Thirsting for God

It's that time of Lent when we get all the Bible readings about thirsting for God, drinking from the well of Christ, the spring of eternal life, etc., etc.

Right now, there are several people I know who are desperately in need of guidance and focus in their life, and yet, today's readings bring to me mind the old adage that you can lead a horse to water but you can't make him drink. I'm not much of an evangelist. I can bring these people to church, I can try to talk to them about sacramental grace, but the leap of faith is up to them. I can't make them get out of bed before noon. I can't make them find the spark. I can't make them open a door and fill their heart with Jesus. I'll just have to keep praying for them, praying that they find peace and happiness, and leave the rest up to God.

Nevertheless, today is the Third Sunday of Lent at St. Stephen's. I had tried to talk a couple of friends into going to other, more "exotic" places, but nobody was really interested (I think it was the earlier hours). It's probably just as well, since I needed to hand in my name at the local parish to try to get a ticket to the papal Mass at the baseball stadium next month.

Hymns today were Passion Chorale for the processional, Kingsfold for the offertory, and In Babilone for the recessional. The choir essentially soloed for the communion marching music responsorial song with a "Taste and see" antiphon by Russell Woollen. They should have cut the communion song. The choir did a really nice motet, Nacket bin ich vom Mutterleibe kommen by Heinrich Schütz, that very nicely fit the Lenten mood during communion, but it was a bit long, and since they always attempt the responsorial ditty first, we ended up having to sit and wait rather impatiently for the choir to finish the motet after all the communion things were washed and put away and the priest sat down to wait.

Oh, the choir did another fun thing. It's been their tradition during Lent to have the cantoress lead the congregation in a Gregorian chant setting of the Kyrie, phrase by phrase, and then have the choir "extend" the phrase with the work of a major composer. Today, they did the Kyrie from Vincent Persichetti's 1960 Mass, Op. 84, and it was wonderful! Persichetti was a composition professor at Juilliard for years before his death about twenty years ago, and his students included people like Philip Glass, Peter Schickele ("P.D.Q. Bach"), and Thelonious Monk. This Mass is deliciously modern in the Phrygian mode with quartal harmony, yet it is surprisingly singable and comforting for a "modern" work. I would love to hear the choir do the whole Mass setting.

Now I have to check my closet and see if I can find a pink sweater or shirt to wear to Mass next weekend, since it'll be Laetare Sunday. Well, I guess technically I'm looking for "rose" but pink, rose, whatever, they look about the same. LOL