The Armchair Liturgist Goes To Mass Easter Evening

The Roman Rite prescribes the account of the disciples’ encounter of the Lord in the Breaking of the Bread at Emmaus for an Easter evening Mass. During the main academic year, we provide a 7pm Sunday Mass with a few exceptions. Yesterday was one of these. But perhaps your parish or another did offer such a Mass as part of its usual schedule. If so, did you use Luke 24:13-35, the longest Lectionary Gospel selection outside of Lent and Holy Week? We read it on the third Sunday of Easter, but only in cycle A (next year).

Does it make sense to read different Gospel passages at Vigil, in the morning, and later in the day? Is it just an attempt to align different Resurrection events with the right time of day?

Sit in the purple chair and redner judgment: Would you offer a Mass Easter evening? (Would anyone show up for it?) And which Easter Sunday Gospel is your favorite?

 

The Armchair Liturgist: Acclamations During The Passion Reading

This might be in that twilight zone of things recently frowned on, but my parish has a long tradition of musical acclamations inserted within the Passion Gospels. I see the Lucan refrain of the thief on the cross used in many places every year. But I don’t like that. It reminds me too much of the pastor who used to tell his own version of the Passion from “memory” every year, incorporating all four Gospels. And maybe Veronica, too.

Last year, for Mark we used a refrain based on the centurion’s confession:

Jesus, Jesus, truly the Son of God.

Did you know that the good thief’s refrain is one of the few times in the Bible (maybe the only in the Gospels) in which the Lord is addressed by name and without an honorific?

Jesus, remember me when you come into your Kingdom.

I confess a love for the hymn from which this refrain is derived. And I use it on Good Friday:

Let all mortal flesh keep silence, and with fear and trembling stand.

What would be a good one for Matthew? I can’t recall what I used two years ago. If anything. Maybe the refrain from Psalm 22 or 31. What would you use? Take up the purple chair and decide: how would you handle the Passions readings of Holy Week?

 

The Armchair Liturgist Plans Ash Wednesday

Ash Wednesday will be something of a scramble in temporary worship conditions in my parish. Ordinarily, our church is conveniently located across the street from campus–the student union in fact. And we get droves of people for four Masses–one at noon and three in the evening.

It won’t be as convenient to walk to the Iowa State Center, which is big enough to hold the people who come to these liturgies. So we added an early morning Mass in our basement. The noon service will be Liturgy of the Word, plus distribution of ashes.

So it’s time to sit in the purple chair before the purple days of Lent. If Ash Wednesday were yours to plan, and assuming your usual availability of clergy, how would you arrange the proceedings? Use a liturgy of the Word more liberally? What are the ideal times to accommodate both parishioners and those occasional Catholics who drop in for the “obligatory” observance of this non-obligatory holy day?

 

The Armchair Liturgist: Nativity Stations

I’ve seen here and there an effort to translate the experience of the Nativity of the Lord into a devotion akin to the Way of the Cross. As I make it out, Advent and/or Christmas deserve some particular spiritual pilgrimage. People have written books on this. My former parish’s effort was featured in the archdiocesan newspaper before Christmas.

My current parish explored the following stations with its children five years ago. It employed twelve: the Annunciation, the Visitation, the Magnificat, the Birth of John the Baptist, and the canticle of Zechariah from Luke, followed by the Annunciation to Joseph and then Joseph taking Mary into his home. Four more from Luke: the journey to Bethlehem, the Birth of Jesus, the Annunciation to shepherds, then the shepherds spreading the news. Last station: Magi.

What do you think? Should Nativity Stations include the anticipatory events of Advent? Need it be fourteen/fifteen stations like the Way of the Cross? Does it need a particular name, The Way of the Crib? Or Manger? Or a particular number of stations?

Image credit: CNS/Paul Haring

 

The Armchair Liturgist: Scripture Homework at Mass

The priest at daily Mass today dropped a piece of “homework” at the end of his homily. “Deuteronomy 11:12,” he said. “Look it up–that is your message.”

I did look it up. It’s here.

What do you think of this idea, dropping a Scripture quote on Massgoers? An effective way to get people to open up the Bible? An eye-catching way of drawing the message of the homily out a few hours or over the next week? I can’t recall a preacher ever doing this before. Would you do it? Have you done it?

 

The Armchair Liturgist Addresses Connecticut

The General Intercessions/Prayers of the Faithful/Prayer Petitions/Universal Prayer continue to be a liturgical locus where the universal and the personal and the places in between get a bit blurred as they stir and mix together. The relevant sections of the GIRM are 69 through 71. This armchair has been the place of many important discernments over the decades.

Another mass murder tragedy unfolded at a Connecticut school yesterday. How will parishes treat this in the Sunday intercessions? Mindful that “(t)he intentions announced should be sober, be composed with a wise liberty and in few words, and they should be expressive of the prayer of the entire community,” how would you accomplish it?

Sobriety would seem to indicate that a prayer not elicit strong emotions on the part of those not directly affected by the tragedy. More children, for example, have been killed by military drones, in the Syrian civil war, and even in gun violence in American inner cities. Most of these deaths are a result of immoral judgments of adults who are generally judged to be more psychologically competent that our average lone gun. So if we get sad or angry at Mass over one set of children, and not others, has the liturgy itself become a selective tool for tears or grumbling outrage?

Our liberty in composition would give us leeway to pray for the victims, to pray for the mourners, to pray for the perpetrators, or to pray for the change required that such incidents become rare or non-existent. Or if it can be accomplished with an economy of words, maybe all of the above. Can your community get behind such a prayer? Would it have to exclude gun control? Should it include the basic human inclination to sin, and even to commit violence against people whom we love? In doing this, would a prayer have a prayer of being effective, if child abusers, anger addicts, and others of violence in our midst were to wake up somehow and respond to God’s graceful poke to get some help? We might all agree such an event would be a good thing. Would it fit the bill? Or must it be worded as generally and as blandly as possible?

How would you word such an intention in your Sunday petitions? Offer it up in the combox, if you would, please.

 

The Armchair Liturgist Ponders the Gloria at Wedding Masses

By now, many clergy and wedding musicians are familiar with the expanded prescriptions of the Gloria, including its provision in ritual Masses, including weddings, and even on a Lent or Advent weekday.

I had a wedding Mass this past weekend in which the presider followed the 1970 Order of Marriage and included a penitential rite. We didn’t prepare a Gloria for singing. But I’m wondering about that next wedding Mass on my schedule.

Let me offer up the purple chair for you with the following questions:

Will you sing or say the Gloria?

If you sing, which setting?

Is the Missal’s Gloria XV really suitable for a festive occasion like a wedding (let alone Christmastime or the Fifty Days)? And if you anticipate people won’t sing it anyway, why not take up the option of a performance piece, even another chant like Gloria VIII?

What’s your opinion on the MR3′s expanded use of the Gloria?

 

The Armchair Liturgist Announces Music

If you’re in a parish that has long announced the liturgical music for people to sing, perhaps you find it a difficult locus for renewal. In my current parish, a choir member invites people to stand and greet. After about a minute, the music is announced, usually with an invitation to “Please join in singing …” and then the song is announced: number, title, number.

During Lent, we’ve encouraged minimal announcements. There is no invitation to greet. I tried to convince the music announcers to just go with number, title, number.

There is talk about a hymn board, but it remains talk. At least until a sound system upgrade surfaces, and we can get the other essential items addressed.

So … sit in the liturgist’s chair and render judgment. How would you make sure the essential information is communicated?

 

The Armchair Liturgist Celebrates Immaculate Conception on Saturday

Spending a chunk of office time earlier today setting up the liturgical schedule on the parish calendar, I noted that the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception falls on Saturday. In my parish, this puts us in a bit of a situation. We don’t celebrate Mass on the Saturday of a given week, though the other parish in town does. We’ll likely offer a Mass. But when? Friday night, maybe before supper? Saturday morning? Our regular weekday Mass is 12 noon.

Your parish may be lucky to have a Saturday Mass. I hope it is well-attended. How will you handle the celebration of the holy day? Music ministry? Treats and snacks? Will any children come with parents? (Or without?)

Sit in the chair and tell us how you would handle it, even to the point of making it obligatory again, despite the Saturday.

 

 

The Armchair Liturgist: A Ritual Skip

This is one for the clergy in the reading audience, mainly. But anyone, feel free to chime in.

At the end of the preparation rites, just before the preface dialogue, the musician(s) wake up (or sleep walk) and start up the Sanctus. Before you know it, the music is done and everybody is kneeling. There are some choices:

A. Go back to the preface dialogue and skip the Sanctus

B. Go back to the preface dialogue, and sing the Sanctus again when indicated.

C. Forego the detour and continue with the Eucharistic Prayer as if it was you yourself who fell asleep.

 

The Armchair Liturgist Wonders About Good Friday Catechumens

Here’s a possible typo in MR3. I know others have commented on the few references to those to be baptized as “catechumens” when in fact those to be baptized tomorrow night are the “elect.” It might be that the Church retains some catechumens who have not been “elected.” Given that some Catholics might still not know the terms catechumen let alone elect, what about a suggestion for today’s Prayer IV is to pray simply for “those preparing for baptism,” covering the elect, catechumens waiting for another year, and perhaps infants?

Sit in the purple chair and render judgment: change the words to make it clear? Or not?

 

The Armchair Liturgist: Ready With Violet Veils?

I was thinking last week that I really need to take a jug of iced tea on a sunny day, sit in my backyard, and read MR3 through cover to cover. Anybody done that yet? The reading of the MR3, that is?

I was noticing that if a parish opts to unveil the cross for veneration than a violet veil is what they are directed to use. The previous edition of the Roman Missal did not specify the veil color–my parish used to use red. I’m thinking of switching to the Second Form of Showing the Holy Cross. What about you?

Suppose you were in a situation in which unveiling had a long attachment in your community, and you find yourself a few days before Good Friday–or even the morning of–with just a red veil. Sit in the armchair and render judgment.

 

The Armchair Liturgist: Candles for St Blase

Maybe this is a few days late, but when our associate pastor asked about candles for this past Friday’s blessing of throats, I mentioned those specialized, pretzelized concoctions:

And my colleague said, no, just the plain two candles, please. We have those. What did your parish use? And if you were in the chair to make this call, what would you opt to use for the February 3rd blessing of throats?

 

The Armchair Liturgist: Continuity for the First Weekdays in Ordinary Time

Liam offers another armchair liturgist bit for us today:

Studying my new daily missal for the coming week, I see that it provides that, when the Baptism of the Lord is celebrated on Monday, as it is this year in the USA, then the readings for the Monday of the First Week of Ordinary Time may be added to the readings of the Tuesday of the First Week of Ordinary Time, so that the continuity of the passages is retained. This is true for the Gospel in cycles I and II. It is also true for the first reading in cycle II (which is what we are in this year); for cycle I, the merit of this approach for the first reading is less clear.

So, who will be advising celebrants and lectors of this option? What’s your preference?

Another choice for liturgists: how would you handle an instance like this where the Lectionary doesn’t give you the merged option? Are your lectors skilled enough to start on “Monday’s page,” then flip to the next day? Same for the priest–flip back and then finish up with Tuesday?

A small editing observation: on the USCCB page linked above, a typo on the choices of Gospel readings.

 

The Armchair Liturgist Ponders Epiphany

Liam suggested I pose some armchair questions for you liturgists-to-be:

The new Missal, finally, contains propers for the Vigil of Epiphany. The readings (including the psalm) are the same for the Vigil and the Day. The collects, offertory prayer and communion prayer are different. So, too, the spoken entrance and communion antiphons (which would be used for those unusual weekend Masses without music). Whose celebrants know this? If you were the parish liturgist, would you proactively advise the parish priests?

Does this feast need its own Vigil readings? What gospel would possible work for this? John 1:10-13? What about the other readings? Baruch 5:5-9? Psalm 2?