Advent Lectionary: Luke 1:78-79

Most Catholics that go to Mass on Christmas Eve are not going for the Mass for December 24th. Many of those who do will enjoy the end of Luke’s first chapter, the canticle of the priest Zechariah. I love the concluding verses:

In the tender compassion of our God
the dawn from on high shall break upon us,
to shine on those who dwell in darkness and the shadow of death,
and to guide our feet into the way of peace.

My ears usually perk up at the words, “tender compassion.” It’s prayed that way with the Grail. The NRSV and Jerusalem Bible gives us “tender mercy.” Compassion. Mercy. Not exactly the same thing, but perhaps the saving event of the incarnation is something of both. And more, mercy “with Passion” sums up the suffering and death of Christ.

Obviously the whole Gospel passage for 24 December sings. Christians sing it every day for the Hours. It’s a good Scripture with which to finish the Advent season.

 

Advent Music: “Legends of St Nicholas”

I suppose I could have posted this a week ago Thursday. But the observance of Saint Nicholas is entwined with Advent and Christmas both, so I’m sure it’s not that much of a problem to suggest giving Anonymous 4 a listen for their disc, Legends of St Nicholas. They seem to have many selections from other recordings available for a quick listen on YouTube, but nothing at all from this disk.

This collection includes a variety of forms: plainchant, songs, and very early polyphony rendering liturgical texts, including a few readings from the legendary traditions of the bishop of Myra.

 

Lucy, Friendly Star

Lucy is the only (major, canonized) martyr of Advent. Her feast lands in the middle of the season, which may be a caution to us believers accustomed to quiet waiting and economic frivolity. At the heart of waiting and preparation is sacrifice. At the center of a season’s royal purple is a drop of red blood.

Today we are still a week away from solstice. But because of the drift of the Julian calendar, late medieval Europe endured December 13th as the shortest day of the year. It’s still a pretty brief nine hours of daylight at my latitude.

Lucy featured prominently in our parish’s Advent pageant a few years back.

(Lucy is praying in her room when she hears her mother calling her.)

MOTHER:  Lucy!  (Lucy finishes praying and comes to her mother and father.)

FATHER:  Lucy, we have good news for you.  Your mother and I have found you a husband. You are getting married.

LUCY:  Married? But I want to dedicate my life to God and help the poor.

FATHER:  But Lucy, we have already made these plans. I have the dowry for the wedding here.

MOTHER:  He is not a Christian, but he is rich and he will take care of you.  (Lucy nods, but not with enthusiasm.  Her parents leave and she kneels to pray.  She opens her Bible and reads.) 

Narrator:   You are the light of the world. A city built on a mountain cannot be hidden. Nor do they light a lamp and then put it under a bushel basket; it is set on a lampstand, where it gives light to everybody in the house. Just so, your light must shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your heavenly Father.

LUCY:  My light WILL shine before others, to give glory to God!  (Lucy takes the dowry money and gives it away to a poor person.   Then she kneels down to pray again. Her family and suitor return.)

MOTHER  Lucy, here is your husband.

SUITOR:  (Noting the Bible) She is a Christian?

FATHER:  But she is a good girl.

SUITOR:  She is a Christian?

MOTHER:   Where is the money we left here? The dowry?

LUCY:  I gave it to the poor.

SUITOR:  She is a crazy Christian!

The scene ended with an arrest and a modern Saint Lucy procession. But we had the girls hold the candles, not wear them as crowns.

Thomas Merton was more poetic about it:

Lucy, whose day is our darkest season,
(Although your name is full of light,)
We walkers in the murk and rain of flesh and sense,
Lost in the midnight of our dead world’s winter solstice
Look for the fogs to open on your friendly star.

Merton’s Kentucky fields in December were chilled and misty. Likely not yet snow-laden with those piercing and brisk and clear winter nights. Before the romance of Christmas sets in, we often have days of gray. Those mists can indeed fog and clog our vision. Lucy is a great saint for Advent. And not just because she is a very friendly star.

 

Advent Music: Alma Redemptoris Mater

Alma Redemptoris Mater, quae pervia caeli
Porta manes, et stella maris, succurre cadenti,
Surgere qui curat, populo: tu quae genuisti,
Natura mirante, tuum sanctum Genitorem
Virgo prius ac posterius, Gabrielis ab ore
Sumens illud Ave, peccatorum miserere.

Two versions. First, sung by my friend Jeremiah:

alma redemptoris mater prime

And Palestrina’s setting.

 

Advent Lectionary: Judith 13:18-19

Judith makes a rare Lectionary appearance Wednesday this week for the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe. If you want my opinion, I think the Lectionary framers were scared spitless of Judith. They probably still are.

R. (15:9d) You are the highest honor of our race.
Blessed are you, daughter, by the Most High God,
above all the women on earth;
and blessed be the LORD God,
the creator of heaven and earth.
R. You are the highest honor of our race.
Your deed of hope will never be forgotten
by those who tell of the might of God.
R. You are the highest honor of our race.

If you read chapters 13 through 15 of Judith, you might get the same idea. We haven’t let the woman say anything in our Lectionary even though she seems to have quite a bit to say after she’s lopped off the head of the barbarian at the gate and has brought it back to the city for encouragement. Instead we get the public tribute from Uzziah. How about more of the praise of God, if not the lady’s words themselves? The least they could have done is add verse 14b, from Judith’s mouth:

Praise God, give praise!
Praise God, who has not withdrawn his mercy
from the house of Israel,
but has shattered our enemies
(by my hand this very night!)

Or perhaps we’d rather not reflect on the European dominion over Latin America, and if we’re thinking Judith and the Virgin of Guadalupe have a connection, it might well be the head of Hernán Cortés should have ended up on an Aztec spike.

Mary’s Magnificat might be an honored text for the Liturgy of the Hours, and for the occasional musical extravaganza. But if we really looked at it closely, I think more churchmen would think twice about putting it in the Lectionary too much. The Annunciation and the Visitation are more safe. And they are mysteries of the Rosary, for heaven’s sake. Not even the Magnificat is that.

Count me as slightly disappointed on the psalm for Guadalupe. The Church can do better.

 

Advent Lectionary: Isaiah 26:1-6

One of our students was sharing his new “favorite” Old Testament canticle. As he was describing the “horn of salvation” and God our “rock,” and the raising of the hungry, the barren, and the needy, I asked, “Hannah’s Canticle?”

Yes! he said.

Mary’s prayer of turning expectations on their head was not her unique inspiration. The first Thursday of Advent finds the Lectionary giving us an excerpt from the Isaiah 26 canticle used at Morning Prayer, Week III. While the Liturgy of the Hours has excised the bold text below, the Lectionary framers kept it for our inspiration at Mass. The whole passage:

On that day they will sing this song in the land of Judah:

“A strong city have we;
he sets up walls and ramparts to protect us.
Open up the gates
to let in a nation that is just,
one that keeps faith.
A nation of firm purpose you keep in peace;
in peace, for its trust in you.”

Trust in the LORD forever!
For the LORD is an eternal Rock.
He humbles those in high places,
and the lofty city he brings down;
He tumbles it to the ground,
levels it with the dust.
It is trampled underfoot by the needy,
by the footsteps of the poor.

In the apocalyptic burst that introduces Advent, we should take seriously the thought of salvation. Many believers show concern about who will be saved, and how many those might be. The prophet’s lyrical passage today suggests that if we dare to harbor expectations about God, they will likely be confounded. Will all be saved? Perhaps not so many. Will it be just a faithful few? Take care, lest prostitutes, tax collectors, and other societal riffraff edge in ahead of the virtuous older sons and daughters.

In today’s reading, the faithful city finds its strength in justice and faith. The lofty city will tumble. The faithful community will attend to God in trust, respect, and by adopting what God finds an earthly priority. The lofty community will find itself leveled. Even if it thinks of itself as orthodox, faithful, privileged, and a loyal remnant.

We are getting prepared for a most unconventional “yes” and a most unconventional savior. High places will indeed be brought low. The needy and poor will indeed be walking in the ruins and dust of the powerful. Only five days into Advent, and we’re already getting the measure of our saving God.

 

Advent Lectionary: The Cosmology of Psalm 72

The psalm for Advent’s first Tuesday is the 72nd. It appears prominently on Epiphany, but we get a daytime preview of it on the third Mass of Advent. What do you make of the cosmology implied in verse 7?

Justice shall flower in his days,
and profound peace, till the moon be no more.

And here, in verse 17a?

May his name be blessed forever;
as long as the sun his name shall remain.

The likely end of the moon will be during the sun’s expansion into the red giant phase. The outer layers of the enlarged sun might slow down our massive satellite enough to spiral into the planet. Or expelled gas from the sun before that final stage might be enough to send the Earth spiraling out just enough to avoid the fate of collision and burning to a cinder.

Psalm 72 has had its interpreters focus on the Messianic aspects, otherwise the notion of a human king ruling till the end of the solar system seems an extreme exaggeration. We know, of course, that the reign of God will extend far beyond the end of the solar system. Planets will be swallowed up, or be ejected from the sun’s vicinity. The sun itself will swell up, then shrink to a white dwarf, and eventually cool to a dark ball of frozen carbon, neon, and oxygen. But grace and faith will remain, those tens of billions of years into the future, and beyond. The psalmist may not have had a glimpse into the ultimate future of the sun and moon, but his lyrical words are no less true.

 

Advent Music: “Celestial Gate”

Luke Hill at dotCommonweal makes a case for a very wide musical Advent/Christmas. I can’t refute it. At my house, there is considerable variety in listening tastes as well as film viewing (Christmases in Connecticut, Canaan, and lots of other places).

I thought I’d peruse my personal library and offer some listening suggestions for this month. My friends and readers know my tastes run pretty eclectic. But many of you might find many of these suggestions helpful to draw you in more deeply into the waiting of these weeks before Christmas.

Today’s suggestion is a more obscure symphony of the great American composer of the last century, Alan Hovhaness. Speaking in commentary of this work …

(M)usic is a sacred art, a pathway through a living universe, merging East and West, heaven and earth, addressed not to the snobbish few but to all people as an inspiration in their journey through the universe.

I loved listening to this piece in the dark, headphones on, laying on the bed or on the floor. Twenty-one minutes of pilgrimage through a universe where grace continues to break through our prisons, the skies open, and we are lifted into a place that, while a bit beyond the ordinary, seems to welcome us and bring us peace.

I hope you enjoy:

Symphony number 6, “Celestial Gate”

 

Advent Lectionary: Isaiah 2:1-5

This Advent I thought I’d highlight a few texts from the Lectionary. Maybe it will work out to be a daily visit. I’ll call upon the Scripture commentary of others from time to time. Maybe Neil will have a moment to bring an offering or two.

At the Mass for the first weekday of Advent, we get the prophet previewing a future of universal salvation and the triumph of peace over war. Thius is also the first reading for the first Advent Sunday Mass, but only in cycle A. Wait till next year. Or go to Mass today to hear …

This is what Isaiah, son of Amoz,
saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem.

In days to come,
The mountain of the LORD’s house
shall be established as the highest mountain
and raised above the hills.
All nations shall stream toward it;
many peoples shall come and say:
“Come, let us climb the LORD’s mountain,
to the house of the God of Jacob,
That he may instruct us in his ways,
and we may walk in his paths.”
For from Zion shall go forth instruction,
and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem.
He shall judge between the nations,
and impose terms on many peoples.
They shall beat their swords into plowshares
and their spears into pruning hooks;
One nation shall not raise the sword against another,
nor shall they train for war again.

O house of Jacob, come,
let us walk in the light of the LORD!

Verses 2 through 5 serve as a canticle for Morning Prayer in the Roman Rite. It was covered by a series of commentaries by Pope John Paul II, His assessment:

At the heart of Isaiah’s “vision” rises Mount Zion, which speaking figuratively will rise above all the other mountains, since it is God’s dwelling place and so the place of contact with heaven (cf. I Kgs 8,22-53). From here according to Isaiah’s saying in 60, 1-6, a light will emanate that will rend and disperse the darkness and toward it will move processions of nations from every corner of the earth.

The power of attraction of Zion is based on two realities that emanate from the Holy Mountain of Jerusalem: the Law and the Word of the Lord. In truth, they constitute a single reality which is the source of life, light and peace, an expression of the mystery of the Lord and of his will. When the nations reach the summit of Zion where the temple of God rises, then the miracle will take place which humanity has always awaited and for which it longs. The peoples will drop their weapons which will then be collected and made into tools for peaceful work: swords will be beaten into ploughshares, spears into pruning hooks. Thus will dawn a horizon of peace, of shalôm in Hebrew   (cf. Is 60,17), a word particularly cherished by Messianic theology. At last the curtain falls forever on war and hatred.

That mountain is also visited for God’s banquet celebrating the end of death in chapter 25.

Passages like Isaiah 2 are one reason why I’m glad the Roman Rite is not tied down exclusively to the psalms and antiphons for music at Mass. This passage needs a marvelous setting–not a strophic setting though. “Come, let us walk in the light of the Lord,” is a great refrain to which to return. Or that citation in 2:L3b, “Come, let us climb the LORD’s mountain, to the house of the God of Jacob, That he may instruct us in his ways, and we may walk in his paths.” A text like this needs more than spoken narration. It needs to sing.