Fr. Z's Blog | Formerly entitled: "What Does The Prayer Really Say?" – Clear, straight commentary on Catholic issues, liturgy and life by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf o{]:¬)

Blog “New Liturgical Movement” under new management

Posted on 4 June 2013 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Kudos to Jeffrey Tucker who has taken over the reins of the blog New Liturgical Movement!

Click on the image and go spike their stats as a welcome gesture.

Posted in Fr. Z KUDOS, The Campus Telephone Pole | Tagged blogs, Jeffrey Tucker, liturgy, New Liturgical Movement
4 Comments

GUEST POST: Gregorian Chant Will Save the World

Posted on 4 June 2013 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Save The Liturgy – Save The Word has been a by word around this blog for a long time.

I saw this on the blog The Back Of The World:

Gregorian Chant Will Save the World

Click to buy!

A few weeks ago, I was sitting at the computer while my two-year-old son noisily played with some tupperware behind me. I clicked on a link to listen to a song from “Angels and Saints at Ephesus”, a new CD by the Benedictines of Mary, Queen of the Apostles (which, incidentally, has been tearing up the Classical music charts). The beautiful, a capella voices of the Sisters came softly over the computer speakers as they began a Gregorian chant in Latin.Suddenly, I noticed that the banging of tupperware behind me had stopped.

I turned to see my two-year-old, standing, staring at the computer, eyes wide open and mouth slightly agape. He took a few steps forward, and then said, breathlessly: “Dada…that’s Jesus music.”

I was stunned. How on earth did he know that? (Our parish certainly doesn’t do any chanting at the N.O. Mass we attend…). He crawled up into my lap, and we listened to the rest of the chant together. And then we listened to it again. And then again. And then again. My boy was totally captivated, totally transfixed, totally enraptured…each time the chant would come to an end, he would look up at me and plead “again, Dada?”

I bought the album, and now every night my son asks to listen to the “Jesus music” as he falls asleep…

***

Fyodor Dostoyevsky once said: “Beauty will save the world.”

Cardinal Ratzinger once said: “The encounter with beauty can become the wound of the arrow that strikes the soul and thus makes it see clearly, so that henceforth it has criteria, based on what it has experienced, and can now weigh the arguments correctly.”

Mother Theresa once said: “You have to learn from the Heart of Jesus. That is why Jesus said ‘learn of me’–not from books.”

And somehow, in ways I will never understand, my two-year-old boy is listening to the beat of the Sacred Heart. He is encountering beauty, and listening to it with childlike ears of faith. He’s learning lessons that only the gentle notes and chords of Heaven can teach him. And all I can do is sit back and treasure up all of these things in my heart…

Ex ore infantium!

Fr Z Kudos to the 2 year old and his father!

If you are in Canada or the UK, copy and paste the CD title (above) into my amazon searchboxes at the bottom of the page. Easy. Otherwise, the UK link is HERE and Canada HERE.

A brief sampling!

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

Posted in "How To..." - Practical Notes, Just Too Cool, Liturgy Science Theatre 3000 | Tagged Gregorian chant, liturgy, sacred music, Save The Liturgy Save The World
10 Comments

My view for a while

Posted on 3 June 2013 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

I am in flight delay limbo, languishing in a lounge.

UPDATE

STILL in limbo. But I think the flight may be en route!

UPDATE:

Five Hours and endless excuses later…

UPDATE:

I finally got home, after 1 a.m., hours after the schedule.

Posted in On the road, What Fr. Z is up to | Tagged limbo
15 Comments

Your Good News

Posted on 3 June 2013 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Do you have some good news? Let us know.

Posted in SESSIUNCULA |
50 Comments

Of Latin and Sunday collections

Posted on 3 June 2013 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

I was alerted to an interesting point found in a parish bulletin.

Old Saint Mary’s in Cincinnati provides information about the weekly totals for the collections at Masses. The totals for 26 May were interesting. HERE

Given that the 11 o’clock is in German, the 9:15 is the more likely candidate to be the principle Mass than is the 12:30. Still, there is quite a contrast in the collections at those Sunday Masses…. aren’t there Fathers?

And compare the attendance numbers. The attendance is not exactly high for any of these Masses, but the per capita giving is markedly higher for one mass than for the others.

“But Father! But Father!”, some one is sure to interject. “That’s just one parish. People will send you bulletins that show that the lowest collection of the day was for the ‘Latin Mass’. So there! You hate Vatican II!”

Maybe they will and maybe they won’t.

Posted in "How To..." - Practical Notes, Our Catholic Identity | Tagged collection basket, collections, Latin
51 Comments

QUAERITUR: Is enduring a migraine a substitute for Friday penance?

Posted on 3 June 2013 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

From a reader:

Would enduring a headache or migraine constitute a proper substitute for a Friday penance?

I’ve seen in others how intense the suffering is.

Enduring any illness can be penitential. Suffering can be offered up for the good of one’s soul (and for other intentions).

That said, it seems to me that sacrificial dimension involved in Friday penance requires not just acceptance of suffering, but also some act of giving up some “good”. For example, for my Friday penance I may give up eating meat, listening to the radio, reading for pleasure, watching a baseball game. My simply enduring something unpleasant is not a sacrifice. You can offer up something unpleasant that it is your duty to perform, but that doesn’t make doing that thing a sacrifice. Johnny, for example, is required by his parents to mow the lawn on Friday after school. He does it, but he would rather be down at the sand lot playing baseball with his friends. He offers it up. On the other hand, he then sees that his neighbor 80-year old Mrs. McGillicuddy’s lawn really needs mowing. He gives up going to the sandlot and mows her lawn. There is an element of sacrifice in that gesture.

Provided that one doesn’t seriously endanger one’s health, perhaps offering up a headache or migraine without taking any painkiller to relieve the suffering could be along the lines of the penance we are asked to perform. In that case it is the giving up of the good of the painkiller that makes enduring the suffering more sacrificial.

At the same time, migraines can be pretty bad. In some cases giving up the good of the painkiller would be a serious gesture indeed.

You could take the painkiller on Friday and then not eat meat, not read that novel, not go to the sandlot….

In any event, it is good to see that someone is thinking about what Friday penance means and why we are obliged to it. Sadly, when overly-optimistic Paul VI relaxed the obligations in the hope that people would on their own accord seek to do penance willingly in a deeper way, human nature trumped optimism and people stopped doing any penance at all.

Posted in "How To..." - Practical Notes, ASK FATHER Question Box, Our Catholic Identity | Tagged Friday penance
24 Comments

Your Sunday Sermon Notes

Posted on 3 June 2013 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

What were the good points you heard for your Sunday sermon?

Posted in SESSIUNCULA |
37 Comments

External (TLM) Observance of Corpus Christi on Sunday… yes? no?

Posted on 2 June 2013 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Today I had qualms… qualms I say… about the 2nd Sunday after Pentecost for the traditional celebration of the Roman Rite. Why? “External celebration”?

One of the long-time readers here posted in a comment (tossing some of my words back into my very teeth… pesky things, words…):

“In the Novus Ordo many people are celebrating Corpus Christi today”

As are many in TLM communities, in accordance with he 2013 FSSP Ordo provision as follows: [The FSSP doesn’t get to make provisions… but let that pass…]

Regarding the Feast of Corpus Christi when it falls on a weekday, it is still celebrated on that week day. In addition, “the external solemnity of the feast must be transferred in the United States and celebrated on the following Sunday, when this feast falls on a week day (Indult of Nov. 25, 1885). Hence, where on Sundays the principal Mass is usually a sung Mass, on the Sunday following this feast this sung Mass in churches and public oratories must, and in semi-public oratories may, be of the transferred external solemnity (S.R.C. 2974, IV; 4269, IX).” A procession of the Blessed Sacrament must follow the Mass.

Reading at face value, it might even appear a violation of this provision to celebrate the Mass of the 2nd Sunday after Pentecost instead of the external solemnity of Corpus Christi in a community with only a single Sung Mass on Sunday. Or is it?

OR. IS. IT?

I decided to consult with trusted sources.

The best answer I got back says something that contradicts what I had thought (though I will defend myself with the reminder that I wasn’t heavily invested in the issue).

I’ll edit the “subjunctive of CYA” (“it would seem”, etc.) from post a reply I received:

The principal Mass today, in the EF, in the United States, should be the external solemnity of Corpus Christi. [Here is the salient point… and I refer readers to Universae Ecclesiae.] The indult of 1885 was still in effect in 1962, and, mutatis mutandis with the Novus Ordo, remains in effect today. Therefore, it is a violation to omit the external solemnity and celebrate the Mass of the second Sunday after Pentecost.

Okay!

I think we need a discussion of this.

But I am ready to shift my position.

Posted in "How To..." - Practical Notes, ASK FATHER Question Box, Linking Back, Liturgy Science Theatre 3000, The Drill | Tagged Corpus Christi, External observance
48 Comments

Just Too Cool… and too sweet

Posted on 2 June 2013 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

A reader alerted me to something at the blog Atlas Obscura.

Despite the religious divide of the lives and cemeteries, the gravestones of Colonel J.C.P.H. of Aeffderson and noblewoman J.W.C. Van Gorkum clasp hands across the divide.
In the 19th century, the Dutch lived with Pillarisation, a policy which seperated public establishments by religious and political affiliations. Yet Colonel Aeffderson was a Protestant, and Van Gorkum was a Catholic, were married for 40 years, a union that likely caused some scandal in the 19th century Netherlands.
The Protestant husband died first, and then Van Gorkum. They wanted to be buried alongside each other, but the policies of Pillarisation made that impossible. Instead two stone hands were added to the back of their gravestones, clasping across the wall that separates them.

Posted in Just Too Cool | Tagged headstones, linked headstones, pillarization
25 Comments

BRICK BY BRICK: New TLM in a small town

Posted on 2 June 2013 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Pope Benedict gave us a great gift in the provisions of Summorum Pontificum.

Get out there and USE THEM!

Now is not the time to fall back or hesitate or wring hands.

Organize! Stop whining! Make it happen!

From a reader:

The small town of Veneta, Oregon (population less than 5,000), which is 20 or so minutes from Eugene is home to an SSPX parish and St. Catherine of Siena Catholic church. Starting this Sunday, the TLM will be celebrated at St. Catherine’s every Sunday and on Holy Days. There is no TLM offered in the area and there are many large parishes in Eugene, but this priest has decided to take up this cross in order to allow a licit option (at least for the celebration of Mass) for those who want to practice and worship traditionally.

The New Evangelization.

Give that SSPX chapel some competition and bring those people back to greater manifest unity with the Roman Pontiff and the local bishop.

Fr Z Kudos to the priest.