The Pope Dedicates La Sagrada Família

As  I write, His Holiness has just begun the Mass of Dedication of that still-unfinished masterpiece, Gaudí's "Expiatory Temple of the Holy Family" in Barcelona.  Indeed, he will name it a Basilica.  What a rebuke to all who say regnare Christum nolumus, "we don't want Christ to reign", to see this amazing work of art, raised in honour of God, now solemnly blessed: a temple of expiation, indeed, wherein the Lamb once slain will stand upon the altar, making present His Sacrifice in reparation for all sin.

(The Mass is in an interesting combination of Catalan, Spanish and Latin.)

To think that many self-styled intellectuals petitioned for the Sagrada Família to be left unfinished - for to complete it would be an affront to secular Spain.  Just as during the Civil War, Catholics are to have no rights.  The building has always been a privately-funded undertaking, so how dare they try to stop people freely doing as they please!  Better the turban than the mitre?

Antoni Gaudí is now styled Servant of God: may God deign to glorify His servant if it be to His honour and will help forward our salvation, that the Church bravely militant here below may recognize him as a hero of the Church triumphant above, an artist-saint like the Blessed Antony of Fiesole, a.k.a. Fra Angelico.  "Beauty will save the world."

The Indispensable Hymn

To-day being the feast of the Dedication, not merely of any church, but of the very Cathedral of Christ's Vicar, I missed singing Neale's superlative rendering of Angularis fundamentum (from his 1851 Mediæval Hymns); here is his text, with Gibbon's great tune on organ to play while you, like I, essay to sing along:

Angularis fundamentum
lapis Christus missus est,
qui parietum compage
in utroque nectitur,
quem Sion sancta suscepit,
in quo credens permanet.

Omnis illa Deo sacra
et dilecta civitas,
plena modulis in laude
et canore jubilo,
trinum Deum unicumque
cum fervore prædicat.

Hoc in templo, summe Deus,
exoratus adveni,
et clementi bonitate
precum vota suscipe;
largam benedictionem
hic infunde jugiter.

Hic promereantur omnes
petita acquirere
et adepta possidere
cum sanctis perenniter,
paradisum introire
translati in requiem.

Gloria et honor Deo
usquequaque altissimo,
una Patri Filioque
inclyto Paraclito,
Cui laus est et potestas
per æterna sæcula.

Christ is made the sure Foundation,

Christ the Head and Cornerstone;

Chosen of the Lord, and precious,

Binding all the Church in one,

Holy Zion’s Help forever,

And her Confidence alone.

All that dedicated city,

Dearly loved of God on high,

In exultant jubilation,

Pours perpetual melody,

God the One in Three adoring

In glad hymns eternally.

To this temple, where we call Thee,

Come, O Lord of Hosts, today;

With Thy wonted lovingkindness

Hear Thy servants as they pray.

And Thy fullest benediction

Shed within its walls alway.

Here vouchsafe to all Thy servants

What they ask of Thee to gain;

What they gain from Thee forever

With the blessèd to retain,

And hereafter in Thy glory

Evermore with Thee to reign.

Laud and honor to the Father,

Laud and honor to the Son,

Laud and honor to the Spirit,

Ever Three and ever One;

Consubstantial, co-eternal,

While unending ages run.

Amen.

Singing, Serving, and Remembering

To-day was marked with many festivities.

For a start, Justin was again with us to lead the ad hoc mixed schola in the Gregorian Propers and Ordinary (Mass XII, Credo I), plus our hymns (processional: "On this day the first of days"; offertory: O esca viatorum; communion: Cælestis urbs Jerusalem; recessional: "Let all mortal flesh keep silence" - a rather odd assortment, frankly, but tuneful) and to play the organ, at our usual 9.15 am Missa Cantata.

Then - after visiting the visiting St Rita's Book-barrel, and buying at last a useful copy of Rossini's Proper of the Mass, plus that great religious comic book, Know your Mass - we went off for coffee with the usual suspects, before farewelling Justin, who was to fly back over East later in the day, to return on the 19th of December for Christmas, just when I leave the West permanently.

Michael and I then went over to St Michael the Archangel Chapel in Leederville for to serve at a wedding and nuptial Mass there at 1.30 pm, but not before stopping off at the International Beer Shop and enjoying a liquid lunch of Saison Regal...

The wedding went off well from the point of view of our M.C. Aaron and my fellow servers Michael, Michael, Michael and I, and Quartessence (reduced to Triessence by the absence overseas of a member), together with Andrew at the organ when not singing, acquitted themselves well with the Byrd Mass for 3 Voices, the Gregorian Propers, and sundry motets (Victoria's Ave Maria, of course; also someone's In te Domine speravi - odd choice for a wedding! - and an Adoro te).  As one is bound to say, the bride looked ravishing and the groom a lucky man: pray that they have a happy and blessed marriage.

After a cuppa with Fr afterward (since we didn't know the families, we of course didn't go to the reception), Mike and I visited our mate Rob, for a drop of Cascade beer from Tasmania, some chips, some good conversation, and a screening of Lord Clark's "Civilization" series (episode 1).

Having now come home, I feel rather unwell; I may have caught a cold, irritatingly enough.

Soon we'll end the day with Vespers of the Dedication of the Lateran Basilica...

But, not to forget, to-day commemorates another important anniversary - my old parish priest back in Hobart, now bishop of Lismore, was received into the Church on this day in 1965: ad multos annos!

Oremus et pro Antistite Ecclesiæ Lismorensis Godefrido:

Stet et pascat in fortitudine tua, Domine, in sublimitate nominis tui.

Bruckner & Dedication of St John Lateran

To-day is the feast of the Dedication of "the Archbasilica of the Most Holy Saviour, St John the Baptist and St John the Evangelist on the Lateran" (otherwise called for short the Lateran, or St John Lateran; sometimes, Our Saviour's or St Saviour's) - the Cathedral of the Pope as Bishop of Rome, and therefore "the Mother and Head of all churches in the City and the world".

The Proper of the Mass for the Dedication of a Church is marvellous, and I'm looking forward to singing it at Mass in just over an hour; here is Bruckner's celebrated setting of Locus iste, the first part of the Gradual of this feast:

Locus iste a Deo factus est, inæstimabile sacramentum, irreprehensibilis est.

(This place has been been made by God; it is a mystery beyond measure, it is free from all stain.)