Fishwrap’s nutty over the Holy See’s ending of “tropes” during the Agnus Dei

I am sure you have heard this at one point or another… perhaps even too often.  Hitherto in many places, during the last stage of preparation before the distribution of Holy Communion, if the work at the altar was going on for a while, the singing of the Agnus Dei (Lamb of God) would be extended – vamped, in a manner of speaking – by the addition of additional (sometimes even appropriate) Christological titles.  Lamb of God… Prince of Peace… King of Kings… etc.

Over the years, however, I have heard some real howlers inserted.

In any event, that’s all over now and the liberal home-spun liturgy types are not happy.  No, not one little bit.   The Holy See determined that these “tropes”, these additions inserted to lengthen the Lamb of God are right out.

Over at the Fishwrap some of them have a little nutty about the Roman oppression, the “control” they are exerting.   Here is a taste, to add some relish to your reading:

[…]

Several also expressed frustration that the Vatican congregation was apparently issuing directives to bishops’ conferences on the matter.

One liturgist, Viatorian Fr. Mark Francis, [This is the guy who, after Summorum Pontificum, in the pages of The Tablet attacked Pope Benedict and anyone who likes the Extraordinary Form. I recall in particular his condescending assertion that the Pope, unlike Francis himself, “is not a trained liturgist”. HERE.] called the changes “another revision to a former way of operating.”

“We’re into this fundamentalist kind of approach,” said Francis, who has previously taught at the Catholic Theological Union in Chicago [Ooooo!  What prestige!] and served in Rome as his congregation’s superior general until July.  [I wonder how they are doing with vocations….]

The changes to the “Lamb of God,” Francis said, are “another example of [the bishops’] trying to maintain the purity of the Roman rite.”  [Imagine such a thing!  Imagine]

“Other than simply being literally faithful to the previous way of doing these things, what does this do for us?” he asked. [Instead of being “literally faithful” we should be “figuratively faithful”! At least I figure that’s what that means.] “How does this help our worship? That question is very rarely asked anymore.”

Felician Sr. Judith Kubicki, an associate professor of theology at Fordham University, [The admixture of Jesuits and liturgy is usually volatile.] said she saw the change as “two-pronged,” [Sounds rather warlike, no?] both as a logistical adjustment following the recent changes in the liturgy and as a further signal that the Vatican is concerned about “controlling the text” of the Mass. [WHAT?!? What is this you say?  Imagine! The “Vatican” trying to control the text of the Mass!]

“It’s another example of a need to completely supervise what the prayer text is,” [It is almost as if there is a connection between what we believe and how we pray!] said Kubicki, who also served as president of the North American Academy of Liturgy in 2008. “And if you have these tropes … they’re no longer under supervision.”

[…]

Imagine Rome trying to control the text of the Roman Rite!

Who do they think they are?!?

Those men in the Congregation.  Are they liturgists?!?

About Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Fr. Z is the guy who runs this blog. o{]:¬)
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44 Comments

  1. RomanticTradition says:

    Ugh, although I’ve never seen this in practice, it sounds much worse than what my priests do at my parish near my house, 2/3 change the Agnus Dei all together one says “This is true Jesus the lamb of God who comes to take away the sins of the world, happy are WE who are called to…” and the other priest says “Behold Jesus, the bread of life, who takes away the sins of the world…”
    Now, people get mad at me because, they’ve heard worse and hate to see me complaining, but I’m a firm believer that the altering of the texts many times inadvertently destroys one of the “Sacred Mysteries” that are meant to be conveyed at that moment. It’s not enough to just say “Behold…” and say whatever you want to make the connection between John the Baptist’s famous acclamation but sticking to the formula the Church provides makes the connection clearly in the same way the new translation makes the “Domine non sum dignus…” more closer to what the centurion actually said.

  2. Gregory DiPippo says:

    Optime Pater,

    Funny you should ask. The Clerics of Saint Viator (aka Viatorians) had 312 priests and 740 other members in 2001, total 1052. In 2010, they had 224 priests and 554 other members, total 778, a decrease of 27 percent. Total decrease since 1959, 57 %. Ain’t the internet just the most useful thing?

    http://www.catholic-hierarchy.org/diocese/dqcsv.html

  3. Cathy says:

    Whether it be the Liturgy or the proposition of electing a candidate, the perfect and the pure are seen as condemnable as being the enemy of the good. My apologies, Father Z, I am so weary for lack of immovable standards. The fickle fashions of faith, and fun, and freedom have left so many souls wandering through the weeping wages of waste, and work and wanton wonder. Just when I think I have found ground to stand on, both friends and foes would move it for me. Perhaps it is the pain of the struggle that perfects the person.

  4. biberin says:

    I went to a different Mass than usual this weekend, same parish. Flabbergasted to see how different two Masses could be. Also flabbergasted that for the great Amen and the Agnus Dei, they used decades’ old, pre-new-translation songs with lots of extra words. At least it stimulates great catechesis for the kids, since all the way home we talk as charitably as we can about how it was supposed to be done.

    I sometimes wonder if I would have converted, had I not had regular access to a well-celebrated N.O., and instead assumed that Catholicism-lite was all that was out there.

  5. curtjester says:

    “Support our Tropes” bumper stickers soon to come to liturgist’s cars everywhere.

  6. Matt R says:

    Father Z! You have quite nice-looking mugs and stickers to hawk that say ‘lex orandi, lex crendendi’!!

  7. jrpascucci says:

    The Catholic Church does not negotiate with liturgists.

    :)

  8. jrpascucci says:

    The Catholic Church does not negotiate with liturgists

  9. wmeyer says:

    The vitriol in comments over there on the Fishwrap is stunning. One thing is clear: they are very selective in their reading of scripture. Pretty much in the same way as Protestants…. oh, wait.

    The Catholic Church does not negotiate with liturgists.

    Nor should it. To the degree that a liturgist possesses any authority, it can only come from the Church. To the degree that any liturgist deviates from Church teaching (s)he separates from the Church, and in so doing, loses both credibility and authority.

    The Church is not a democracy; rather, it is the repository of the Truth of God, and consequently cannot follow popular fashion and fad.

  10. Gail F says:

    Curt Jester: HA HA HA HA.
    ““It’s another example of a need to completely supervise what the prayer text is.” Ummmmmm…. isn’t Rome SUPPOSED to completely supervise what the prayer text is? The way I understand it, people were singing extra “tropes” outside of Mass, where it’s okay to do so, and someone started doing it IN Mass, where it’s not. Why do these peopel make everything such a big deal? You want to do a concert and sing the Agnus Dei, sing all the tropes you want! You want to sing at Mass? Sing the actual prayer. NO BIG DEAL.

  11. acardnal says:

    Unfortunately, I have experienced the never ending series of trophes. It usually brings all attention to the Music Director, choir and parish liturgist (whatever they are) but this is, of course, is what they want – to be the center of attention for their “creativity” and ingenuity and ignoring the suffering Christ on the altar.

  12. asperges says:

    “.. said she saw the change as “two-pronged,”

    Pity she didn’t see the change as three-pronged, then it would have been “tri-dentine.”

  13. Actually, if anyone wants “control” it is the liturgist quoted. He wants to control the words and actions of the Mass himself, and like many a control-freak when told “no,” he looses it. Sad.

  14. rtjl says:

    Liturgists like to complain about how controlling Rome is but they are, if anything, even more controlling than Rome. When they are in charge they rule with an Iron fist that puts Machiavelli to shame. The control from Rome that liturgists complain about I experience as protection and freedom; protection from the oppressive domination of liturgists and freedom to be faithful to the Roman Rite. Only a liturgist could construe Rome actually giving people permission to do something, i.e. use the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite, as something oppressive.

    Now that the Agnus Dei has been secured perhaps Rome can go on to protecting the Gloria. And after that I personally wouldn’t mind Rome stepping in to rescue the Liturgy of the Hours from liturgists who will celebrate it only after they have adapted, modified and otherwise folded, spindled and mutilated it beyond recognition.

    “Rome doesn’t negotiate with liturgists” – good one. I would add “Don’t feed the liturgists” to the mix as well.

  15. poohbear says:

    If these people had jobs in the secular world, they would know that the CEO and board of directors set the rules. So too the Holy Father and the Congregations.
    I think I’ll go over to the fishwrap and post this :)

  16. jorgens6 says:

    I went to Mass this morning and heard my first NON-TROPED “Lamb of God” in SEVERAL months!! Thanks Be To God!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

  17. Kat says:

    My husband calls the tropes the “Freebird” Lamb of God. It just keeps going on and on…

  18. Apparently the 2 parishes in Coeur d’Alene, ID, didn’t get the message….but thanks be to God this will be ending….soon. I’m assuming in the new missalettes they’ll be publishing this directive.

  19. Therese says:

    Here are the two best articles regarding sacred music I have read this week:

    http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/column.php?n=2301

    http://www.crisismagazine.com/2012/catholic-music-its-time-to-stop-making-stuff-up

    (Yes, we have the ‘refrain’ Gloria. Awful.)

    I recall attending a Mass where a bishop attempted the ‘Ecce’ but was prevented by a choir that went on and on with the ‘Agnus Dei’. The disgust was plain on his face, but I doubt he did anything to correct the situation for the parish was his own diocesan seat.

    I cannot find a single priest in our area who did not welcome the new translation with open arms. But very few trouble themselves to banish those lousy ‘hymns’. And now at last I understand the emphasis on ‘active participation’ of the laity: per Vatican II we were supposed to learn in Latin the prayers of the Mass that pertain to us, and to be able to sing Gregorian chant. We’d all be as busy as bees had this task been undertaken. But like a heat-seeking missile gone astray, we laity were never given the opportunity to do the right thing. Maybe that’s why we’re now trying to usurp the role of the priest in so many ways.

  20. Melody says:

    Thank goodness, most of the parishes around here use the extended version, and it is very tedious. Not to mention it destroys the symbolism of three in the prayer.

  21. plaf26 says:

    Since the sacred liturgy is a constitutive element of Sacred Tradition (one of the ways Divine Revelation comes to us, the other being Sacred Scripture, according to Vatican II) the Vatican HAD BETTER be concerned about controlling the text.

  22. ghp95134 says:

    @ acardnal: … I have experienced the never ending series of trophes.

    Ahhhh …. the Agnus Dei has hypertroph[i]ed. Looks like surgery is just what the doctors ordered.

    –ghp

  23. acardnal says:

    When one conflates trope with strophe (familiar to readers of the Office) one gets a new word: trophe. Not to be confused with trophy of which the choir and cantor should not receive for their hypertropes.

  24. Charles E Flynn says:

    Jimmy Akin has a good article on this subject, complete with a plug for a worthy mug:
    Vatican: Stop Messing with the Lamb of God.

  25. Springkeeper says:

    I’m curious why that publication isn’t called “The Catholic Resister.”

  26. Northern Ox says:

    I’ve actually never experienced an “extended” Agnus Dei. What seems to happen hereabouts is just the replacement of the second “verse” with someting other than “Lamb of God.” I’m not sure that was ever what anybody had in mind, even under the “old” rule.

  27. AnnAsher says:

    We were at Mass about a month ago in Saginaw MI where u heard “Bread of Life” used for the second “lamb of God” in a Novus Ordo (of course). I did a double take. It had been so long since I heard that and I thought it went out with the corrections last Advent. Glad to hear it is out now! All this inventiveness to “make the Mass more meaningful” displays how little the innovators know the meaning in the first place!

  28. Fr Sean Coyle says:

    A problem I have with a sung Agnus Dei is that the priest is often left waiting until the choir sings a too long version, without any additional words. The red reads: ‘Then he [the priest] takes the host, breaks it over the paten, and places a small peace in the chalice saying quietly . . . Meanwhile the following is sung or said . . . the invocation may even be repeated several times if the fraction is prolonged . . .’

    The GIRM No 83 says, ‘The fraction or breaking of bread . . . should not be unnecessarily prolonged or accorded exaggerated importance.’ In my experience it is usually the singing that does exactly that, again without adding any words. Unless there are a very large number of hosts consecrated at a Mass with a very large number of people, and the hosts are placed in smaller ciboria at this time so that ‘the faithful, just as the Priest himself is bound to do, receive the Lords’ Body from hosts consecrated at the same Mass . . .’ [GIRM No 85].

    My question would be, is there ever any need to sing the Agnus Dei?

  29. Fr Sean Coyle says:

    Correction: Unless there are a very large number of hosts consecrated at a Mass with a very large number of people, and the hosts are placed in smaller ciboria at this time so that ‘the faithful, just as the Priest himself is bound to do, receive the Lords’ Body from hosts consecrated at the same Mass . . .’ [GIRM No 85], is there ever any need to sing the Agnus Dei?

  30. Pingback: St Peter Scruples Deviancy National Catholic Reporter | Big Pulpit

  31. VexillaRegis says:

    The Pope’s sent his troopes to end the tropes!

  32. pelerin says:

    It is quite an eye opener to read the comments on the link provided. One writer has bravely tried to insert some sense into it but it is so disheartening to read the comments from those who describe themselves as Catholics but who do not want to obey the Church even in the directive re the tropes.

    One commenter says he/she has ‘never broken away’ although admits to accepting abortion, artificial birth control, divorce etc and admits to ‘ making use of the Church for baptisms, marriage, funerals etc.’ Another comment says that ‘being a Catholic meant ignoring most of what priests said.’

    I recently learnt that an old friend had left the Church and joined another. At least she has been honest. I fail to understand why Catholics still say they are Catholic and yet have no intention of ‘following the rules.’ Saying they are still on the inside as it were, their opinions bring dangerous confusion to those who wish to follow the Church.

  33. Imrahil says:

    I fail to understand why Catholics still say they are Catholic and yet have no intention of ‘following the rules.’

    Rationally I don’t understand that either, but let me give a guess as far as feelings, and such-like things are concerned.

    There a two points at stake here.

    The first is the bond of the Mystical Body of Christ. It is a hard thing, a feelably hard thing, for the member to cut itself off the Body.

    The second is that they have imbibed, and rightly imbibed, the thought that Catholicism is The Truth. (That the same people might despise, for reason of confused moral principle, such talk as sectarian or so is not so really relevant.) By implication, what is true must be within Catholicism (so far they’re still right), and even so much more if it is also charitable, given the focus charity has in Christianity… (so far they’re right too).
    Now there appears a curious problem that what they perceive as true may not be true, and even what they perceive as charitable may not really be charitable. Here’s the problem.

    If a Church was more of a club for people with the same opinion and if to belong to the Church was a matter men were free to choose without moral directives telling us to choose this way or the other, well then the thing were easy. We’d just tell them to go and found their own club, and we could still be friends in a civil way.

    But it is not so. We do have excommunication, but it was never meant to be mere distinguishment. It was always meant and called a penalty. We can tell them they have obligations even as to having opinions. We can not tell them to go other place and not trouble us.

  34. pelerin says:

    An interesting reply Imrahil. I see your point but having been received into the Church many years ago I am inclined to respect more those who join another church through conviction rather than those who remain and try to undermine it from within.

  35. Magash says:

    Our youth music minister took to heart the requirements imposed to not add to the sung Ordinaries when the corrected translation went into effect last Advent. Would that the music minister at the other masses had followed suit. So we’ve not had tropes at the youth Mass since then. No responsoral Gloria, no added tropes to the Lamb of God, Sanctus word for word. Not so the other Masses.
    She is a prime example of why the bishops need to clean up GIA and OCP. Since music is in “official” publications which are authorized by the USCCB (through the bishops of Oregon and Chicago) she figures it is permissible to use. If such publications only contained music which really adheres to Catholic theological requirements then that is what she would use.
    Yes, chant would be better than hymns, but I’m not about to allow the perfect to be enemy to the good. Until the GIRM is change to require that the Propers not be replaced by congregational hymns we’re stuck with them. If we’re stuck with them they need to be the best, truest, theologically sound and musically well crafted hymns we can get.

  36. Late for heaven says:

    The problem with your live and let live proposal Imrahil is due to Vatican II these people who deliberately set themselves against church teaching are most often the ones in charge of liturgy, RCIA, catechism, music and parish councils. They are attempting to hijack the church and make it stand for ideas that it does not hold. They are in fact, heretics.

    Now in the old mass if they harbored these ideas in their breast as they silently worshiped next to me, I could welcome them in all good will trusting to the Holy Spirit and giving thanks to God. Nowadays they are in my face and I must conform or challenge. So I think they should use some intellectual honesty and go get self validation elsewhere. At Mass I submit to God, not to some puffed up wannabe do gooder.

    You must understand that I am myself a recovering puffed up wannabe do gooder

  37. Imrahil says:

    Dear @pelerin,

    thank you for your kind response. And I also respect those more who join another Church for conviction rather than try to undermine it from within. The undermining from within is a disgusting thing.

    However, I was not talking about such people. I was not talking about people have have found the conviction that another Church is the only church God called into existence, and in possession of supreme and unmitigated truth. Such people, erroneous though their conviction is, are under the moral obligation to join the said church. (Yet such people are, I believe, on a practical point rare, if only because such churches are rare.)

    Also I was not speaking of a person who wants to undermine it from within. I was speaking of a wants to remain within in spite of problems. Of course, this person may quite well say that she was only going for some rather less important doctrines upon which the Church may still change her mind. Of course, she wants (among other things) to change them to her opinion.

    So far she is right. There are less important doctrines and there are doctrines upon which the Church may still change her mind (called fallible); there is also an intersecting set of both. She may quite well be wrong about what is – to put it into the terminology – fallible; and about what is important. And of course about the issues where she differs with the Church themselves.

    She may quite well be even an unknown apostate. (“Personal God? Well, isn’t that a bit mythological?”) The canonical penalties are there for a reason; and they are properly called medicines – because an excommunication, other perhaps than “mere talk” of theologians (which our person supposes to just have their own opinions), really would make clear that the Church believes something else, and thus perhaps bring about a conversion. But to expect from all unbelievers to join another Church so that they don’t trouble us anymore is, in fact, like to expect all burglars to emigrate to Burglaria so that they don’t trouble us anymore. We cannot expect the unbelievers to do the job the Church herself, by constant exposal in sermons, by private convincing, by private admonition, by thorough catechesis, by officialates, by inquiries (if you allow this English word without connecting it to penalties an etymologically related institution inflicted) must do.

    Personal note: I did indeed not in the usual sense convert to Catholicism. I highly benefitted from the traditional customs to baptize children and to bring the baptized to Communion and Confirmation at fixed ages. And I once was led to read some apologies where the points of blame actually held against the Church were actually defended, which was quite a surprise; I have sided with the Church ever since… (though I remember that even before I once defended the biological Virgin Birth against my teacher of religion, simply because I had no clue and still don’t what an unbiologically-understood Virgin Birth should be.)

  38. Late for heaven says:

    The Church today is not suffering from a great heretical movement that pits one great idea against Her Holy (Whole) teaching. She is dying the death of a thousand cuts: “what difference does it make if I just sing one more verse? Where is the harm in that?” “So what if the tabernacle is no longer on the altar, people can just go into the chapel.” “No, don’t mention abortion or contraception during RCIA, these people are in a vulnerable spiritual state. We can deal with that later” “Why not hold hands with everyone around the altar, what harm can that do?” And the list goes on and on and on. Each small variation is no big deal in itself, but everyone adds their own and our worship becomes unrecognizable, a glorification of small eccentricities.

  39. wmeyer says:

    Late for heaven: Pope St. Pius X characterized modernism as “the synthesis of all heresies”. It is indeed the death by a thousand cuts, and has been working its evils for many years.

  40. The Masked Chicken says:

    One writer has bravely tried to insert some sense into it but it is so disheartening to read the comments from those who describe themselves as Catholics but who do not want to obey the Church even in the directive re the tropes.

    That might have been me. I was a long-time commenter over at Jimmy’s site (there are much fewer lively discussions over there, now, sigh, since the blog has become more information-based).

    Let me try to put this into historical context. Troping has always been a natural reaction during the periods when the Liturgy was most in flux. From about 900 A. D., or earlier, the Alleluia was troped, either melodically or textually and, eventually, these compositions gained their own independent status a Sequences. There was an explosion of them in the 10th and 11th century. The Cistertian Reform of the mid-Eleventh Century more or less quashed many of them.

    Even though the Mass was, more or less, a set liturgy, with local variants, by about 1100, troping was still used for the Agnus Dei and the Kyrie, with the high point bring the 1100’s to mid-1200’s. In fact, there are at least 100 known troped Agnus Dei settings from that period. Almost none were explicitly outlawed by the Church.

    After that troping gradually declined as the impulse to experiment went into the latest, “thing,” – polyphony. At first, the Mass was relatively unscathed (The Machaut Mass being the first example of a decent polyphonic setting and it is relatively tame – a good listen, if you are unfamiliar with Medieval Polyphonic Mass settings). Unfortunately, the urge to experiment in the secular realm (okay, relatively secular, since there was little non-religious based music at the time), led by the sometimes very complicated techniques of the isorhythmic motets of the period, eventually led not only to Parody Masses in the early Renaisance, where secular melodies were used for the Mass melodies (much like the use of show tunes in a lot of the modern slocky Mass hymns) and sometimes using complicated motet or madrigal-like (not quite madrigals, yet) forms, but even (and these really go back to the 1200’s) polylingual settings where all four voices sang each in a different language. Utter chaos.

    Just as the Cistertian Reform got rid of most of the sequences (they were further reduced by Trent), the Council of Trent, at the XXII session addressed the excesses in music. They wrote (attached after Canon IX):

    They shall also banish from churches all those kinds of music, in which, whether by the organ, or in the singing, there is mixed up any thing lascivious or impure; as also all secular actions; vain and therefore profane conversations, all walking about, noise, and clamour, that so the house of God may be seen to be, and may be called, truly a house of prayer.

    The exact type of discipline and types of acceptable music to be used were left to regional Synods. Although they did not outright forbid troping, contemporary musicians were afraid to use them and they essential died out of use. It was the secularity that was being outlawed, not the technique of troping, itself.

    Fast forward. Vatican II, likewise said (SC 114, 116):

    114. The treasure of sacred music is to be preserved and fostered with great care. Choirs must be diligently promoted, especially in cathedral churches; but bishops and other pastors of souls must be at pains to ensure that, whenever the sacred action is to be celebrated with song, the whole body of the faithful may be able to contribute that active participation which is rightly theirs, as laid down in Art. 28 and 30.

    116. The Church acknowledges Gregorian chant as specially suited to the Roman liturgy: therefore, other things being equal, it should be given pride of place in liturgical services.

    But other kinds of sacred music, especially polyphony, are by no means excluded from liturgical celebrations, so long as they accord with the spirit of the liturgical action, as laid down in Art. 30.

    Article 30 relates to the dreaded, “Active Participation.”

    Again, Vatican II did not outlaw the practice of troping, per se. Indeed, troping is a part of the treasury of sacred music and related to polyphony.

    What has been outlawed, over and over again, is the terrible unintelligibility and distraction which results when secular composition techniques are not put exclusively at the service of the liturgy. Polyphony, when used sparingly, a la Palestrina or Victoria, produces a mysterious, intelligible addition to the liturgical action. Polyphony which is more like a late Bach fugue setting, can (not always) produce both a distraction and an unintelligibility of the music within the liturgy such that the musical composition hardly seems a part of it – like applause.

    I repeat, troping, qua troping, has never been outlawed by any Council, to my knowledge. What has been outlawed is music that likes to promote itself during the Mass. The modern Agnus Dei tropes are of this nature – troping for troping’s sake. If there had been, maybe, two or three troped Agnus Dei, total, for use on specific occasions, like, say, a funeral Mass, where the tropes commented on life after death, the ban would have probably never occurred, but the secular mentality of experimentation and simply troping for troping’s sake in the modern post-Vatican II Agnus Dei detract from the liturgy. That is why they were banned.

    That, plus, the GIRM specifically prescribes how the Agnus Dei is to be used, liturgically (it could have allowed troping – it chose not to). Nothing should be laid on the shoulders of Vatican II for this mess – blame hackey Church music composers who have no real understanding of how music is supposed to be united to the Liturgy. Troped Agnus Dei can still be used, per SC 114, if they are already part of an established, Tradition-approved form. For instance, at a Solemn High Tridentine Mass, Gounod’s Saint Cecilia Mass, which has a slightly troped Agnus Dei, might be used. The GIRM prescription does not apply to the TLM.

    The Chicken

  41. acricketchirps says:

    @Fr.Z. Over the years, however, I have heard some real howlers inserted.

    I was hoping to see some of the howlers in the combox. My favorite: “One nice guy”

    … okay, I made that one up during a particularly excruciating N.O. Mass.

  42. acricketchirps says:

    One writer has bravely tried to insert some sense into it

    I think he means someone posting at NCR under the name “Simon D.” The guy seemed to have infinite patience with the troglodytes commenting over there, God bless him.

  43. pelerin says:

    Yes – acricketchirps – I did mean Simon D. He remained so polite throughout.

  44. cl00bie says:

    We used to trope:

    Jesus, Righteous Dude!!!
    Jesus, Happy Meal!!!
    Jesus, Steadfast Friend!!!

    We haven’t troped for years, since the last pastor cut it out. After the new translation, our Bishop mandated that all parishes learn the approved English setting first, a Latin setting second, and other properly translated settings after that.

    At the beginning of choir season, our director said we’d be learning a new English setting. I asked: “What about the Latin setting?” He looked at me pointedly and I said (half jokingly): “Don’t make me go to the Bishop!” :)

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