Midnight Mass '07

Christmas Eve, Laurent and I strolled over to St. Paul's K Street for Midnight Mass. It was a lovely evening, and the weather very temperate. We'd had a hard time weighing the pros and cons of where to go to church. There are a lot of Catholic and Episcopal churches in D.C., and they started their services at all different hours and had all kinds of different approaches to the festal day. Ultimately we chose St. Paul's because of the announced music to be sung, and also because they always have a huge champagne buffet up in the parish hall after the service! Does that make us "rice Christians"? LOL

St. Paul's is always a fun place to go for the big high holy day services, since they've a particularly splendid choir and organ and they are masters at High Church Anglo-Catholic ritual and liturgy. There's also a sense of history, too, since it is widely believed that the very first "Midnight Mass" to be held in an American Episcopal (Anglican) church was here at St. Paul's in 1870.

Since Christmas, I've heard from several friends that their churches were full but not packed for Midnight Mass. Thus was the case at St. Paul's, too. We showed up 45 minutes before the start time to get a good seat (and we got great seats!), but I think we could have showed up 30 minutes early and still gotten a good place. While they set up a few chairs in the narthex for overflow, the pews in the nave all could have had a few more people packed into them, so we were quite comfortable.

About quarter til, John started the organ prelude. He played Widor's Andante sostenuo from Symphonie Gothique, Op. 70, No. 9; Bach's In dulci jubilo, BWV 751; and Langlais's La crêche, Les anges, Les bergers, and La sainte famille from La Nativité. At the conclusion of the service, he would play Henri Mulet's Carillon-Sortie for the postlude. There's a picture of John in my post for Christmas Day.

Hymns for the formal Solemn Procession opening the service were Irby, Regent Square, and Adeste Fideles. Other hymns included Winchester Old for the sequence, Noel (an English tune for "It came upon the midnight clear") after the offertory, Stille Nacht during post-communion ablutions (the choir sang a verse in German), and Mendelssohn for the recessional (and the way John used the tuba mirabilis for Mendelssohn, it was more like, "Hark! The herald tubas sing!").

The Mass setting was Mozart's Coronation Mass, K. 317. They had a particularly excellent soprano soloist during the Mozart. Choral anthems were Poulenc's "O magnum mysterium" for the offertory and Britten's "Of one that is so fair and bright" during communion (with an antiphonal choir in the side chapel). The choir also did Anglican chant by John Goss for the psalm and chanted plainsong antiphons for the introit, gospel alleluia, offertory, and communion.

As always at St. Pauls, the reception following the service was quite lovely. There was a truckload of champagne, and I think they had a little cranberry spritzer for those not wanting alcohol. The food tables were laden with vegetables and dips, cheeses and cheese spreads, miniature ham sandwiches, sausage puffs, deviled eggs, and I think probably every shrimp from the Gulf of Mexico. We were there at the reception for quite some time, and still, they kept bringing out the shrimp!

The rector chatted with us a bit and complimented Laurent's Christmas tie. Laurent proudly told the priest that he was wearing Christmas boxers, too, and then, mustering up all his droll British dignity, the priest thanked Laurent for his unexpected confession. I just can't take that boy anywhere.

Christmas in Washington

Merry Christmas, everyone!


This is the first day of Christmas. You can start counting the twelve days now.




Laurent and I pose with organist John after Midnight Mass
at St. Paul's K Street.



Creche under the altar of the Marian shrine at St. Paul's K Street.



Laurent and I at the National Christmas Tree at the White House.
The tree looks better this year than in has the past three years.



This is the painting done in 1515 by Bernardino Luini that was used
for the Christmas stamp this year. It's called the
Madonna of the Carnation, and it's in gallery M18
at the National Gallery of Art.
I was surprised how small the painting is.
It's oil on a small wood panel in a big frame.

Latin Advent IV

Yesterday morning, I took Laurent to the Catholic cathedral for his first Mass there. It surprised me that after four years of living in the same town and within walking distance of St. Matthew's, he'd never gotten over for a service or at least a visit, but we remedied that.

We went to the 10 o'clock service, one that is always fun and a bit different, since it's in Latin. No, they don't do the Tridentine liturgy, but they do the Novus Ordo service, a contemporary, post-Vatican II translation. The homily, readings, and prayers of the people remain in English. The Mass setting is all assorted Gregorian chant, and the celebrant chanted much (though not nearly all he could) of the service.

The cathedral has a very nice, professional Schola Cantorum, supplemented with their Gregorian Scholars, that provides the musical leadership for the Mass. They sang "Ave Maria 5vv" by Palestrina for the offertory anthem, did a choral Agnus Dei from Missa super dixit Maria by Hassler, and for a communion motet, they did "Ecce concipies" by Gallus, in addition to introit, offertory, and communion antiphons.

There was one little sore thumb during the service. After the communion motet, they scheduled a congregational hymn "Within Our Hearts Be Born," a contemporary thing from the Gather hymnal. Now, the cathedral does seven Masses every Sunday, and this is the only Latin Mass. Now, I may be wrong, but don't you think that the people who come to the Latin Mass aren't exactly the Gather hymnal crowd?

(FYI, for you non-Catholics, the "traditional" hymnal these days is the Worship hymnal, a book filled with a few Catholic hymns, but mainly composed of solid Anglican and Lutheran hymns with revised "Catholic" words; the Gather hymnal is the reviled repository of bad contemporary Catholic music for the Haugen and Haas crowd and those who enjoy the "St. Louis Jesuits" genre.)

Other hymns for the day were Truro for the processional and Veni Veni Emmanuel for the recessional.

There was a very young priest I didn't know who was celebrant and homilist. I find it interesting how so many of the younger generation in the Church are attracted to the traditional ritual and ceremony of the old ways, and make fun of the folk Mass/hippie style of "contemporary" worship.

On our way into the cathedral, the cathedral rector was standing back in the narthex. I introduced Laurent to the good monsignor so Laurent wouldn't think he was another seminarian like he did with the rector of the National Shrine. LOL Laurent liked the service. Gregorian chant sounds so nice in marble, reverberant spaces.

Gaudete

Ryan wanted to go to church with us again Sunday, but he hated the huggy-kissy liturgy and the bad contemporary Catholic music at St. Matthew's Cathedral last week, so he acquiesced to going with us to St. Stephen's, even though he hates the 1960 period architecture (for a recovering Baptist, Ryan is very opinionated as to Roman Catholic worship). As Ryan doesn't do mornings, he, Laurent, and I went to the 5:30 on Sunday evening.

The 5:30 at St. Stephen's is rather unique. In contrast to the cathedral's dreadful contemporary evening Mass, St. Stephen's does the Mass setting (Kyrie, Gloria, Sanctus, etc.) in Gregorian chant. It's not a Tridentine Mass, alas, and the rest of the liturgy is in English, but at least those portions are sung in Latin. The service is fully cantored, but, thus far, they are doing all the music a capella. That works fine for the chants and traditional hymns, but it's usually a train wreck for more contemporary responsorial songs. They might have better luck if they picked music specifically for the service, instead of trying to do the same Mass with the same songs at every single Sunday Mass.

Anyway, it was Gaudete Sunday, the "joyful" break in the season of Advent, in preparation for the soon-to-come Christmas season. It's one of only two days in the liturgical year when the priests wear pink. The Mass setting was all Latin chant, with the Memorial Acclamation and Great Amen in English to Proulx's Mass for the City (I wish they'd get plainsong for those, too). Hymns were Veni, Veni Emmanuel for the processional, Truro for the offertory, and King of Glory for the recessional. As usual, no one sang the responsorial during communion.

I was proud of Ryan. He was being very charitable Sunday, and took a huge bag of his old clothes and coats (it's not as cold in D.C. as it is in New Hampshire) to contribute to the parish winter clothing drive.

On our way home after church, we were walking down the street when some strange female walking in front of us turned around, interrupted our conversation, and asked Laurent, "What's wrong with you?" I was aghast. Laurent says he's used to it, though. For those of you unaware, Laurent has cerebral palsy, wears leg braces, uses a cane to keep his balance, and has a bit of a struggling gait, yet he gets around fine and sometimes wants to walk faster than me. This isn't the first time I've witnessed this sort of thing happen. We were standing in line at a store cash register one day, and some older woman in the line turned and asked, "What do you have?" Now, when small children do things like that, that's one thing, as they are curious and non-judgmental about everything, but I expect grown women to have better manners.

Double Mass

Somehow I managed to end up going to Mass twice today.

This morning, Laurent and I headed over to St. Stephen's. They've switched their Mass setting for Advent to Richard Proulx's Mass for the City, though the Agnus Dei continues to be the Isele Holy Cross Mass, the Kyrie was plainsong, and the Gospel Alleluia is an adaptation of the de Victoria "O Magnum Mysterium."

The choir sang "This Is the Record of John" by Josef Rheinberger for the communion motet. Hymns were Nun komm der Heiden Heiland for the processional, Geneva for the offertory, a bad Jesuit responsorial for the communion marching music, and Venez, divin Messie for the recessional. I thought it was fun during the processional hymn when the words got to "down to death and hell descends" and the organist interpolated a little minor dissonant "hell" for us.

Monsignor's homily talked about confession. He tends to do that every year around this time.

_________________________

This afternoon, Ryan decided he wanted to go to Mass! Well, far be it from me to discourage him. He even picked out the 5:30 at St. Matthew's Cathedral as the place he wanted to go (he doesn't like St. Stephen's cause he thinks the outside door is ugly....interestingly enough, Monsignor has drawn up plans for a new entry way, but I don't think they've found donors yet).

The music there—that St. Louis Jesuits guitar Mass crap—quickly reminded me why I don't like going to that Mass. What's worse, they were receiving RCIA candidates tonight, and they did some weird little hippie/New Age ceremony with the candidates spaced out down the center aisle and, as the celebrant said stuff, the sponsors had to touch and make signs of the cross on various parts of the candidates' bodies. It was ghastly.....stuff like that would definitely send me running and make me not want to join a church.

The entrance hymn was an interestingly unsingable "Break Forth, O Beauteous Heavenly Light" that much of the congregation gave up on once it got too confusing. During the offertory, they sang a Psalm 85 responsorial setting from the Gather hymnal (both this and the actual psalm were both Haas settings). For the recessional, they did "God of All People." The Mass setting was the Haas' Mass of Light.

The celebrant (I didn't know the priest) talked during his homily about his preferences in Quizno's sandwiches. Somehow, he also worked in the concept that world peace was a good idea.

The one bright spot in the Mass was during communion. They had a tenor sing "Comfort Ye" and "Every Valley" from Handel's Messiah. It was nice, though the piano was very, very bright and muddled (it's hard to use a grand piano in a marble floored room), and it was a really odd juxataposition to have Handel with all the Haas music.

Oh, we saw Michael there in the congregation, but couldn't get over to say hi in the crowd. I seem to recall him telling me he likes bad contemporary Catholic music.

The street beggars were all out in force tonight as people came down the cathedral steps after Mass.

New year's church

Laurent and I celebrated the Church's new year yesterday at St. Paul's K Street. Usually, Laurent and I go to St. Stephen Martyr on Sunday mornings, but, even though I woke him at ten, he was too slow getting dressed and wasn't ready to leave until eleven. So, since Mass at Stevie's had already started, we went to K Street, as their Mass doesn't start until quarter past.

The place looks very pretty, decked out for Advent—this is a parish that, instead of purple, uses rich blue brocade with deep red orphreys and ornaments on their frontals and eucharistic vestments.

The Mass setting was Palestrina's Missa brevis. The choir sang Wood's "O thou the central orb" for the offertory and the de Victoria "Ave Maria" for the communion motet. Hymns were Helmsley for the processional (I thought it was cute that they did a service leaflet insert to give the congregation the four-part harmony music instead of the melody-only version in the hymnal), Llangloffan for the sequence, Nun komm, der Heiden Heiland during the ablutions, and Wachet auf for the recessional.

The organ prelude and postludes were two of the Bach preludes based on Nun komm, der Heiden Heiland, with BWV 659 before and BWV 661 after.

The new seminarian read the sermon.

I was expecting maybe to hear Parry's "I Was Glad When They Said unto Me" today, but the choir did that psalm text to Anglican chant by Sir Walter Parratt.

Ran in to Mattie at Mass. It was fortuitous to see him. After the service, we went up to the parish hall for croissants with cream cheese and fruit preserves and little glasses of fino sherry.

Advent IV

Happy new year!

(For those of you not in the know, today is the first day of the Christian year.)

Off to Mass soon, but I thought I'd make a quick new year's post. Already got my first Christmas card on Friday (in *November*!) from some lawyer in Southern California. I didn't send out cards last year, so I'm sure 75% of my mailing list cut me from theirs; I don't expect many cards this year. LOL

This day always presents a dilemma. Do I go to Advent Lessons and Carols at St. Paul's K Street or at the National Cathedral? Perhaps timing will help me decide. The cathedral is at four and K Street isn't til six.

Supposed to rain today. I guess I'll wear black and purple.

Who knows how to make fancy animated user pics? I want an Advent wreath that has flickering candles, and that lights the appropriate number of candles for each week.