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Annual Mass of the Society of St Catherine of Siena

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On Thursday evening I celebrated High Mass at the Conventual Chapel of the Knights of Malta. This was the annual Mass of the Society of St Catherine of Siena of which I am proud to have been appointed chaplain. Dr Laurence Hemming was Deacon and Fr Jean Claude Selvini Subdeacon. Jonathan Hague was MC. The Oratory School choir sang the Byrd 3 part Mass and the Gregorian chant propers. Fr Andrew Wadsworth and Fr Gareth Jones assisted in choir. The photographs are from  Mac McLernon's photostream  where you can find many more. Here are a couple:
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SSCS Study Day for priests

The Society of St Catherine of Siena is holding a study day for priests on Tuesday 6 October at Our Lady of the Rosary, Blackfen. The 1911-1913 Liturgical Reform By Paul Cavendish The lecture will consider the pre-1911 breviary and various questions relating to the arrangement of the psalms, the Dominical, festal and ferial offices and the offices of Lent and Advent. The problem of the calendar will be considered, particularly the ferial and Dominical cycles being swamped by the disproportionate number of doubles and the prominence given to Sundays in the 1911-1913 reform as well as the change to the cursus of the psalter and the implications for choral celebration. The day is open to all clergy. Seminarians who are free to come are also welcome. There is no charge for the day but if clergy are able to make a contribution from an allowance for “Ministry to Priests” or similar, that would be appreciated. Programme 11.00am Arrival (tea and coffee available) 11.30am Lecture “The 1911-1913...
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"Alter ad Alterum" chant colloquium

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Yesterday I had to miss the colloquium given by Professor László Dobszay. It was just impossible in the midst of parish work that had to be attended to after coming back from Lourdes. I was very sorry to miss it, both because of the quality of Professor Dobszay's work and because of the lost opportunity to meet many friends who were there. Here is a report of the day from the Society of St Catherine of Siena: On Monday 1st June, the Society of St Catherine of Siena in collaboration with the London Oratory School held a colloquium on the possibilities for chant at Mass and other occasions. Entitled ‘Alter ad Alterum: The Seraphic Voice in the Liturgy’, the colloquium was led by the renown liturgist and musicologist, Professor László Dobszay, Fellow of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences and member of the faculty of the Ferenc Liszt Academy of Music in Budapest. The colloquium began with the office of None, after which followed two very full and generous presentations from Prof. Dob...
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Celebrations for St Catherine of Siena

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In the Society of St Catherine of Siena , we celebrated the feast of our patron saint today. In a paper read to the St Nicholas Study group, Susan Parsons spoke about the moral lessons of the octaves. Various octaves were suppressed during the reforms of the 1950s and we are now left with only the Christmas and Easter Octaves. The octave of Pentecost was a surprising omission from the calendar of the post Vatican II reform, paradoxically coinciding with the proclamation of the "New Pentecost" and the birth of the Catholic charismatic movement. Dr Laurence Hemming had to hand an Octavarium showing that in the older tradition, not only were there many minor octaves of universal observance, but there were also octaves for local Churches for their patronal feast and the dedication of the Church. After the paper, there was some intense discussion on the question of the Liturgical Movement in its early stages and the role played by Guéranger's Liturgical Year in bringing peopl...
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Missa Cantata in the Abbey Church

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The Abbey Church at Belmont is currently " in restauro " as they say in Rome. Encased in scaffolding, it is undergoing some major restoration. Therefore most of the Sacred Liturgy is celebrated in a very well appointed temporary chapel in the Monks' Refectory. Today, however, we were able to celebrate our Missa Cantata in the Abbey Church. Fr Harrison of the Oratory was the celebrant and a schola of three (two monks and Fr Wadsworth) provided the chant for the Mass which echoed through the stone walls of the beautiful Church. Fr Wadsworth, the chaplain of the Society of St Catherine of Siena , preached today, and Dr Laurence Hemming served the Mass. In the setting of the Abbey Church, there was a sense of what really constitutes the traditional Roman "noble simplicity" without any of the dumbing down that is so often associated with that phrase. We were there to offer adoration to the Father through Christ His Son, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, in the timele...
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Popular posts from this blog

Saint Gabriel

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The angels call for our veneration and awe as part of God’s creation. Part of the destructive modernism of the 1970s included advice to Catholic school teachers that they should not talk to children about angels. This wrought lasting damage which continues to need rectifying. We should include in our prayers a heartfelt recourse to our own Guardian Angels. The Archangel Gabriel “God is my strength” would be terrifying were he to appear to any of us. Our Lady was “troubled” at the word of Saint Gabriel and wondered at the manner of the salutation. Immediately, according to his mission, the awesome messenger explained himself. Modern retelling of the event is often reduced to the jejune “Mary said Yes to God”. In fact, she said “Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it done to me according to thy word”. This conveys more accurately the flawless faith and trust of the Immaculata. In the infinitely wise providence of the Father, we now know the structure of the event in even more detai...
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Our Easter Faith: Not a Pious Crème Fraiche

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In public life, some basically well-meaning figures have the graciousness to wish us well at Easter and to recognise the importance of the Christian feast day. Perhaps they might assure us that their thoughts are with us at this time. That is kind of them and in Christian charity we should thank them for their kindness, but Easter should be a great deal more than that for us. We must believe that Our Lord Jesus Christ is risen from the grave, in the flesh, and lives for eternity. We cannot treat Easter as a jolly holiday that heralds spring, or the remembrance of a significant event from the past. It must change us today and every day, change who we are and what we do. The Christian faith cannot be a mild custard or blancmange of religiosity. (I am showing my age. Nowadays, I should say that it cannot be reduced to a pious crème fraiche .) We bow down and adore the King of Kings, risen from the tomb, who, “[…] continues for ever,...
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Blessing of the New Painting of St Bede at Clapham Park

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This morning, the parish priest at Clapham Park, Fr Marcus Holden, blessed a new picture of the parish's patron, Saint Bede, painted by James Tildsley. It is sited over a recently installed side altar near the rear of the Church. The altar itself was acquired from Antique Church Furnishings . The website gives the information that the altar was built and carved by a nun in a convent near Liverpool. It is a beautiful piece of work and it is always a joy when such works of art find a suitable and dignified home. The inscription on the gradine is AMANS AMATUS AMOR. The sellers translate this as “Loving is the object of love” which is a reasonable stab at “dynamic equivalence”. Today the parish's relic of St Bede was exposed for veneration in its distinctive brightly-coloured reliquary. After the blessing, there was High Mass with Fr Holden as celebrant, Fr Littleton deacon, and myself subdeacon. That gave me the enjoyable task of chant...
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Plenary indulgences not impossible

Dilexit Prior in Letters from a Young Catholic asked some useful questions today about indulgences. I thought it would be best to do a post here especially to cover the controversial question of detachment from venial sin. But first the other questions: The conditions for gaining a plenary indulgence Pope Paul VI set down a number of norms relating to indulgences at the end of Indulgentiarum Doctrina . Norm 7 states: To acquire a plenary indulgence it is necessary to perform the work to which the indulgence is attached and to fulfil three conditions: sacramental confession, Eucharistic Communion and prayer for the intentions of the Supreme Pontiff. It is further required that all attachment to sin, even to venial sin, be absent. If this disposition is in any way less than complete, or if the prescribed three conditions are not fulfilled, the indulgence will be only partial, except for the provisions contained in n.11 for those who are “impeded.” It is worth reading the other norms bec...
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Portiuncula indulgence tomorrow (and indulgences generally)

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Tomorrow, 2 August, you can gain a plenary indulgence under the usual conditions ( see below ) by visiting a parish Church and there reciting the Our Father and the Creed . This is called the Portiuncula indulgence and goes back to St Francis of Assisi. Fr Z has the details . Don't forget that you can also gain a plenary indulgence by visiting a Church on the day of the titular feast, and there reciting the Our Father and the Creed . I made a list of other indulgences: please see the post Plenary indulgences for particular days which has a link to the list. The post has some background information which you may find helpful since indulgences are not well understood today - which is not surprising since indulgences are not included in most Catholic education curricula, and most priests never preach about them. Therefore many Catholics are left with whatever silly, half-baked, ill-informed nonsense about indulgences happens to be current. If you want to understand the theology...
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