Participatio Actuosa

Our fortnightly choir practice falling to-night, how better than to sing and pray what a few hours' hence the Cardinal electors shall chant as they advance toward the Sistine Chapel, Michelangelo's Last Judgement before their eyes, begging God the Holy Ghost inspire them to choose a fit successor to St Peter? 

After first practising, then we sang in supplication (though not in procession) the Litanies of the Saints and the hymn Veni Creator Spiritus (with added versicle and Collect from a popular Novena), before concluding with the Sub tuum præsidium (appointed for use at the close of the first session).

This was our true, because inward and spiritual, participation in the Conclave, by prayer asking, seeking and knocking, a prayer also outward and vocal, sung "in the beauty of holiness", since we are a complex unity of soul and body.

As we commented later, how terrifying it must be to the Cardinals to enter upon the Conclave, what a weighty responsibility, and how the solemn moment must drive vain and ambitious fancies from any reasonable heart. They need our prayers, and above all him who shall be elected, and in a short time enter the Room of Tears to vest in the Papal clothes.

It was a pleasant surprise to have Bp Robarts of the TAC (a friend of our choir and our priest) join us for prayer and a cuppa afterwards; as cantor, I was stuck by how apposite the petition was that we sang, among so many other invocations and obsecrations:

Ut ómnibus in Christum credéntibus unitátem largíri dignéris, te rogámus, audi nos.

(That thou wouldst deign to grant unity to all who believe in Christ, We beseech Thee, hear us.)

God grant us, not the Pontiff our sins and indifference deserve, but such a most merciful and faithful High Priest as shall stand in the holy place, purge out all the corruptions into which Holy Church has fallen, and by his true preaching save many souls, to the glory of God.

A Confession and a Misprint

I have an admission to make: it was only last night - nearly six months after I moved to Tasmania from Western Australia - that I got around to bringing up from storage my prie-dieu (which I felt I really should use to kneel at for to say the Litanies of the Saints).

I no longer have "Catholic knees" - too much time spent standing or sitting, not enough spent meekly kneeling on my knees...  St Ambrose tells us the knee was made flexible to propitiate the wrath of God - Flectamus genua!  (At least my kneeler has padding, thanks be.)

As I've left my F.S.S.P. Breviary upstairs in the bedroom, I used my new Nova et Vetera Breviary to read the Litaniæ Sanctorum - and discovered a misprint: Per baptismum et sanctum, ieiunium tuum (note the incorrect comma).

Rogation Monday

I almost forgot to mention that, in fellowship with the Church of all times and in all places, to-day and the next two days are days of rogation - days when, directly before the Ascension of Our Lord, the Litanies of the Saints are sung in procession.  At least, that is what Traditionalists do, unlike the lazy majority of the Western Church since 1969!  I note that only this year the Church in Australia has finally got around to setting some days for special prayer...  (These three rogation days, in contradistinction to the Greater Litanies sung on the 25th of April, are the Lesser Litanies, and apparently stem from special days of prayer set aside in early Christian Gaul to avert pestilence.)  

According to the 1962 Breviary, the Minor Litanies are only of obligation to those bound to the Breviary AND who participate in a procession "or other peculiar supplications" (the Major Litanies remain of obligation, albeit if they are recited with the faithful in the vernacular, that fulfils the duty - these Greater Litanies are of Roman origin and are, as the name suggests, considered more important): but of course it is laudable sentire - et rogare - cum Ecclesia and pray these prayers.  (I must admit that, as in Australia, the 25th of March is ANZAC Day, devoted to the memorial of the fallen in war, I had entirely forgotten about the Major Litanies, but at least I now recall the Minor ones.)  If and only if the procession with Litanies is held is the Mass of Rogation celebrated; otherwise, only a commemoration of the Rogation Day is made in the usual manner at Mass.