Ember Saturday Mass at St Anthony's

Last Saturday there was a splendid Solemn Mass, with the full Ember Saturday Mass, with a spiritual talk, at Westminster Cathedral in London. Partly by chance, we mirrored this occasion in Oxford, at St Anthony of Padua.

The Ember Days are a truly great liturgical event, taking place four times a year. They consist of Wednesday, Friday and Saturday, traditionally days of pennance, to sanctify each season of the year. The Saturday Mass includes five Prophecies (readings from the Old Testament), an Epistle and a Gospel. Since it was Sung, the schola last Saturday sang the Graduals between each one, and the lovely Canticle of the Three Young Men sung as a continuation of the last Prophecy, which gives the story of the attempt to martyr them, and their miraculous preservation in the heart of the fiery furnace.


The pattern of a series of lessons followed by the Offertory and the rest of Mass is reminiscent of the Easter Vigil, and the Ember Saturday Mass was originally a vigil. The lessons took place during the night, and at dawn Mass was said. This is why the Gospel for the Sunday following is the same as the Gospel for the Ember Saturday: originally the Ember Saturday Mass started on Saturday and ended on Sunday, and there was no separate Sunday Mass.


While in the ancient Easter Vigil, more of the vigil was taken up by baptisms, formerly the vigil of the Ember Saturday was used for ordinations, with different orders being conferred after each reading.

The richness of the Ember Saturday Mass is really a case in point of the glories of the traditional calendar. The richness of the scripture and chant of this service is wonderful, and this is given to us four times a year, not on a feast day, but as part of the seasonal unfolding of the year.

The celebrant was Fr Simon Leworthy FSSP, the deacon Fr Nicholas Edmonds-Smith Cong Orat, and the subdeacon Br Oliver Craddock Cong Orat (both of the Oxford Oratory). The day was arranged by Fr Aldo Tapparo, the parish priest, who sat in choir. After lunch in the presbytery, Fr Edmonds-Smith gave a very interesting and edifying talk about the Ember Saturday liturgy, and we concluded with Benediction.

More photos here.

Pastoral letter on marriage

Archbishop Vincent Nichols, as President of the Bishops' Conference of England and Wales, and Archbishop Peter Smith, have signed a letter to be read out in churches this weekend all over England and Wales, on the subject of same-sex marriage.

The letter looks very good to me. Here's a short extract:

Changing the legal definition of marriage would be a profoundly radical step. Its consequences should be taken seriously now. The law helps to shape and form social and cultural values. A change in the law would gradually and inevitably transform society’s understanding of the purpose of marriage. It would reduce it just to the commitment of the two people involved. There would be no recognition of the complementarity of male and female or that marriage is intended for the procreation and education of children.

You can see the full text on Fr Ray Blake's blog.


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LMS Sponsored places to Chartres

I mentioned our sponsored places to Chartres not long ago, and as of today 11 of the 12 for young people (16-35) places have been snapped up. So if you want the last one - saving £100 - you need to move fast: go here.

For those, like me, who've exceeded that age range, and live a basically sedentry life, I recommend a bit of practice. The other day I walked home from Oxford along the Oxford canal: from the old canal basin (now, alas, the Worcester Street car park, but the canal is still there a few yards away),
to Shipton on Cherwell, where this Medieval 'preaching cross' is preserved, and then accross country to Woodstock. More photos.
 

FIUV Position Papers on the 1962 Missal

The Foederation Internationalis Una Voce (FIUV), the international federation to which the LMS, and an ever-growing number of associations from other countries, is affilated, is publishing a series of discussion papers on specific aspects of the 1962 Missal. These are all things in which the EF differs from the OF. They are brief (1,500 words), and while aimed at a general link the issues to the most recent relevant magisterial documents and modern liturgical scholarship.

The purpose of the papers is to inform those attached to the 'former liturgical tradition', and other interested Catholics, of good arguments in favour of these traditions, and to contribute to the debate about the future development of the 1962 liturgical books.

I am the 'Moderator' of the working group which is overseeing these papers. They are available on the FIUV website, and are being published one by one on the Rorate Caeli blog. A very interesting discussion is taking place there on the first paper, 'The Service of the Altar by Men and Boys'.

I've also put them on the LMS website.

We are very interested in comments and have a special email address where they can be sent, for those who'd rather not post them in a comments box:

positio AT fiuv.org

(remove spaces and replace AT with @: if, that is, you are not a robot!)

The LMS 6-day Latin Course 23-29th July: now booking

This year is the 60th anniversary of Pope John XXIII's clarion call for the fostering of Latin, Veterum Sapientia. He quoted the words of Pius XI, praising its 'concise, varied and harmonious style, full of majesty and dignity', 'a treasure ... of incomparable worth', holding it up as 'the splendid vesture of her heavenly doctrine and sacred laws'. This language is the Church's own, and it is available to all: even a smattering of Latin will allow you to follow the words of the Latin liturgy, and not a mere translation. Don't let this opportunity pass you by!

At the 2010 Summer School the Latin Mass Society organised their first residential Latin Course. This pilot scheme, running alongside the St Catherine’s Trust Summer School, was a great success, and another Latin Course is being organised for July 2012, which will be directed by John Hunwicke of the Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham, and Br Richard Bailey of the Holy Name, Manchester.

The course is intensive, over six days, with its own accommodation in the St Winifrede’s Guest House in Holywell, which is run by the Bridgettine Sisters. The Latinists will be able to attend the daily Missa Cantata and sung Compline which are part of the Summer School’s timetable.

We have made it as cheap as possible, plus there is a 10% discount for LMS members, and a  50% discount for full-time students, seminarians and priests.

More details, and booking form, here.

Infanticide

I've just put a post up on my Philosophy blog about the infanticide question, inspired in part by The Bones' excellent post. As it happens I've just had an article published in the Catholic Medical Quarterly, giving a critique of a popular medical textbook, which you can download here.

I'm minded to write a article on the morality of killing medical ethicists. If I get the time to do it, I'll post it up...

New book by Dr John Rao

To understand the present, you need to know history. Dr John Rao is the ideal guide: this book will take you through the history of the Church, her successes and failures, good and bad strategies, breakthroughs and dead-ends. It is a must-read for every serious Catholic.

Here's the blurb.

Black Legends and the Light of the World:

The War of Words with the Incarnate Word

John C. Rao, D. Phil., Oxford University

Associate Professor of History, St. John’s University

Read an interview with the author about the book here.

Black Legends and the Light of the World is a thematic discussion of the whole of Church History, based upon the Roman Forum Summer Symposia at Gardone Riviera in Italy (1993-2011). It has three purposes. The first is to explain the successes of Catholic Christendom as the product of faithfulness to the fullness of the message of the Incarnate Word regarding the individual and society. A second is to connect its failures to an all too frequent clerical and lay Catholic willingness to believe and follow the guidance of rhetorical “word merchants” who either falsely blacken Christ’s teaching or emasculate it, rendering it incapable of changing fallen men and nature. The third is to demonstrate the essential unity of such destructive rhetorical game playing in its perennial war of words against the substantive natural and supernatural correction and transformation of man and society through the Word---from the age of the Sophists to that of Global Pluralism.

In order to begin the printing and distribution of this book as quickly as possible, I have persuaded my publisher to make a generous pre-order offer on Black Legends.  The book is already in the printing stage of production and will be ready for shipping by the end of March at the latest. The actual cost of this 680-page book has yet to be determined, but we have settled on a special price of just $30 on all pre-orders received before March 15.  Postage and handling costs are also to be waived.  Please send check or money orders to: The Remnant Press P.O. Box 1117, Forest Lake, Minnesota 55025.  Or, place your pre-order at www.RemnantNewspaper.comThis book will be available to buy at the LMS Conference on 9th June, where Dr Rao will be speaking. Book your place now!