgy also formally marks the Purification as the end of the whole cycle of celebrations that form the first part of the Church’s year. On the first Sunday of Advent, the Postcommunion begins with the words, “May we receive (suscipiamus) Thy mercy, Lord, in the midst of Thy temple”, while the Introit of the Purification, citing Psalm 47 more exactly, begins with the verb in the indicative: “We have received (suscepimus), o God, Thy mercy, in the midst of Thy temple.” This change indicates that what we asked for and awaited in Advent has been fully received in the Birth of Christ.


It should also be noted that the earliest possible date for Ash Wednesday is February 4th. (This has not occurred since 1818, and will not occur again until 2285.) The Christmas cycle, including the preparatory season of Advent, will therefore always be separated from the Easter cycle, including the preparatory season of Lent, by an interval of at least one day.

In the later 4th century, the pilgrim Egeria wrote, in her famous account of her visit to the Holy Land, that the Meeting of the Lord with Simeon in the Temple was celebrated there with particular solemnity, “just as at Easter”, forty days after Epiphany. In her time, the Epiphany commemorated all the events of the Lord’s birth, and the Meeting was therefore originally kept on February 14th; this arrangement is still observed to this day in the Armenian Rite. When the feast of Christmas was adopted in the East shortly after (and in some places, even before), the eastern Epiphany was made to focus on the Lord’s Baptism; the Meeting, as an event of His infancy, was then moved back to February 2nd, counting the forty days from December 25th.
A 14th century miniature of the Presentation in the Menologion of Demetrios I Palaiologos, despot of Thessalonike.
It is often stated that when it was introduced to the West in the mid-to-late 7th-century, the Meeting became a Marian feast, whereas the East continued to observe it as a feast of the Lord. (See, for example, the relevant entries in the old Catholic Encyclopedia, the 1956 revisions of Butler’s Lives, vol. 1, p. 235 and Bl. Schuster’s The Sacramentary, vol. 3, p. 397; the last refers quite incorrectly to its “predominantly Marian character.”) This arises from a rather superficial analysis of its liturgical title and texts. It is true that its Latin name appears very early as “the Purification of the Virgin Mary”, as, for example, in the Gelasian Sacramentary and the Murbach lectionary, both of the mid-8th century. It is also true that it was considered a Marian feast in the Middle Ages. But its character as a “double feast”, and one of Greek origin, was never forgotten; about a century before Durandus, Sicard of Cremona wrote, “Today’s is therefore a double solemnity, of Her that gives birth, and of Him that is born, that is of the Mother and the Son; in regards to the Mother, it is called ‘the Purification’, in regard to the Son, ‘Hypapante’, which is interpreted ‘the Meeting.’ ” (Mitrale 5.11)

The traditional Roman Mass of the Purification refers to the Virgin only where She is mentioned in the Gospel, and almost parenthetically in the Postcommunion. Likewise, the rites that precede the Mass refer to Her once in the first prayer for the blessing of candles, again, almost parenthetically, and twice in the processional antiphons. The double character of the feast noted by Sicard and Durandus is more clearly expressed in the Office, many parts of which are taken from the common for feasts of the Virgin. However, even here, the invitatory, lessons and responsories of Matins, and the Lauds antiphons, (also used at the following Hours), all refer to the Meeting of Christ with Simeon.

According to the Liber Pontificalis, Pope St Sergius I (687-701) established a procession from the church of St Adrian in the Roman Forum to Saint Mary Major, to be held on the Annunciation, the Dormition and Nativity of the Virgin, and the “feast of St Simeon”. Born in Sicily, but of Syrian origin, this Pope was certainly familiar from his youth with the liturgies of both the Byzantine and Latin tradition. There is good evidence that a procession with candles was associated with the feast from an early date, as Butler’s Lives also notes, but it died out entirely in the East; where it is done today in a few Eastern churches, it is a fairly recent Latinization. There is no mention of candles in the Liber Pontificalis’ words about Pope Sergius, nor in the early Roman liturgical books; the first reference to a blessing of candles on February 2nd is found in the late 10th century.

The church of Saint Adrian in the Roman Forum, shown here on the right in a 16th century print. The church was built in the 7th century inside the long-abandoned Roman senate house known as the Curia Julia, but almost every trace of the building’s history as a church was removed in a restoration from 1935-38. 
The Roman blessing is characteristically simple, following a pattern similar to that of the blessing of palms. Five prayers are said over the candles, after which they are sprinkled with holy water and incensed, and then distributed, as the canticle of Simeon Nunc dimittis is sung with the antiphon after every verse, “A light to the revelation of the gentiles, and the glory of thy people Israel.” After a second antiphon and a brief collect comes a procession, accompanied by the singing of two long antiphons. The first of these is borrowed from the Byzantine Liturgy; the second is from the day’s Gospel.

Aña Adorn thy bridal chamber, o Sion, and receive Christ the King. Embrace Mary, who is the gate of heaven, for she bears the glorious King of the new light. She remains a virgin, as she brings forth in Her hands the Son, begotten before the day-star; whom Simeon taking into his arms, proclaimed to peoples to be is the Lord of life and death and the Savior of the world.
Aña Simeon had received an answer from the Holy Ghost, that he would not see death, before he had seen the Anointed of the Lord; and when they were bringing the Child into the temple, he received Him in his arms, and blessed God, saying, “Now dost thou dismiss thy servant, O Lord, in peace. V. When His parents were bringing Jesus, to do according to the custom of the Law for Him, he took Him in his arms.

As the procession enters the church, one of the responsories of Matins is sung; note the clever way the repetition of the verse completes the doxology at the end.

R. They offered for Him unto the Lord a pair of turtle-doves, or two young pigeons * As it is written in the law of the Lord. V. And after the days of Mary’s purification were fulfilled, according to the law of Moses, they brought Him to Jerusalem, to present Him to the Lord. As it is written. Glory be. As it is written.

The historical Roman tradition was to use violet vestments for the procession, and white for the Mass which follows on returning to the church. Lit candles are held by the clergy and faithful (as much as may be practically allowed) during the procession, at the singing of the Gospel, and from the Canon to communion.

Many improbable attempts have been made to connect the Candlemas blessing and procession with the ancient Roman purification rite of the Lupercalia. The Venerable Bede, writing in roughly the year 720, says that the Roman King Numa dedicated February to the god Februus, another name for Pluto, “who was believed to have power over rites of purification,” and established it as a month of various rites to religiously purify the city. (The name of both the month and the god derive from “februare – to purify.”) Bede then says that the Christian religion changed “this custom” for the better, without mentioning the Lupercalia specifically, by instituting a procession with candles in its place “in the same month, on the day of St Mary.” (De temporum ratione XII; P.L. XC, col. 351)

The Lupercalia are mentioned repeatedly by other Church Fathers, and even at the end of the fifth century, Pope St Gelasius I felt the need to combat some vestiges of its celebration. A race though the city that formed part of the festival was still being run, and the Pope sarcastically suggests in a letter to a Roman senator who defended the practice that the runners should return to the more ancient practice, and go naked. Bede’s idea becomes more tempting as an explanation for the procession’s origins when one considers that the Lupercalia were celebrated from February 13th to the 15th, coinciding with the Purification’s original Eastern date; and further, that the name of the Christian feast that begins the ancient Roman month of purification was changed to “the Purification” in Rome.

For all this, however, it is extremely unlikely that any vestiges of the pagan rite remained in the time of Pope Sergius, who instituted the procession almost two centuries after Gelasius, and not for the Purification alone, but for all the Marian feasts. Rome had suffered in the meantime a significant depopulation during the plagues and wars of the sixth century, which dealt a massive blow to the city’s ancient customs and institutions. Furthermore, there is no reason to believe that the feast was ever kept in the West on any date other than February 2nd.
The Presentation of Christ in the Temple, mosaic by Jacopo Torriti, 1296, Santa Maria Maggiore, Rome

Saturday, February 01, 2025

Lecture by Thomas Neal on February 7 in Faringdon, England

This coming Friday, February 7th, the church of Blessed Hugh of Faringdon in Faringdon, England, will host a lecture by our friend Thomas Neal, titled “The History and Future of Gregorian Chant in the Roman Liturgy.” The first part of this lecture will outline the history of Western liturgical chant from the Jewish temple worship of the Old Testament, through to the early church and the manuscripts of the 9th and 10th centuries. In the second part, Mr Neal will offer reflections on the nature and purpose of liturgical chant, and suggest reasons why it has always been considered the highest form of liturgical music. At the end of the lecture, there will be an opportunity for Q&A. The lecture will begin at 7:45pm; the church is located on Marlborough Street.

Thomas Neal is a teacher, musicologist, and church musician based in Oxford (UK). He read music to postgraduate level at Clare College, University of Cambridge, where he was the John Stewart of Rannoch Scholar in Sacred Music. His research focuses on the sources of sacred music in sixteenth-century Rome, with a particular focus on the life and works of Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina. Thomas has over fifteen years of experience directing music for the traditional Latin liturgy, in addition to conducting numerous choirs and period instrument ensembles in repertoire from Josquin to Haydn. Since 2018 he has been the Director of Music at New College School, Oxford.

The first page of the Laon Gradual, the oldest extant manuscript of liturgical chant.

Friday, January 31, 2025

Gothic and Baroque Sculptures in a Swiss Abbey

Following up on three recent posts from earlier this month, this is the final set of Nicola’s photos of the abbey of St John in Müstair, Switzerland. The first part showed frescos from the Carolingian era, the second those of the Romanesque period, and the third, various Romanesque sculptures. I have titled this post Gothic and Baroque Sculptures for the sake of simplicity, but they are mixed in with some other things, including the abbess’ crook and pectoral cross, and some pictures of the nuns’ living quarters.

A wooden altar of Our Lady of the Rosary, with small panels of the fifteen mysteries arranged around the central image of the Virgin and Child, as Mary hands a rosary and a scapular to the faithful beneath Her.

Two late Gothic (1520s) sculptural panels, originally part of a triptych, of the Annunciation and Visitation.
The pectoral cross, ring and crook of the last abbess, Rev. Mother Augustina Wolf, who held the title from 1806-10. (When the area was invaded by the kingdom of Bavaria in 1810, the abbey was not suppressed, but degraded to a priory.)
Rings with the letters IHS or some other symbol on them, which signify that the nuns’ are brides of Christ.
The refectory was built in a large within the complex by the abbess Angelina Planta ca. 1500; these decoration were added to it by another abbess in the 1760s.

An Important New Online Resources: Dom Lentini’s Te Decet Hymnus

My colleague Matthew Hazell has uploaded to archive.org a scan of an important resource for the study of the reform of the Divine Office, Dom Anselmo Lentini’s book Te decet hymnus: L’innario della “Liturgia Horarum”. Dom Lentini (1901-89), a monk of the abbey of Montecassino, was the head of the coetus (subcommittee) that reformed the Office hymns, and this book is the official account of their work.

The bulk of the book is taken up with the hymns themselves, with information on the author and date of each one, if known, or if not, an estimate at least of the period in which it was composed. In the cases where hymns are excerpts from longer ones, it indicates which strophes of the original text are used. (This is not by any means an innovation of the reform.) It also indicates where relevant, some of the other which breviaries had the hymn in their repertoire, i.e. Dominican, Premonstratensian etc. Prior to the internet age, the tools for researching other medieval breviaries were very limited, and so this information is certainly useful, but far from comprehensive. There are also many bibliographical references to scholarly collections of hymnography in which the original texts have been collected, such as the Analecta hymnica.

There is also detailed information about the changes which were made to the hymns for various reasons. I have often referred to these changes in articles that I have written here, and my favorite adjective to describe them is “cack-handed”. As with the rest of the liturgy, the hymns were subjected to an aggressive campaign of ideological censorship, based on the Bright Ideas of the members of the each coetus as to what Modern Man™ could bear to hear in his prayers. So for example, all references to fasting in Lent are replaced by “abstinence” or something similar.
There is a common notion that the Liturgy of the Hours undid Pope Urban VIII’s classicizing reform of the Latinity of the hymns, and reverted to the original texts. This is largely true, but not entirely so. In addition to imposing the aforementioned ideological censorship, Dom Lentini also “corrected” many metrical irregularities, and changed unusual words. Many of these changes are well made, but many of them were unnecessary, and together, they have the unfortunate effect of homogenizing the hymns.
Lastly, I note that the non-Latin text (all the notes, the prenotanda etc.) is in Italian, but I hazard to guess that at least the more basic notes are simple enough as to be intelligible to those who know some Latin, or one of the other Romance languages.

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