Who you callin’ “salt”?
“There are some in the Church today who do not look forward in hope
with the eyes of faith but tend to be preoccupied with looking back in
some kind of nostalgia for a Church they never experienced prior to the
Second Vatican Council. I encourage you to study the history of the Church
as a living and developing tradition and not to look back as Lot’s wife
did or you might end up being a pillar of salt rather then the ‘salt of
the earth.’”
Maybe you have heard this bit from a homily by an American bishop ordaining
his new priests. Without peeking at the end of this month’s column, try
to guess what year this was preached. Bonus points for guessing the pope
who appointed this bishop. Full marks if you know who he is or was.
Education in life and peace
Choral singing, according to Pope Benedict XVI, “is an exercise
of the external hearing and voice; it is also an education of interior
hearing, the hearing of the heart, an exercise and an education in life
and peace.” The holy father offered these unscripted remarks after a July
concert at the Castle of Mirabello, where he was vacationing in the Italian
Alps. “Singing together in choir and with other choirs together, demands
attention to the other, attention to the composer, attention to the conductor,
attention to this totality that we call music and culture,” he added.
NPM honorees
This summer’s NPM convention in Indianapolis honored some well-known
figures in liturgy and music. NPM bestowed its Jubilate Deo to Father
J. Michael Joncas. His Minnesota compatriot Marty Haugen was
named Pastoral Musician of the Year. OCP Publications presented NPM founder
Father
Virgil C. Funk with a Festschrift, a special volume assembled in his
honor, titled The Song of the Assembly: Pastoral Music in Practice,
a
collection of new essays each based on a church document on liturgy promulgated
over the past century.
NPM also announced winners of its hymn competition. Steven Ottományi
of
Huntington Beach, Calif., crafted a new hymn text entitled “Family of Faith.”
The NPM website (www.npm.org) describes it thus: “In just four brief stanzas
the hymn forms a prayer to Christ to bring about the change of heart required
for genuine unity in one family of faith.” Father Ricky Manalo, CSP,
collaborated with Rodolfo López and
Nguyen Dinh Dien
on a trilingual communion song, “That All May Be One in Christ,” based
on Jesus’s prayer for unity in John 17. Both pieces were used in convention
worship, and both are now available for download and parish use — in plenty
of time for 2008’s Week of Prayer for Christian Unity, Jan. 18 to 25.
Saint Patrick’s Day 2008
Because of a very early Easter (March 23), we’ll have a bit of a scramble
in the coming liturgical year to accommodate the feasts of St. Joseph (Saturday,
March 15) and the Annunciation (Monday, March 31). Also, the feast of St.
Patrick is displaced by the liturgies of Holy Week, a very rare occurrence
that won’t repeat until 2160. What to do?
The Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments
made the call for the two universal feasts of Joseph and Mary (see transferred
dates above), which ordinarily fall on March 19 and 25, respectively. The
decision for St. Patrick’s Day — the liturgical observance — has been left
to national conferences.
The Irish bishops will bump Jesus’s foster father for a March 15, 2008,
St. Patrick’s Day. However, the secular sphere is unimpressed, as a representative
of Dublin’s St. Patrick’s Festival said, “Parades and other cultural events
will continue on the traditional feast day of St. Patrick, March 17.”
In the United States, the migration of liturgical and cultural events
to the weekend will remain a higher priority than considering the Christian
Holy Week or Easter Octave. Atlanta’s St. Patrick observance will match
the Irish liturgy, the day before Palm Sunday. Holyoke, Mass., is hoping
to get more springtime green; they’ve postponed their festivities till
Sunday, March 30.
Only his acolyte knows for sure?
Shortly after the promulgation of the holy father’s motu proprio
loosening
of some restrictions on the 1962 missal, some internet sources were proclaiming
that Pope Benedict XVI uses the traditional Latin Mass in his private
chapel. That prompted a rather hasty official denial from Father Federico
Lombardi, SJ, “The confusion probably was caused by our footage of
the pope celebrating facing the altar, which is due to the fact that the
altar is against the wall.” Actually, the current Roman Missal does
not stipulate the orientation of priest or altar.
Saint-filled passing
As Lady Bird Johnson passed from a coma into death this past
summer, the gathered family of the former first lady prayed the Litany
of Saints. Though she was not Catholic, her daughter Luci is, and
she called a friend when the time of death seemed near. Father Bob Scott
did
not perform formal last rites but simply prayed with the family. “I said,
‘Let’s say some prayers and give her a welcome into heaven, from all the
saints in heaven,” Scott said. “I finished the Litany of the Saints, believe
it or not, and the nurse said, ‘She’s passed’ — at that very moment when
I finished the Litany of the Saints.”
Salty bishop
Here are the answers to the “quiz” in “Who you callin’ ‘salt’?” at the
beginning of this column: The homily was preached in 2007. The bishop was
appointed by the late Pope John Paul II in 1999, and his name is
Stephen
Blaire. ML
