The Most Holy Name

By mistake, I read the ferial Office yester-day, when I should have said the Office of the Holy Name of Jesus (according to my Dominican Diurnal and Breviary); so, instead of reading the ferial Office to-day, I'm saying the Office of the Holy Name.  "Office for Office", after all, is the principle.  In addition, to-day, the 3rd, is the Optional Memorial of the Most Holy Name in the Ordinary Form, so Lauds in my Diurnal coincided with the Mass I attended.

I was struck by how the very long-winded and indeed rather bizarre orations in the Extraordinary Form (though not in the Dominican Rite – alas, I live far from a friar) have been replaced by, frankly, rather better ones in the Ordinary.  For example, the Postcommunion in the 1962 Missal is:

Omnípotens ætérne Deus, qui creásti et redemísti nos, réspice propítius vota nostra: et sacrifícium salutáris hóstiæ, quod in honórem nóminis Fílii tui, Dómini nostri Jesu Christi, majestáti tuæ obtúlimus, plácido et benígno vultu suscípere dignéris; ut grátia tua nobis infúsa, sub glorióso nómine Jesu, ætérnæ prædestinatiónis titulo gaudeámus nómina nostra scripta esse in cælis. Per eumdem...

(Almighty eternal God, Who hast created and redeemed us, graciously regard our desires, and deign to receive with a placid and benign countenance the sacrifice of the saving Victim, which we have offered to Thy majesty, in honour of the Name of Thy Son, our Lord Jesus Christ; that, Thy grace infused into us, we may rejoice that our names are written in heaven, under the glorious Name of Jesus, a pledge of eternal predestination. Through the same...)

Is this not a terribly overlong prayer, hardly fitting the expected concision of the Roman Mass?

This, I believe, has been abbreviated to advantage, to become the Prayer after Communion in the current Missal, which I append in the Latin and in the new English translation:

Hostia sumpta, Domine, quam Christi nomen honorantes tuæ obtulimus majestati, gratiam tuam, quaesumus, nobis infundat uberrime, ut et nostra in caelis esse scripta nomina gaudeamus. Per Christum Dominum nostrum.

May the sacrificial gifts offered to your majesty, O Lord, to honour Christ's Name and which we have now received, fill us, we pray, with your abundant grace, so that we may come to rejoice that our names, too, are written in heaven. Through Christ our Lord.

I have underlined the words common to the new and old forms of this prayer, demonstrating how the one derives from the other, the necessary grammatical changes being made.  The new is definitely a tighter, more effective composition, whereas the older was too diffuse.

Travel Journal: 2nd January

Sunday 2^nd January 2011: Feast of the Most Holy Name of Jesus

This morning I arose at half six, and went to the airport to collect my mother and sister, who have come over to Melbourne to spend part of their holiday with me (since Dad passed away, we've felt it best to try and do more together as a family).  First breakfast was at McDonald’s, waiting for their plane to arrive… second breakfast, with them, was at the European Café in central Melbourne.

I returned to St Aloysius for the 11 am Solemn Mass.  To-day Fr McDaniels was the celebrant, Fr Tattersall the deacon, and one of yester-day’s servers the ersatz sub-deacon (amazing vestments, very fine); Fr Terence was in the confessional shriving penitents during the Sacrifice.  Again, Mass IV and Credo III were sung (the latter with organ accompaniment); the choir expertly handled the propers (including of course the Asperges before Mass, sung to one of the alternate settings) plus two motets, Byrd’s setting of the Memento salutis Auctor (the hymn at the Little Hours of the Little Office, of course in the pre-Urban VIII version) and Victoria’s Jesu dulcis memoria; for a recessional we sang “Jesus the very thought of thee”, being a translation of Jesu dulcis memoria.  Again, how well the organ sounds…  Mass took an hour and a half.

In passing, it may be noted how lengthy and strange the Postcommunion, even more so than the Secret, of this Mass is.

Of old, Fr Tattersall preached, the Holy Name of God was so terrible and great that it were a blasphemy to pronounce it even in devotion: only the High Priest, once a year, entering the Holy of Holies, casting the blood upon the mercy seat, dared utter the Tetragrammaton in the midst of a most solemn sacred rite.  But now, in Jesus, the Holy Name is made the Name we may confidently invoke – and it is the only name that saves.  All attempts at salvation in other names are foolish devilry (as the mad ragings of the evil ideologies, so murderous and destructive, of the past bloodfilled century sadly prove).

Father mentioned, inter alia, another grave threat against which we must work and pray: the insanity of changing the very definition of marriage to include unnatural pretended unions.  He will offer up Mass on the Feast of the Holy Family for the defeat of this wicked enterprise.

Lunch was again at the Balaclava.

I used the lazy afternoon back at our apartment to read the Office.

The Dominican Office of the Holy Name, incidentally, has variations from the Roman – most obviously in the five Lauds antiphons.

Jesu, Jesu, Jesu, esto mihi Jesus

Kneeling before the altar, before and after making my confession, I remembered these words: Jesu, Jesu, Jesu, esto mihi Jesus (hoc est, Salvator) – "Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, be to me Jesus (that is, Saviour)".   In church, what is better than to kneel before the Sacramental Presence, and invoke Our Lord?

Of old time the English had a great devotion to the Holy Name of Jesus, as exemplified in the Jesus Psalter, a form of devotion consisting in great part in a devout calling upon that saving Name.  This was retained in Anglicanism, as early injunctions to make reverence at Christ's Name makes clear: hopefully those soon to be in full communion again will help reinstate the traditional practice of bowing one's head at the Name of Jesus.

To-day (in the traditional Roman calendar) also marks the memory of two famous martyrs, SS Perpetua and Felicity, who bravely bore witness before hostile and uncomprehending pagans in Carthage just over 1800 years ago: as St Augustine put it, thus through trial and suffering they entered "perpetual felicity".  At the stirring account of their witness unto death, partly dictated by the saints themselves, the heart dilates in love for such great champions of Christ.  May they pray for us, and their glorious merits avail on our behalf.

Preces for the Holy Name

Here's something I found last year, I think: the modern Liturgia Horarum has the following preces for Vespers of 2nd January and Lauds of 3rd January, obviously alluding to the (then-suppressed) Feast of the Holy Name, and based upon the Litanies thereof:

Deus, multifariam loquens patribus nostris in prophetis, novissime locutus est nobis in Filio suo.  Ejus misericordiam imploremus, dicentes: Kyrie, eleison.

Pro Ecclesia tua sancta, – ut filii tui fideliter fortiterque confiteantur nomen Salvatoris.  Kyrie, eleison.  

Pro evangelizantibus, – ut operarii a te missi cum omni fiducia prædicent gentibus nomen Salvatoris.  Kyrie, eleison.

Pro fratribus nostris infirmis, – ut sanitatem obtineant invocantes nomen Salvatoris.  Kyrie, eleison.

Pro christianis persecutioni obnoxiis, – ut injurias patienter sustineant propter nomen Salvatoris.  Kyrie, eleison.

Pro fratribus nostris, qui culpa hominum obierunt, – ut tua misericordia vitam consequantur.  Kyrie, eleison.

Redemptorem nostrum, Filium Dei, qui homo factus est, ut hominem renovaret, lætanter invocemus, dicentes: Esto nobiscum, Emmanuel.  

Jesu, Fili Dei vivi, splendor Patris, lux æterna, rex gloriæ, sol justitiæ, fili Virginis Mariæ, – incarnationis tuæ gloria diem hunc illumina.  Esto nobiscum, Emmanuel.

Jesu, admirabilis consiliarius, Deus fortis, pater futuri sæculi, princeps pacis, – humanitatis tuæ sanctitate viam nostram dirige.  Esto...

Jesu, omnipotens, patiens, obœdiens, mitis et humilis corde, – omnibus mansuetudinis potentiam manifesta.  Esto...

Jesu, pater pauperum, fidelium tuorum gloria, pastor bone, lux vera, infinita sapientia, immensa bonitas, via et vita nostra, – spiritum paupertatis Ecclesiæ tuæ concede.  Esto...

To the last intercession I would append my own (cf. IGLH, n. 188 – Licet tamen... quasdam intentiones addere particulares):

Jesu, amator castitatis, amator noster, Deus pacis, auctor vitæ, exemplar virtutum, zelator animarum, Deus noster, refugium nostrum, – da nobis tuam pacem, et vitam æternam.  Esto...

Jesu, gaudium Angelorum, rex Patriarcharum, magister Apostolorum, doctor Evangelistarum, fortitudo Martyrum, lumen Confessorum, puritas Virginum, corona Sanctorum omnium, – precibus et meritis eorum perducas nos ad societatem civium supernorum.  Esto...

Furthermore, thumbing back thro' vol. I of the Lit. Hor. turns up much of the rest of the Litanies of the Holy Name turned into intercessions at Vespers for the 26th of December (which is not of St Stephen a capitulo, unlike in the older Breviary):

Verbum Dei, quod, in nobis habitando, salutis perpetuæ tramitem reseravit, deprecemur et sincera humilitate rogemus: Ab omni malo, libera nos, Domine.

Per mysterium incarnationis tuæ, per nativitatem et infantiam tuam, – per totam vitam tuam Patri dicatam: Ab omni malo, libera nos, Domine.

Per labores tuos, per prædicationes et itinera tua, per conversationem tuam inter peccatores:

Per agoniam et passionem tuam, per crucem et desolationem tuam, – per angustias tuas, per mortem et sepulturam tuam: Ab...

Per resurrectionem et ascensionem tuam, per donationem Spiritus Sancti, per gaudia et gloriam tuam æternam, – fratres nostros, jam defunctos, libera, Domine.  Ab...

Again, I would add before the last petition, as is allowable:

Per sanctissimæ Eucharistiæ institutionem tuam: Ab omni malo, libera nos, Domine.

The Holy Name

While I kept the Feast of the Most Holy Name of JESUS yesterday, since I was praying the 1962 Breviary (altho' I didn't get round to it till late at night after a very busy day!), in the modern Roman Rite the same feast (as an optional memorial) falls today, rather than attaching to the Sunday between the 2nd and the 5th inst., or failing that, on the 2nd; and the modern Martyrology declares:

Sanctissimi Nominis Jesu, in quo solo omne flectatur genu, cælestium, terrestrium et infernorum, ad gloriam divinæ majestatis.

(Of the Most Holy Name of Jesus, at which alone every knee shall bend, of celestials, of terrestrials and of infernals*, to the glory of the divine majesty.  [Cf. Phil. ii, 10-11.])

[*i.e. "of those who are in heaven, on earth, and in hell" – my little joke.]

This reminds me: one of the many things I like about the modern Divine Office is the inclusion of New Testament canticles at Vespers; and I liked to genuflect at the words Ut in nomine Jesu omne genu flectatur, cælestium, terrestrium, et infernorum, which appear each Saturday in the cancticle from Philippians ii, 6-11; I based this on the rubric requiring this genuflection at the same words when read on Palm Sunday (and on the feasts of the Holy Cross) as part of the Epistle at the Traditional Mass.

I also try to maintain the formerly universal Catholic custom of bowing the head at the name of Jesus.  It is a sad sign of secularization that this salutary practice has become so rare.

Today's a good day (especially since I hardly celebrated the Feast yesterday) to pray the Litanies of the Most Holy Name; also a good day to delight in the moving Office hymns – Jesu Rex admirabilis (at Matins), Jesu decus angelicum (at Lauds), and Jesu dulcis memoria (at Vespers)  – proper to the (Traditional version) of the feast, drawn from the Jubilus Rhythmicus (wrongly) attributed to St Bernard.

Certain versicles in the Office, widely used elsewhere in the Church's Liturgy, have great appeal also:

V/.   Sit nomen Domini benedictum.

R/.  Ex hoc nunc et usque in sæculum.  (Ps 112:2)

V/.  Adjutorium nostrum in nomine Domini.

R/.  Qui fecit cælum et terram.  (Ps 123:8)

V/.  Magnificate Dominum mecum.

R/.  Et exaltemus nomen ejus in idipsum.  (Ps 33:4)

Domine, Dominus noster, quam admirabile est nomen tuum in universa terra!  (Ps 8:2)

Ego autem in Domino gaudebo, et exsultabo in Deo Jesu meo.  (Hab.  iii, 18)

The last sentence - the 3rd antiphon at Vespers – is unique in that it is the actual Vulgate rendering of "But I will rejoice in the Lord, and exalt in God my Saviour": for that is the import of the Name Jesus.

This also reminds me of the pious customs for those at Sunday or festal Vespers to bow their heads (and doff their birettas...) at the half-verses Sanctum et terribile nomen ejus and Sit nomen Domini benedictum in Psalms 110 and 112, and even at et sanctum nomen ejus in the Magnificat.

Yesterday's Postcommunion at Mass in the extraordinary form is quite unusual:

Omnipotens æterne Deus, qui creasti et redemisti nos, respice propitius vota nostra: et sacrificium salutaris hostiæ, quod in honorem nominis Filii tui, Domini nostri Jesu Christi, majestati tuæ obtulimus, placido et benigno vultu suscipere digneris; ut gratia tua nobis infusa, sub glorioso nomine Jesu, æternæ prædestinationis titulo gaudeamus nomina nostra scripta esse in cælis.  Per eumdem Dominum...

(Almighty eternal God, Who hast created and redeemed us, graciously regard our prayers: and deign to receive with a placid and benign countenance the sacrifice of the saving Victim which we have offered unto Thy Majesty, in honour of the Name of Thy Son, our Lord Jesus Christ; that Thy grace being poured forth into us,  we may rejoice at our names to be written in heaven under the glorious Name of Jesus as a title of eternal predestination.  Thro' the same...)

"For there is no other name under heaven given to men, whereby we must be saved."  (Acts iv, 12.)