Online Edition: October 2007
Vol. XIII, No. 7
News & Views
Adoremus Conference | New Chant Recording from Father Waddell | Voice from the Past? | Gregorian Chant and Polyphony — Sacred Music Workshop | Preaching Workshop at Liturgical Institute | Music Director Needed
There is still time to make plans to attend the one-day conference sponsored by Adoremus to be held November 3 at St. Mary’s Church, Escondido, California.
Bishop Salvatore Cordileone, auxiliary bishop of San Diego, will be a featured presenter, along with Father Joseph Fessio of Ignatius Press, Helen Hull Hitchcock, and Father Jerry Pokorsky. There will also be a Gregorian chant workshop.
Registration: $15 per person; $25 per family. For more information and to register, e-mail [email protected], or phone 800-526-2151, ext 413.
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New Chant Recording from Father Waddell
“Christ is Risen, Truly Risen!” is the title of a CD recording of chants and anthems for Easter newly gathered and arranged by Father Chrysogonus Waddell, OSCO, of the Gethsemani Abbey in Kentucky.
Father Chrysogonus’s notes on the CD explain that “the music of this recording is meant to flow from and lead back into the heart of the Paschal Mystery: Christ dying and rising, present and acting in our midst through His Spirit given at Pentecost. The texts span a period of some three thousand years, from the time of David … to the present; the music likewise spans a period beginning with perhaps the fifth century and extending into the present…. Most of this music is rooted in tradition — and here tradition means the past living on in the present and sweeping us into the future…. Whether dating from the earliest ages of Gregorian monody or from as late as the twenty-first century, this music comes to us from the heart of the Paschal Mystery. May it lead us all back to it….”
Father Chrysogonus addressed the 2006 Fellowship of Catholic Scholars convention. This address, “Are there lessons for today in 12th-century music?”, appeared in AB in November 2006. (www. adoremus.org/1106SacredMusic.htm).
The recording was produced by World Library Publications (WLP) of Franklin Park, Illinois (web site: www.wlpmusic.com).
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A bit of the new biographical work on William F. Buckley Jr., Strictly Right, by Linda Bridges and John R. Coyne captured the attention of Father Richard Neuhaus in the October issue of First Things. Father Neuhaus observes that the book is not all politics, and he quotes “possibly the longest sentence Buckley ever wrote, on the liturgical changes that destabilized the Church in the 1970s”.
Here is Buckley:
“Really, the new liturgists should have offered training in yoga, or whatever else Mother Church in her resourcefulness might baptize as a distinctively Catholic means by which we might turn off the fascistic static of the contemporary Mass, during which one is either attempting to sing, totally neglecting the prayers at the foot of the altar, which suddenly we are told are irrelevant; or attempting to read the missal at one’s own syncopated pace, which we must now do athwart the obtrusive rhythm of the priest or the commentator; or attempting to meditate on this or the other prayer or sentiment or analysis in the Ordinary or in the Proper of the Mass, only to find that such meditation is sheer outlawry which stands in the way of the liturgical calisthenics devised by the Central Coach, who apparently judges it an act of neglect if the churchgoer is permitted more than two minutes and 46 seconds without being made to stand if he was kneeling, or kneel if he was standing, or sit — or sing — or chant — or anything if perchance he was praying, from which anarchism he must at all costs be rescued: ‘LET US NOW RECITE THE COMMUNION ANTIPHON,’ says the commentator; to which exhortation I find myself aching to reply in that ‘loud and clear and reverential voice’ the manual for lectors prescribes: ‘LET US NOT!’”
It is tempting to think of Mr. Buckley’s long sentence as somehow prophetic — though he could hardly have anticipated the “long sentence” of the Catholic Liturgy’s captivity to the Spirit of Innovation that followed the Council.
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Gregorian Chant and Polyphony — Sacred Music Workshop
Discover the timeless treasury of the Catholic Church’s sacred music this October 26-27 at St. Peter Church in Stevens Point, Wisconsin. Beginning Friday at 3:00 p.m., nationally renowned Gregorian Chant expert Rev. Dr. Robert Skeris will give you the tools to unlock the “square notes” of chant notation and learn some Gregorian chant, then sing what you have learned together with your fellow workshop attendees at St. Peter’s Vigil Mass that weekend. You’ll also sing sacred polyphony, which are motets written with a number of voice parts in harmony, recommended in Church documents after Gregorian chant. This workshop is ideal for music directors, choir members, clergy, teachers, parents, or anyone interested in experiencing our rich heritage of sacred music.
Cost is $75 per person including a text, music and some meals. Lodging and other information available at www.saintpetercatholic.com. Or contact Darcy Bunn at 715-343-9007 or e-mail [email protected].
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Preaching Workshop at Liturgical Institute
The Liturgical Institute of the University of Saint Mary of the Lake/Mundelein Seminary announces “Profound Preaching”, a preaching workshop for priests and deacons with Father Peter John Cameron, OP, founding editor of Magnificat magazine and professor of homiletics at the Dominican House of Studies in Washington, DC.
Topics include: “Preaching the Readings of Cycle A”, “Preaching in the Light of Deus Caritas Est”, and “The Preacher’s Appeal to Experience”. Friday, November 9, Mundelein, Illinois, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. For further information call 847-837-4542 or visit www.liturgicalinstitute.org.
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The newest Catholic parish in Corpus Christi, Texas, is seeking a music director. Father James Farfaglia, the pastor, who is “totally faithful to the liturgical norms of the Catholic liturgy and totally committed to Pope Benedict’s ‘reform of the reform’”, is looking for a music director who has a background in Gregorian Chant, and who can easily work with choir members at the pastor’s direction. The parish can offer a part-time salary based on experience.
For more information, contact Father Farfaglia at St. Helena of the True Cross of Jesus Catholic Church, P.O. Box 8121, Corpus Christi, TX 78468. Phone (361) 549-6900, or e-mail [email protected]. Parish web site: www.sthelenacctx.org.
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