Venantius Fortunatus and Passiontide

Although the current Roman Liturgical Calendar does not directly observe the last two weeks of Lent as Passiontide, some Catholic churches maintain the tradition of veiling their crucifixes and statues starting this Sunday, which in the 1962 Roman Missal begins Passiontide with Passion Sunday. You also might note in the Novus Ordo that the Preface is for the Passion of Our Lord at the daily Masses starting Monday and that there an optional collect on Friday for Our Lady of Sorrows.

Next Sunday will be Palm Sunday in Passiontide. From the 1913 Catholic Encyclopedia, Passiontide is defined as:

The two weeks between Passion Sunday and Easter. The last week is Holy Week, while the first is called by the Latins "Hebdomas Passionis", by the Greeks "Week of the palms" (from the Sunday following). During this time the monks of the East, who had chosen the desert for a severer mode of life, returned to their monasteries (Cyril of Scythopolis in "Life of St. Euthymius", n. 11). The rubrical prescriptions of the Roman Missal, Breviary, and "Caeremoniale Episcoporum" for this time are: before Vespers of Saturday preceding Passion Sunday the crosses, statues, and pictures of Our Lord and of the saints on the altar and throughout the church, with the sole exception of the crosses and pictures of the Way of the Cross, are to be covered with a violet veil, not translucent, nor in any way ornamented. The crosses remain covered until after the solemn denudation of the principal crucifix on Good Friday. The statues and pictures retain their covering, no matter what feast may occur, until the Gloria in Excelsis of Holy Saturday. According to an answer of the S. R. C. of 14 May, 1878, the practice may be tolerated of keeping the statue of St. Joseph, if outside the sanctuary, uncovered during the month of March, which is dedicated to his honour, even during Passiontide. In the Masses de tempore the Psalm Judica is not said; the Gloria Patri is omitted at the Asperges, the Introit, and the Lavabo; only two orations are recited and the Preface is of the Holy Cross. In the Dominical and ferial offices of the Breviary the doxology is omitted in the Invitatorium and in the responses, whether long or short. The crosses are veiled because Christ during this time no longer walked openly among the people, but hid himself. Hence in the papal chapel the veiling formerly took place at the words of the Gospel: "Jesus autem abscondebat se." [Jesus hid Himself] Another reason is added by Durandus, namely that Christ's divinity was hidden when he arrived at the time of His suffering and death. The images of the saints also are covered because it would seem improper for the servants to appear when the Master himself is hidden (Nilles, "Kal.", II, 188).

In some places the crosses were covered on Ash Wednesday; in others on the first Sunday of Lent. In England it was customary on the first Monday of Lent to cover up all the crucifixes, images of every kind, the reliquaries, and even the cup with the Blessed Sacrament. The cloths used were of white linen or silk and marked with a red cross (Rock, infra, IV, 258). The two beautiful hymns of the season, "Vexilla Regis" and "Pange lingua gloriosi", are the work of Venantius Fortunatus (q. v.), Bishop of Poitiers. On the Friday of Passion Week the Church very appropriately honours the Seven Dolours of Our Lady. On Saturday the Greeks commemorate the resuscitation of Lazarus.

John Mason Neale, the Anglo-Catholic Tractarian, translated Vexilla Regis as "The Royal Banners Forward Go", and Pange lingua gloriosi as "Sing, my tongue, the glorious battle".

My late husband Mark took the picture above one afternoon at Blessed Sacrament Catholic Church in Wichita, Kansas--you can see that the Crucifix in the Sanctuary of the church is veiled.

Holy Week: The Triduum

The Triduum begins tonight with the Mass of the Lord's Supper, the Washing of the Feet, the Stripping of the Altars, the Transfer of the Eucharist to the Altar of Repose, and the Night of Watching. I'll be at the Church of the Blessed Sacrament with the Holy Week issue of Magnificat, such an indispensable companion tonight and tomorrow and through the Triduum through Easter Sunday. In addition to the Morning and Evening Prayers and the readings for the Masses and Good Friday service throughout the week, it provides a beautiful collection of devotional aids. One line in the Via Crucis prayers has resonated with me since I started using it last week:

"An instrument used to execute criminals stands at the center of all Catholic life and practice. From the moment that Jesus takes up his cross, nothing that transpires in the Church of Christ makes sense apart from his cross."

Stat crux dum volvitur orbis is the Carthusian motto: The cross stands firm while the world is turning.

In the silence of Holy Week, during the services of the Holy Triduum, it almost seems like the world stops turning as time stands still.

Pange, lingua, gloriósi

Córporis mystérium,

Sanguinísque pretiósi,

Quem in mundi prétium

Fructus ventris generósi

Rex effúdit géntium.

Nobis datus, nobis natus

Ex intácta Vírgine,

Et in mundo conversátus,

Sparso verbi sémine,

Sui moras incolátus

Miro clausit órdine.

In suprémæ nocte coenæ

Recúmbens cum frátribus

Observáta lege plene

Cibis in legálibus,

Cibum turbæ duodénæ

Se dat suis mánibus.

Verbum caro, panem verum

Verbo carnem éfficit:

Fitque sanguis Christi merum,

Et si sensus déficit,

Ad firmándum cor sincérum

Sola fides súfficit.

TANTUM ERGO SACRAMÉNTUM

Venerémur cérnui:

Et antíquum documéntum

Novo cedat rítui:

Præstet fides suppleméntum

Sénsuum deféctui.

Genitóri, Genitóque

Laus et jubilátio,

Salus, honor, virtus quoque

Sit et benedíctio:

Procedénti ab utróque

Compar sit laudátio.

Amen.

Sarum Rite Holy Thursday: The Stripping of the Altars

As this blogger notes, the Sarum Use celebration of Holy Thursday is more solemn than the Latin Rite. As the Ordinary Form of the Latin Rite remembers the institution of the sacraments of Holy Communion and Holy Orders, the priest wears white vestments; the Gloria is sung; bells ring, and the Altar is quietly stripped after the Blessed Sacrament has being processed to the Altar of Repose. An air of solemnity sets in with that procession and the chanting of St. Thomas Aquinas's Eucharistic hymn, Pange, lingua and we try to meet Jesus's challenge in the Garden of Gethsemane, "Could you not watch one hour with me?"

The Sarum Use Holy Thursday omits the Gloria, uses Red vestments (as on Palm Sunday and Good Friday), and the Altar is ceremoniously and significantly stripped in preparation for Good Friday, as this post describes.

• When the Altar is stripped, that symbolizes the stripping of Jesus at Calvary before He is nailed to the cross.

• When the Altar is washed with wine and water, that symbolizes the blood and water that poured from His wounded side, representing Baptism and Holy Communion.

• When the Altar is scrubbed with a brush, that symbolizes the scourging at the Pillar. 

More about the Sarum Use here.

A friend of mine posted on his Facebook page that his students were having trouble understanding or relating to Josef Pieper's theories of the relationship between religious ritual and leisure. They are Catholic high school students, but they have been secularized to degree that they don't see the connections between the great public work of the Church and their private lives. Sadly, I think the post-modern Catholic Church liturgy--not because of the Holy Thursday rites at all, which I think are wonderful--has contributed to this problem. The suppression of the prayers of Tenebrae, for example, stripped Holy Week of some of its mystery, not to mention the great cultural riches of musical settings of Jeremiah's Lamentations. Note that many Mainline Protestant churches celebrate Tenebrae, because they recognize the conflict between good and evil during Holy Week, and that we all participate in that conflict and live it everyday. When we remember the Passion and Death of Jesus, we should experience darkness and silence in the liturgy.

Father James V. Schall, SJ, identified the issue in his Foreword to the Ignatius Press edition of Leisure: The Basis of Culture:

When a culture is in the process of denying its own roots, it becomes most important to know what these roots are. We had best know what we reject before we reject it. If we are going to build a chair, the first thing we need to know, above all else, is what a chair is. Otherwise, we can do nothing. We are not a culture that never understood what a human being was in his nature and in his destiny.

Rather we are a culture that, having once known these things, has decided against living them or understanding them. Indeed, we have decided to reject most of them, almost as an act of defiance—as an act of pure humanism—as if what we are is not first given to us. We have let an empty future that we propose to make by our own standards become the ideal over and against a real past that revealed to us what man really was and is: namely, a being open to wonder who did not create himself or the world in which he dwells.

During Holy Week, being "a being open to wonder who did not create himself or the world in which he dwells' also means being a being open to wonder who did not redeem himself and whose suffering and striving only has meaning because of Jesus, who suffered for us, died for us, and rose for us. Something indeed to wonder about through prayer and meditation--which require leisure and time and attention.

Pange Lingua Gloriosi

Edward Caswall (July 15, 1814 to January 2, 1878) followed Blessed John Henry Newman from the Church of England to the Catholic Church and the Oratory in Birmingham.

He translated St. Thomas Aquinas's Corpus Christi hymn Pange Lingua:

Pange, lingua, gloriosi
Corporis mysterium,
Sanguinisque pretiosi,
quem in mundi pretium
fructus ventris generosi
Rex effudit Gentium.
Nobis datus, nobis natus
ex intacta Virgine,
et in mundo conversatus,
sparso verbi semine,
sui moras incolatus
miro clausit ordine.
In supremae nocte coenae
recumbens cum fratribus
observata lege plene
cibis in legalibus,
cibum turbae duodenae
se dat suis manibus.
Verbum caro, panem verum
verbo carnem efficit:
fitque sanguis Christi merum,
et si sensus deficit,
ad firmandum cor sincerum
sola fides sufficit.
Tantum ergo Sacramentum
veneremur cernui:
et antiquum documentum
novo cedat ritui:
praestet fides supplementum
sensuum defectui.
Genitori, Genitoque
laus et jubilatio,
salus, honor, virtus quoque
sit et benedictio:
Procedenti ab utroque
compar sit laudatio.
Amen. Alleluja.

Sing, my tongue, the Savior's glory,
of His flesh the mystery sing;
of the Blood, all price exceeding,
shed by our immortal King,
destined, for the world's redemption,
from a noble womb to spring.
Of a pure and spotless Virgin
born for us on earth below,
He, as Man, with man conversing,
stayed, the seeds of truth to sow;
then He closed in solemn order
wondrously His life of woe.
On the night of that Last Supper,
seated with His chosen band,
He the Pascal victim eating,
first fulfills the Law's command;
then as Food to His Apostles
gives Himself with His own hand.
Word-made-Flesh, the bread of nature
by His word to Flesh He turns;
wine into His Blood He changes;
what though sense no change discerns?
Only be the heart in earnest,
faith her lesson quickly learns.
Down in adoration falling,
This great Sacrament we hail,
Over ancient forms of worship
Newer rites of grace prevail;
Faith will tell us Christ is present,
When our human senses fail.
To the everlasting Father,
And the Son who made us free
And the Spirit, God proceeding
From them Each eternally,
Be salvation, honor, blessing,
Might and endless majesty.
Amen. Alleluia.

More about Edward Caswall from the old Catholic Encyclopedia.