Online Lecture and Q&A with Sir James MacMillan, January 17: “Setting the Words of the Mass to Music in the Secular Environment of Our Time”

The composer’s challenge of writing a Mass setting in the sixteenth century presented itself on a more local level - a setting to be sung in a certain place and time, mindful of the wishes of a patron, and perhaps with a mind towards publication and use elsewhere. Received in an environment integrally linked to liturgical practice, a Mass did not have to make a case for its existence. Even in the nineteenth century, the liturgical practice yet served as a justification for the text which might now be set for a concert setting, aimed at dramatic effect, particularly in the Requiem.

What can be said today? Mass settings are heard in the liturgical context only by a small subset of people. The average Catholics who regularly attend Mass rarely hear something approaching the artistic integrity of a Mass by Palestrina or Rheinberger. The average concert-goer, too, rarely hears a Mass and then usually only the occasional Requiem which, for them, has lost its cultural cachet as something used in religious practice. The Mass presents in our time as an artifact of some long-lost culture, perhaps interesting as a museum piece or an homage to a bygone era. Catholic practice for the average parish, too, is often yet bereft of the hearing of artistically substantial works, presenting a challenge for the intrepid music director to help Catholics feel at home in beautiful works which might seem to them as “a concert at Mass.” There are many miles to be traversed to plant the seeds of a rich culture for reception of the Mass, and certainly readers of the NLM know and are engaged in this project of the re-Christianization of culture and the re-sacralization of liturgical practice.

The current culture presents a particular challenge (and opportunity) for the modern composer: can one compose something that stands on its own as artistically significant in a concert setting so as to draw people into the mysteries bespoken, and yet can it be actually used in a liturgical setting, fulfilling the purposes and qualities of sacred music the Church requires? Or, perhaps the concert aspect is to be shriven altogether, focusing again on the local instantiation as in olden times, again focusing on a culture of lived liturgical practice.

Sir James MacMillan has been writing Masses for a long time in his illustrious career, and is uniquely skilled in our time at writing which makes a case for the Mass, preaching the mysteries of the Mass to the concert-going audience and yet writing for parish and cathedral choirs music the Church gladly receives as part of the treasury of sacred music.

MacMillan’s Missa Brevis, written when he was just 17 but not premiered until 30 years later, displays the remarkable skill of a young composer.

The Catholic Institute of Sacred Music is happy to invite you to the first event of its spring term of its fourth annual Public Lecture and Concert Series to explore this topic with Sir James. The lecture, available online for free or a suggested donation of $20, will feature some of Sir James’ movements from Masses and an opportunity for Q&A. The lecture will be held online via Zoom; an RSVP is required.

Saturday, January 17th

10:00 a.m. PST | 1:00 p.m. EST

Registration available here.

We hope to see you there!

Why Look to the East?

We continue Luisella Scrosati’s series on the orientation of Christian worship with her sixth part, “Perché guardare ad est“, originally published in Italian on the website of La Nuova Bussola Quotidiana on December 14, and reproduced here by permission of the editors. (Read Part 1; Part 2; Part 3; Part 4; Part 5)

Why did Christians insist so much on praying towards the east? Why did they do everything possible to build churches and altars oriented in that direction? Why so much attention and insistence?

Before investigating the rich meaning of the orientation of prayer, which we have already presented in part (see here), it is necessary to recall a fundamental principle that we have forgotten in the spiritualism that has invaded the Catholic world, a spiritualism that translates into an exclusivity of interiority to the detriment of exteriority. Damascene writes:

It is not without reason or by chance that we prostrate ourselves in adoration towards the east, but it is because we are constituted by visible and invisible nature, that is, intelligible and sensible, so that we perform a twofold adoration directed towards the Creator. (Exposition of the Faith, 85)

Our human nature has this twofold dimension; it is in its integrity that it is called to worship God. It is quite evident to contemporary man that a division that sacrifices the invisible and intelligible aspect of worship can lead to a purely formal, sterile, and empty worship; on the other hand, the opposite seems less felt and understood, namely, that the elimination of the visible and sensible dimension in worship creates no less of a problem. Whichever way you look at it, a “schizophrenia” in worship always entails a sickness of the religious man.

Faced with the complacency with which some today would dismiss the problem of the orientation of prayer – the kind of person who says “the important thing is to pray” (and nothing else) – the Christians of the centuries that preceded us, up to the dawn of modernity, knew very well that this physical orientation expresses and conditions the inner orientation of life.

In his Rationale Divinorum Officiorum, to which I already referred in the previous article of this series, William Durandus summarizes the stratification of meanings and mysteries that oriented prayer confesses, and recalls the power and simplicity of a bodily posture. We look to the east, primarily because our whole being is turned toward Christ, “the splendor of eternal light,” who visited us like the sun rising from on high to enlighten us, immersed in darkness and the shadow of death (cf. Luke 1, 78). Turning our bodies toward this earthly light, which since creation has been a sign of the light of Christ the Redeemer, we are also exhorted, Durandus explains, “to turn our minds to higher realities.” In this latter respect, looking toward the east has the same meaning as turning our gaze upward in prayer.

The third reason he offers is a curious one: “because those who want to praise God must not turn their backs on him.” Who knows what Durandus would say about our liturgical gatherings! In reality, it is the “negative” corollary of the first two and further emphasizes the importance of the bodily gesture. Paying attention to orienting one’s body in a certain direction, a gesture that reminds the soul that it too is called to orient itself, to tune in to God, means at the same time spurring it not to forget God by turning its back on him.

It is interesting to note that in the rite of Baptism, the catechumen was asked to confess his faith by turning to the east, while turning his back on the kingdom of darkness, symbolized by the west, which he was determined to renounce forever. This rite is like the photographic negative of what Durandus expresses and marks once again that Christian life is essentially a turning towards the light of Christ: “The night is far gone, the day is at hand. Let us then cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light” (Rom 13, 12).

Durandus, who is generally inspired by St. John Damascene on this theme, explicitly refers to it when he indicates the orientation of prayer as the search for our true homeland.

Scripture adds: “Then the Lord planted a garden in Eden, in the East, and placed there the man whom he had formed” (cf. Gen 2, 8) and who, having violated the divine command, was banished from the delights of the garden, evidently to the West. Seeking our original homeland and keeping our gaze fixed on it, we worship God. (Exposition of the Faith, 85)

Orientation is decisive in constantly reminding man that he is in search of another homeland, that his heart must not settle for the false delights of this world: his original condition is different, and so is the eternal destiny to which he is called. Every time we look to the east, we confess the infinite goodness of God who created us in integrity and grace, and we shed tears of nostalgia for our lost condition and of desire for the true homeland that is promised to us. Looking to the east therefore means rejecting any attempt at a worldly Christianity, a Christianity that presumes to build the city of man, forgetting the City of God, the “new heavens and a new earth, in which righteousness shall dwell” (2 Peter 3:13).

Looking to the east, we also meet the gaze of Christ who, from the cross, “looked to the west,” toward that kingdom of darkness from which he was about to rescue us with the Cross. Meeting this gaze softens the hardness of the heart and causes new tears of gratitude and repentance to flow, while we await his return as judge with fear and hope. In fact, says Damascene,

Christ, rising up, ascended towards the East, and in this way the apostles worship him, and so he will come again in the way he was seen departing towards heaven…. Therefore, ready to welcome him from the East, we turn towards it and worship him. (Ibid.)

By this gesture we confess that history does not lead to absurdity, does not lead to the triumph of evil, despite appearances to the contrary; nor is it a circle closed in on itself and always the same. It goes towards the infallible and unappealable judgment of Christ, who will reveal the thoughts of every heart.

The orientation of prayer thus synthesizes the entire Christian revelation on the origin of man and his redemption, on his eternal destiny, on the direction of history, uniting it with the symbolic reality of creation.

Few other gestures can hold so many meanings and unleash their power. Every time the Christian people (and each individual) remembers to turn towards the east for prayer, they confess and reinvigorate the great hope of the Church, which awaits, renewed by tears, the arrival of her Bridegroom, who “comes forth from his bridal chamber” (Ps 19, 5), like the sun peering over the horizon in the east.

The hour is uncertain but the coming is certain – the moment when, suddenly, we will hear the voice that will shake us from our sleep: “Behold, the bridegroom! Go out to meet him!” (Mt 25, 6). And blessed are those who, with readiness, will turn toward the east to welcome the coming Christ.

The Gospels of the Epiphany (Part 1)

The feast of the Epiphany is one of the richest of the Church’s liturgical year, commemorating several different events in the life of Our Lord. The Roman and other western rites have traditionally laid the strongest emphasis on the visit of the three Magi to the infant Jesus, which is recounted in the Gospel of the feast; the paintings and sarcophagi from the catacombs of Rome attest to the great antiquity of this tradition. In the Byzantine Rite, on the other hand, the visit to the Magi is read on Christmas Day, and the Epiphany is principally focused on the Baptism of the Lord, as may be seen in the icon of the feast. The Roman Rite traditionally assigns the celebration of this latter event to the octave day of the Epiphany, which was officially renamed “the Baptism of the Lord” in the 1961 rubrical reform; this change was carried over into the post-Conciliar liturgy. The Epiphany is also traditionally the day on which the date of Easter is announced to the faithful, and the feast and its vigil are the occasion of several blessings in the Rituale.

The Adoration of the Magi, depicted on a Christian sarcophagus of the 4th century, now in the Pio-Christian collection of the Vatican Museums.

At the first Mass of Christmas, the Church reads the revelation of the Incarnation to the people of the ancient covenant, represented by the shepherds; at the dawn Mass, these men of humble estate come to Bethlehem, and behold the Creator of the Universe as an infant sleeping in a manger. This private manifestation of God to the people of Israel on Christmas is complimented by a similarly private manifestation on Epiphany to the nations of the world, in the persons of the Magi. As St Fulgentius says in a sermon read during the octave of the Epiphany, “The shepherds were the first-fruits of the Jews; the Magi have become the first-fruits of the gentiles.” St Matthew does not say that the Wise Men found the Holy Family still at the stable in Bethlehem, where they had been found earlier by the shepherds, but the Church’s artistic tradition has depicted it thus, precisely to emphasize the connection between these two “epiphanies”.

The last antiphon of Christmas Matins is “God hath made known, alleluja, his salvation, alleluja,” words which are repeated at both Lauds and Vespers; the psalm from which they are taken, Psalm 97, has been associated with the Nativity of the Lord from very ancient times. A subsequent verse of the same psalm is sung as the communion antiphon of the third and most solemn of the three Christmas Masses, and is repeated several times during the octave: “All the ends of the earth have seen the salvation of our God.” These words are fulfilled in the Epiphany, when the representatives of the ends of the earth, the Magi, come to worship the Christ Child, God Incarnate for our salvation. Therefore, although the Gospel does not say how many they were, Christian art from the earliest times (and especially in Rome) has usually shown them as three, representing the three parts of the world known to ancient peoples, Asia, Africa and Europe, descendents of the three sons of Noah.

The Adoration of the Magi, by Flemish painter Gerard David, ca. 1490.

From the earliest times, the Roman Gospel of the third Mass of Christmas has been the Prologue of St John (1, 1-14); this is attested already in the middle of the seventh century in the very oldest lectionary of the Roman Rite, the Comes Romanus of Wurzburg. In the high Middle Ages, the custom emerged of reading this same text at the end of the Mass, as part of the celebrant’s thanksgiving. At the third Mass of Christmas, therefore, the Gospel of the Epiphany was read in its place, uniting the revelation of the Incarnate Word to Israel with His revelation to the nations. It is worth noting that the Gospels of both Christmas and Epiphany end with a genuflection, by which we imitate the Magi in kneeling before the Divine Infant, just as we honor the Incarnation every Sunday by genuflecting during the Creed at the words “Et incarnatus est.” (The 1961 rubrical reform of Pope St John XXIII prescribes that there be no last Gospel at this Mass.)

In the Middle Ages, another pair of Gospels was added to the liturgy to associate the feasts of Christmas and Epiphany. At Matins of Christmas, the Genealogy of Christ according to St Matthew (1, 1-16) was sung before the Te Deum and the Midnight Mass, at Epiphany Matins, the Genealogy according to St Luke (3, 21 – 4, 1). Both of these were normally sung with the same ceremonies that accompany the singing of the Gospel at Solemn Mass. Since these texts are fairly repetitive, musicians composed special and elaborate music for them; they were often set for two deacons or groups of deacons, who would alternate the verses.

St Matthew’ genealogy was clearly chosen for Christmas because it ends with St Joseph, “the husband of Mary, from whom was born Jesus, that is called Christ.” In German-speaking lands, it was usually follow by the antiphon “O mundi Domina”, a final O antiphon on the cusp between Advent and Christmas. That of St Luke was then assigned to Epiphany because it is preceded by an account of the Baptism of Christ (vs. 21-23), one of the principal events commemorated by the feast. This Gospel ends with Christ departing into the desert “lead by the Spirit”, a distant prelude to the coming Lenten fast. Commenting on the reason why these two Gospels are read on their respective feasts, Sicard of Cremona writes in about 1200, “Matthew reckons (the genealogy) by descending (from Abraham to Joseph), because he is describing the humanity of Christ, by which He descends to us. Luke recounts (the genealogy) ascending, since from the baptized One he ascends to God, showing the effects of baptism; because the baptized become sons of God.” (Mitrale, V, 6)

Folio 19r of the Schuttern Gospels, an early 9th century illuminated manuscript produced at the Abbey of Schuttern in Baden-Württemberg, Germany.

These texts occur in virtually every use of the Roman Rite except that of the Roman Curia itself, the ancestor of the Breviary of St. Pius V; they were retained after the Tridentine reform in the proper breviaries of certain religious orders, including the Premonstratensians, Dominicans, and Carmelites of the Ancient Observance.

Here is a marvelous recording of the Genealogy of Christ according to St Luke from Epiphany Matins.

An equally nice version of the Genealogy according to St Matthew from Christmas Matins, sung by the Schola Hungarica; brevitatis causa, the names between “the wife of Uriah” and Jacob, the father of St Joseph, are omitted in this recording. (There is small mistake at the very beginning; the word “autem” is incorrectly added after the name of Abraham.)

Also from the Schola Hungarica, the antiphon “O mundi Domina”; the music is very similar to that of the standard seven O antiphons of Advent.

Aña O mundi Domina, regio ex semine orta, ex tuo jam processit Christus alvo, tamquam sponsus de thalamao; hic jacet in praesepio, qui et sidera regit. ~ O Lady of the world, born of royal descent, Christ hath now come forth from Thy womb, as a bridegroom from his chamber; he lieth in a manger, that also ruleth the stars.

A Full Training in Sacred Art Wall Painting Suitable for Catholics

Writing the Light’s 2-year Certificate, Starts Fall 2026, Applications Open Now.

If we want to see a genuine and widespread flourishing of sacred art in our churches, artists must learn to paint church interiors.

To participate authentically in the sacred liturgy, the environment in which we worship must foster an encounter with Christ in the Eucharist. This requires beautifully celebrated liturgies, as well as music, art, and architecture that harmonise with the actions of the celebrants and the congregation.

The frescoes at St Francis of Assisi, Baddesley Clinton, England, painted by contemporary English Catholic artist Martin Earle. See here for more infomation.

If the sacred art is to play its part in this, we need artists who can paint well and on a large scale, directly onto the walls and ceilings of our places of worship, creating sacred spaces that draw us powerfully into the encounter with Christ.

The Writing the Light School of Byzantine artist practice, under the internationally known icon painter George Kordis, now offers a full 2-year Certificate program. I would encourage all Catholic students who want to learn wall painting to consider this, regardless of the style they eventually hope to paint in. They will come out of the program with a facility in drawing and painting that is so great that they will be able to adapt what they learn to their chosen style. George, who is Greek Orthodox, is exceptionally open and friendly to non-Orthodox students. I attended an icon painting class with him in Crete in the summer of 2025, and about a third of the students were Catholic.

Although preserved most clearly in the Christian East, the Byzantine visual system is not foreign to Roman Catholicism. In fact, it formed the common artistic DNA of the undivided Church, which extended well into the second millennium in the West. Romanesque frescoes, early Gothic cycles, illuminated manuscripts, and even elements of early Renaissance sacred art all share its underlying principles:

● Rhythmic structuring of form

● Archetypal proportions

● Ordered movement of line

● Hierarchical composition

● A focus on theological meaning over naturalistic imitation

For contemporary Catholic artists seeking to recover a unified, theologically grounded approach to sacred imagery, this system offers a way forward. 

The Sacred Space program embraces this shared heritage, offering Catholics a way to reconnect with the structural principles that once shaped the visual identity of Western sacred art.

Dr. George Kordis, who heads the program, is regarded as one of the top contemporary master iconographers working in this specialized field today, and it is at the interest and urging of many students around the world that Writing the Light has formed a separate 2-year program for those students who wish to include a special focus on church wall painting in their training. With exposure to a deeper understanding of the role of church painting and the elements of design on a larger scale, students will enter into a two-year program that encompasses theory, methodology, materials, professional best practices, and firsthand apprenticeship experience working with Dr. Kordis, select expert faculty, and learning in real time alongside Kordis’s church-painting team. The select group of students in this limited cohort will engage in the practice of techniques both online and in in-person residencies, culminating in an opportunity to paint a chapel in Greece alongside Dr. Kordis, as well as options for various internship and work/study opportunities.

Dr George Kordis

For more information on the entrance requirements, go to https://writingthelight.com/church-wall-painting-program/.

Download this PDF, written by Writing the Light, especially for interested Catholics who are coming to this from a range of Western artistic traditions.

And watch this video of George painting a church in Hungary. Note the extraordinary facility with which he draws from memory:

The Shrine of St Edward the Confessor in Westminster Abbey

St Edward the Confessor, the last Anglo-Saxon king of England, died on January 5th of the year 1066. His body was buried the following day in the church of a Benedictine abbey which he himself had built, in a tomb right in front of the altar. When he was canonized 95 years later by Pope Alexander III, a shrine was built for his relics, but this no longer exists, since the whole abbey, originally titled to St Peter, but known simply known as Westminster Abbey, was completely rebuilt in subsequent centuries. His feast day, October 13, is the date of this translation, which took place in 1163, under St Thomas Becket, who would also be canonized by the same Pope.

The shrine of St Edward is one of two such shrines in all of England which were not destroyed by the impiety of Henry VIII and his successors. (The other is of a Saint called Wite of whom nothing is known.) A few days ago, I stumbled across this very interesting video about it on the YouTube channel of a man named Allan Barton, which gives a nice summary of the history of his cultus, and of shrine chapel as it now stands in the abbey, and the relics which it preserves. The second video talks about the tombs of the Plantagenet monarchs which were later added to the chapel. 

The Marian Character of the Feast of the Circumcision

It is a well-known fact that there are several different themes to be found in the Mass and Office of January 1st, which is simultaneously the feast of the Circumcision, the octave of Christmas, and a celebration of the divine maternity of the Virgin Mary. Another element is one of protest against the excesses of the pagan celebration of the New Year; anciently, this was expressed in the Roman Rite by a special Mass “ad prohibendum ab idolis – to prohibit from idols”, also to be sung on that day.

The flight of the Holy Family into Egypt, with an idol falling from its pillar in the background, a traditional representation inspired by the words of Isaiah 19, 1, “Behold the Lord will ascend upon a swift cloud, and will enter into Egypt, and the idols of Egypt shall be moved at his presence.” (From the Hours of Chrétienne de France, 1470-75; Bibliothèque de l'Arsenal, Ms-562 réserve)

As I noted in an article last week, liturgical scholars in the pre-Conciliar period mistakenly believed that the commemoration of the Circumcision was adopted into the Roman Rite from the Gallican. This leaves the question of how the Roman Rite celebrated January 1st before this took place. In 1933, Dom Bernard Botte OSB proposed, on the evidence of some ancient antiphonaries, that in the first half of the 7th century, the day was celebrated in Rome as a feast of the Virgin Mary. According to his theory, it was then transformed a few decades later into the “octave of the Lord”, the title which it has in the oldest manuscripts, and still later, renamed as the Circumcision. Although his deduction was not universally accepted at the time, it was of course the theory behind the invention of the Solemnity of Mary, which replaced the ancient celebration in the post-Conciliar reform.

In a 1994 article in the journal Ecclesia Orans, which is published by the Pontifical Liturgical Institute of St Anselm in Rome, Dom Jacques-Marie Guilmard OSB, a monk of Solesmes Abbey, demonstrated that in point of fact, the exact opposite is the truth. (Une antique fête mariale au 1 janvier dans la ville de Rome? Ecclesia Orans 1-1, 1994) “For Rome at the beginning of the 7th century, January 1st is not a religious festival, nor a Mass for the entire city, nor truly a Marian celebration, nor a preparation for the great Marian feasts. … The laudable novelty which consists of celebrating Our Lady eight days after Christmas was inspired by a liturgical mistake. The initiative came from Gaul at the end of the 8th century.”

In a Gelasian Sacramentary of the early 8th century (ms. Vatican Reginensis 316), the Mass of the “Octave of the Lord” is that described in my previous article on this subject; the only references to the Virgin Mary are those contained in the preface. Immediately after it is the Mass “ad prohibendum ab idolis.” In the Gellone Sacramentary, another of the Gelasian type written within the last two decades of the same century, the same two Masses appear, with all the same prayers; however, “another Mass of the Octave of the Lord”, as it is labelled, has been inserted between them. The Collect of this latter, Deus qui salutis, is that said on the Circumcision in the Missal of St Pius V: “O God, Who by the fruitful virginity of blessed Mary, have bestowed upon the human race the rewards of eternal salvation: grant, we beseech Thee, that we may experience Her intercession for us, through whom we have been made worthy to receive author of life.”

Folio 9r of the Gellone Sacramentary, with the second Mass for the Octave of the Lord, beginning with the prayer Deus qui salutis. The Mass “ad prohibendum ab idolis” begins next to the fellow with the handlebar mustache; there is very often no discernible connection between the liturgical text and the marginal illustration, as is the case here.

This second Mass has a second collect, two secrets (but no preface of its own), and a post-communion, none of which mention the Virgin Mary. It also has a prayer “ad populum”, like those said in the Roman Missal on the ferial days of Lent, which refers to “Simeon the Just”; this relates to the longer Gospel from Luke 2 (verses 21-40 or 21-33) attested in the ancient lectionaries for this day. The first Secret (Muneribus nostris) and the Postcommunion (Haec nos communio) of this Mass are also those found in the Missal of St Pius V, but without the words “intercedente beata Virgine Dei Genitrice Maria” in the latter, which are a later interpolation.

Most of the Gregorian Sacramentaries of the post-Carolingian period (mid-9th – 10th centuries) reproduce this same group of prayers, taken as a unit from the Gelasian. In all of them, however, the Mass is entitled “the Octave of the Lord,” and none of them uses the title found in those antiphonaries which give a Mass of the Virgin, known from its Introit as Vultum tuum. Those among them which retain the proper preface for the day also change its beginning, from “as we celebrate today the octave of His Birth” to “as we celebrate the day of His Circumcision, and the octave of His Birth.” In this period, we also find a solemn blessing added to Pontifical Mass after “Pax Domini sit semper vobiscum”; this is still noted in the last editions of the Sarum Missal, and was the inspiration for the optional solemn blessings in the post-conciliar reform. In the Sacramentary of Drogo, bishop of Metz (845-55), the three proper invocations of this blessing for January 1st all refer solely to the Circumcision, and not at all to the Virgin Mary.

Folios 32v and 33r of the Sacramentary of Drogo, Bishop of Metz, 845-55 (Bibliothèque nationale de France. Département des Manuscrits. Latin 9428) showing the first two pages (out of three) of the Mass of the Octave of the Lord: the Collect, Secret (called Super oblata), the Preface, and the solemn Pontifical blessing.

The later medieval Uses adapted these varying traditions of the early sacramentaries in many different ways. The Collect of January 1st may be either Deus, qui nobis nati from the older Mass of the octave, or the newer Marian Collect Deus qui salutis, with their accompanying Secrets and Post-Communions. However, there is almost absolute uniformity that the Gregorian chant parts are repeated from the third Mass of Christmas day (Puer natus est), with the exception of the proper Alleluia Multifarie. The words “intercedente beata Dei Genitrice Maria” are often found interpolated into the Secret and Post-Communion of the later set, but not always; as late as 1578, they are absent from the Premonstratensian Missal. These same prayers are almost invariably found in medieval Missals in the Votive Mass of the Virgin Mary for the season between Christmas and the Purification, very often with the Introit Vultum tuum, but also with Salve, Sancta Parens. (This latter is appointed for the Solemnity of Mary in the post-Conciliar Missal.)

In short, then, the Marian elements in the Mass of January 1st consist of a single Collect, one which was certainly very widely diffused through the many Uses of the Roman Rite, and a later, parenthetical interpolation in the accompanying Post-Communion, and occasionally also in the Secret.

The Virgin Mary is certainly more prominent in the texts of the Office than of the Mass, and this is often adduced as evidence of the day’s original Marian character. The Catholic Encyclopedia exaggerates when it says, in its article on the feast of the Circumcision, “in the Office, the responses and antiphons set forth her privileges and extol her wonderful prerogatives. The psalms for Vespers are those appointed for her feasts, and the antiphons and hymn of Lauds keep her constantly in view.” In the Roman Breviary, the antiphons of Matins all refer solely to Christ; it is tempting to speculate that the antiphon of Psalm 23, “Be lifted up, ye everlasting doors, and the King of glory shall come in” refers to the ancient custom by which the account of Christ’s Presentation was also read at the Mass. The first three responsories in the Roman Breviary also refer only to Christ, and five to both Him and His Mother, but in the Monastic Breviary, the proportion is 7 and 5. Among the antiphons for the Psalms of Lauds, the Virgin is mentioned in passing in the first two, and the subject of one clause in each of the last two; only the middle one, “Rubum quem viderat” is principally about Her. The hymns are simply repeated from Christmas. Of the three antiphons for the Gospel canticles, that of Second Vespers, Magnum hereditatis mysterium, mentions Her prominently, but the other two not at all.

As stated above, it is a common feature of the Western liturgies of January 1st to have some element by which the Church responds to the riotous pagan celebrations of the New Year. This theme is very prominent in the Ambrosian Rite; most of the antiphons of its Office for the day refer to it, and not to the Birth or Circumcision of Christ, nor to the Virgin Mary. Even here, however, the prayers of the Mass and Office are all taken from the old Gelasian Masses of the Octave of the Lord, and not from that “to prohibit from idols.” The only one that mentions the Virgin Mary is the Collect Deus qui salutis; in the rest of the Mass and Office, She hardly figures at all.

In the Roman Rite, there remains only one small reference to the ancient Mass against the idols. Although the Gregorian parts of the Circumcision are mostly repeated from the third Mass of Christmas, the Epistle, Titus 2, 11-15, is repeated from the first, because of the following words: “the grace of God our Saviour hath appeared to all men; Instructing us, that, denying ungodliness and worldly desires, we should live soberly, and justly, and godly in this world,”

Epiphany Celebrations in Bridgeport, Connecticut

The Oratory of Ss Cyril and Methodius, the ICRSP’s Apostolate in Bridgeport, Connecticut, will have the following special celebrations for the feast of the Epiphany tomorrow and on Tuesday. The church is located at 79 Church St. (See their Facebook page for the regularly scheduled Masses and other services.)

Monday, January 5th, starting at 6pm, Solemn First Vespers of the Epiphany, followed by the blessing of Epiphany water.

Tuesday, January 6th, starting at 6pm, Solemn Mass, with Victoria’s Missa Trahe me post te, and the proclamation of the movable feasts, followed by the blessing of chalk, and of frankincense and myrrh, then a potluck reception in the church hall.

The Holy Name of Jesus 2026

In nómine Jesu omne genu flectátur, caelestium, terrestrium et infernórum: et omnis lingua confiteátur, quia Dóminus Jesus Christus in gloria est Dei Patris. Ps. 8 Dómine, Dóminus noster, quam admirábile est nomen tuum in universa terra! Gloria Patri. In nomine Jesu... (The introit of the feast of the Holy Name of Jesus.)

The Triumph of the Holy Name of Jesus, from the ceiling of the church of the Gesù in Rome; by Giovanni Battista Gaulli, generally known as Baciccia; 1674. (Image from Wikipedia by LivioAndronico)

Introit At the Name of Jesus let every knee bend of those in heaven, on earth, and under the earth, and let every tongue confess that the Lord Jesus Christ is in the glory of God the Father. Ps. 8 O Lord, our Lord, how wonderous is Thy Name over all the earth. Glory be. At the Name of Jesus...

The Abbey of St Martin in Disentis, Switzerland

Our resident Ambrosian expert Nicola de’ Grandi recently visited the abbey of St Martin in the town of Disentis, which is located in the central Swiss canton of Grisons, about 35 miles to the southeast of Lucerne. In Romansch, a Romance language which is spoken principally in Grisons, the town is called “Mustér”, which is to say, monastery, after this foundation, which began in the late 7th or early 8th century. The monastery is also dedicated to the Virgin Mary, to St Peter, and to its founders, Placidus and Sigbert, but St Martin is the titular of the main church. Like so many ancient monasteries, it has been rebuilt many times; the current church dates to the late 17th and early 18th century.

The main sanctuary and choir.

The nave seen as one looks back from the crossing.

The altar to the left of the main choir is dedicated to St Benedict

On the opposite side, an altar dedicated to a Saint called Placid, not the disciple of St Benedict, but a local landowner who assisted St Sigbert in the foundation of the abbey, and was killed by the regional governor, a man named Victor.

The preaching pulpit

Continue Reading this Article. . .

St. Francis of Assisi’s Canticle of the Sun: Sister Water

Claude Monet, Water Lilies

Lost in Translation #154

After wishing that Brother Wind and the air praise God, Saint Francis turns to Sister Water:

Laudato si, mi Signore, per sor’Acqua,

la quale è multo utile et humile et pretiosa et casta.

Which I translate as:

Praised be You, my Lord, through Sister Water,

which is very useful and humble and precious and chaste.

Water, it would seem, captures the human imagination like no other earthly element. “Meditation and water are wedded for ever,” writes Herman Melville in Moby Dick. “Take almost any path you please, and ten to one it carries you down in a dale, and leaves you there by a pool in the stream. There is magic in it.” Norman Maclean concludes his beautiful novel A River Runs through It with this observation:

Eventually, all things merge into one, and a river runs through it. The river was cut by the world’s great flood and runs over rocks from the basement of time. On some of the rocks are timeless raindrops. Under the rocks are the words, and some of the words are theirs.

I am haunted by waters.

And this magic stuff becomes even more magical, so to speak, when mixed with sanctifying grace. Our Lord knew what He was doing when He made water the matter for the sacrament of our initiation into eternal life. In the Old Testament, water is both life and death: life, for example, for the Hebrews crossing the Red Sea and death for the Egyptians who followed them. Water is also cleansing and healing, as in the case of the Naaman the Aramean who was cured of leprosy after bathing seven times in the River Jordan. The sacrament of baptism combines all these characteristics: being plunged in the waters of baptism brings death to self and life in Christ, and it washes us clean of all sin.

Saint Francis gives three descriptions for water. First, it is “very useful.” Water not only sustains our lives but the lives of every other creature on whom we depend for sustenance, every plant and animal. And there is no beverage we consume that does not contain H2O. Water is also essential to cleanliness and, despite its dangers, it is a lot of fun to boat on or to swim in or simply to gaze upon from the shore.

Second, water is precious. Thanks to our impressive modern water-treatment plants and an amazing network of indoor plumbing, it is easy to forget how difficult it was for many of our ancestors to have a reliable source of potable water, and how difficult it still is in some parts of the developing world. Francis was surely grateful for water. “To him,” writes Msgr. Arthur Tonne, “plain Sister Water tasted better than the richest wine.”

Third, the Saint calls water “chaste.” It is a curious choice. No doubt he is referring to water’s purity, but like English, the Italian language has its own word for purity. Chastity, on the other hand, is a special kind of purity, a purity regarding sexual desire and activity. The image that emerges is of Sister Water as a humble and dear maiden, not unlike the Blessed Virgin Mary. It is a surprising image but fitting, since Francis has personified water by calling it/her his sister.

And perhaps this image of chastity should make us more concerned about polluting or sullying Sister Water. The Great Pacific Garbage Patch is an island of microplastic debris in the Pacific Ocean three times the size of France; and 703,000,000 people today (one in ten) lack access to clean water. Let’s do a better job protecting our sister’s chastity.

The Great Pacific Garbage Patch

This article appeared as “Song of Water” in the Messenger of St. Anthony 127:7, international edition (July/August 2025), p. 33. Many thanks to its editors for allowing its publication here.

The Ancient Character of the Feast of the Circumcision

It is a commonplace of pre-Conciliar liturgical scholarship that the title of today’s feast as that of the Circumcision is a later development in the Roman Rite, imported from the Gallican Rite and elsewhere. The revised Butler’s Lives of the Saints states “On the whole it would seem that outside Rome—in Gaul, Germany, Spain, and even at Milan and in the south of Italy—an effort was made to exalt the mystery of the Circumcision in the hope that it might fill the popular mind and win the revelers from their pagan superstitions. In Rome itself, however, there is no trace of any reference to the Circumcision until a relatively late period.” Similar statements are made in the Catholic Encyclopedia article on the feast, in the Bl. Schuster’s The Sacramentary, in Dom Suitbert Bäumer’s History of the Breviary, and in Mons. Pierre Battifol’s History of the Roman Breviary. [1] This assessment is based on a very superficial reading of the day’s original title and liturgical texts; in reality, the Circumcision was a prominent feature of today’s liturgy from the very beginning.

The title “feast of the Circumcision” is first attested in the 540s, in a non-Roman lectionary known as the Lectionary of Victor of Capua. However, it may well be rather older than that. A council held at Tour in France in 567 refers explicitly to the Circumcision as a feast of long-standing: “our fathers established … that on the Calends (of January) the Mass of the Circumcision should be celebrated.” The words cited above from Butler’s Lives about “win(ning) the revelers from their pagan superstitions” refer to a common feature of the liturgies of January 1st, that they were designed at least in part as an answer to and reproof of riotous pagan celebrations of New Year’s Day; the same canon of the Council of Tours speaks of three day of litanies instituted in this season “to trod down the custom of the pagans.”

In the most ancient Roman liturgical books, however, the title is simply “the octave of the Lord”, as we find for example in the Lectionary of Wurzburg and the Gelasian Sacramentary. Nevertheless, even though the word “circumcision” is not used as the title of the liturgical day, or in the prayers, it is not true that “there is no trace of any reference to the Circumcision” in the early Roman liturgy.

Folios 8v and 9r of the Gellone Sacramentary, a sacramentary of the mixed Gelasian type written in 780-800 AD. The Mass of “the Octave of the Lord” begins towards the bottom of the page on the left. (Bibliothèque nationale de France, Département des Manuscrits, Latin 12048)

The Breviary and Missal of St Pius V have as the Collect for the day the prayer “Deus, qui salutis aeternae”, which refers principally to the Virgin Mary as the one “through whom we merited to receive the Author of life.” However, this is not the original Collect, which is attested in the Gelasian Sacramentary in the 8th century, and found in many other Uses of the Roman Rite, (Sarum etc.); it is still used by the Premonstratensians, Dominicans and Carmelites to this day. “O God, who grant us to celebrate the eighth day of the Savior’s Birth; strengthen us (or ‘defend us’ – fac nos muniri) by the everlasting divinity of Him, by whose dealing in the flesh we have been restored (or ‘renewed’ – reparati).” [2]

The verb “reparo”, of which “reparati” is the past participle, is used especially in mercantile language to mean “to procure by exchange; to purchase, obtain.” In the context of this prayer, it is deliberately chosen in reference to the words immediately before it, “dealing (commercio) in the flesh.” This language of commerce and purchase reflects the fact that the Circumcision was the very first shedding of Christ’s blood, the price of our redemption, of which St Paul says, “you are bought with a great price. Glorify and bear God in your body” (1 Cor. 6, 20), and St Peter, “you were not redeemed (literally ‘bought back’) with corruptible things as gold or silver, from your vain conversation of the tradition of your fathers, but with the precious blood of Christ …” (1 Pet. 1, 18-19)

The first antiphon of Lauds on the feast of the Circumcision also refers to this “commerce” or “exchange.” “O wondrous exchange (commercium)! The creator of the human race, taking on a living body, hath deigned to be born of a Virgin; and without seed, coming forth as a man, hath bestowed on us His divinity.” [3] Like the Collect cited above, this is one of the many places where the liturgy of the Christmas season reflects upon the fact that in the process begun with His Incarnation and Birth, and completed in His Passion and Resurrection, Christ does not merely rescue Man from sin and death, but bestows upon him glory and immortality, which the Eastern Fathers call the “divinization” of man.

It is not true, as is too often stated by people who have every reason to know better, that the early Church had to persuade people of the divinity of Christ. The idea of a divine being of some sort descending from heaven and doing something beneficial for the human race was very congenial to the Greco-Roman mind. What the Church had to persuade the world of was not the divinity of Christ, but rather the humanity of God: the idea that the being that took so much interest in the welfare of the human race that He joined it is none other and none less than God Himself. The language of “commerce” and “exchange” between “divinity” (specified as “everlasting” against the teaching of Arians that the Son of God had a beginning) and “the flesh” is eminently appropriate to the Circumcision, not only because it was the first shedding of Christ’s blood, but also because the manner of its shedding demonstrates the reality and fullness of His temporal human nature which He unites to His eternal divine nature.

The Circumcision, by Friedrich Herlin, 1466

The Gelasian Sacramentary has a second collect for the feast which reads as follows: “Almighty and everlasting God, who in Thy only-begotten Son made us to be a new creature; preserve the works of Thy mercy, and cleanse us from every stain of oldness: so that by the help of Thy grace, we may be found in the form of Him in whom our substance is with Thee, Our Lord Jesus Christ, etc.” [4] The words “new creature” in the context of the feast of the Circumcision refer to one of the two places where St Paul uses the same expression, Galatians 6, 15: “For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision availeth any thing, nor uncircumcision [5], but a new creature.” This explains, then, that the “oldness” of which we are being cleansed is the rites of both Judaism and paganism, looking forward to the washing of sins in baptism, which is commemorated in a few days time on the feast of the Epiphany.

It is well known that the Roman Rite anciently used far more prefaces than we have in the later medieval Missals, and that of the Gelasian Sacramentary for January 1st is particularly elaborate. “Truly is it worthy… through Christ our Lord: and as we celebrate today the octave of His Birth, we venerate Thy wondrous deeds, o Lord. For * She that bore (Him) was both Mother and Virgin; He that was born was both an infant and God. Rightly did the heavens speak, and the Angels give thanks; the shepherds rejoiced, the wise men were changed, kings were troubled, and the little children crowned in their glorious passion. Suckle, o Mother, (Him that is) our food; suckle the bread that cometh from heaven, and was laid in a manger, as if to feed the devout beasts. For there did the ox know his owner, and the ass his master’s crib, namely, the circumcision and the uncircumcision. * Which also our Savior and Lord, being received by Simeon in the temple, deigned entirely to fulfill. And therefore with the Angels etc.” [6]

The section marked between the stars here is taken from a Christmas sermon by St Augustine [7]; the words “the circumcision and the uncircumcision” stand in apposition to “the ox … and the ass.” This refers to an exegetical tradition of the Church Fathers which goes back to Origen [8], that the ox, a clean animal according to the Law of Moses, represents the Jewish people, the people of the circumcision, while the ass, an unclean animal, represents the gentiles, the people of the uncircumcision. The presence of both at the manger indicates the universality of Christ’s mission as the redeemer and savior of all men, Jew and gentile. He submitted to the Old Law, which He Himself had instituted, but also replaced it with a truly universal rite, since circumcision can only be done to men, but baptism can be done to all, as St Paul teaches: “For as many of you as have been baptized in Christ, have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek: there is neither bond nor free: there is neither male nor female. For you are all one in Christ Jesus.” (Galatians 3, 27-28)

The so-called Sarcophagus of Stilicho, in the Basilica of St. Ambrose in Milan. ca. 400 A.D. The Gospel of St Luke does not say which animals were present in the stable, but an ox and an ass are mentioned in Isaiah 1, 3 in connection with a manger. Once this verse was connected with the Gospel passage, the ox and the ass alone became so indicative of the scene that in a small space, Mary, Joseph, the angels, the shepherds, the Magi, the star, and even the stable could all be omitted, as we see here.

In the Missal of St Pius V, the Gospel of the Circumcision is the shortest of the liturgical year, consisting of a single verse, Luke 2, 21. “After eight days were accomplished, that the Child should be circumcised, His name was called Jesus, which was called by the Angel, before He was conceived in the womb.” Anciently, however, a much longer Gospel was read, and it was because of this that the day was called “the octave of the Lord”, rather than “the feast of the Circumcision.”

In the two oldest lectionaries of the Roman Rite, the Gospel is Luke 2, 21-32, recounting both the Circumcision and the Presentation of Christ in the temple (up to the Nunc dimittis), of which we now celebrate the latter on Candlemas. This explains the reference to the Presentation in the Gelasian preface given above. In the oldest lectionary of the Ambrosian Rite, the same Gospel was read up to verse 40, including also the words of Simeon to the Virgin Mary, and Luke’s account of the prophetess Anna. Although the Ambrosian Office for January 1st makes many explicit references to pagan celebrations of New Year’s Day, as does the first Scriptural reading of the Mass, the original Preface is wholly concerned with the Circumcision and the Presentation. [9] The ancient Gallican and Mozarabic liturgies also read this longer version, and the very lengthy preface of the latter speaks of both the Circumcision and the Presentation.

There is good reason to believe that this conjunction of the Circumcision and Presentation of Christ in a single feast is extremely ancient. St Jerome translated a homily of Origen on Luke 2, 21-23, which appears as the Gospel for January 1 in the Gallican Missal of Bobbio. [10] In his commentary on the Gospel of St Luke, which is collected in part from notes on sermons preached in the churches of Milan ca. 389-90, St Ambrose interrupts his thoughts about the Circumcision to say, “ ‘To present him to the Lord.’ (Luke 2, 22) I would explain what it means for Him to be presented to the Lord in Jerusalem, had I not explained it earlier in my comments on Isaiah.” [11] This indicates that both episodes were read at the same time. In a Christmas sermon different from the one cited above, St Augustine concludes his explanation of Christ’s circumcision by saying “I ask you, dearest brothers, what greatness did the elderly Simeon see in the little one? What he saw was what the Mother carried; what he understood was the ruler of the world.” [12]

The celebration of the Circumcision and the Presentation together would explain why the liturgical title of January 1st was not originally “the feast of the Circumcision”, nor “the octave of the Nativitity”, but rather “the octave of the Lord”, which is to say, a feast that celebrated all the later events of the Lord’s infancy after His Birth. It remains therefore only to note that all Western traditions agree in highlighting the Circumcision by beginning the day’s Gospel at verse 21, without repeating any of the verses from the Nativity itself.

My heartfelt thanks to Nicola de’ Grandi for helping me with the research on this article.

NOTES

[1] Schuster vol. 1, p. 395: “(The Octave of Our Lord) ... was the original designation of today’s synaxis until, though the influence of the Gallican liturgies, was added to it that of the Circumcision.” Bäumer, vol. 1, p. 270: “En Gaule également, il y eut des additions; on ajouta les fêtes de la Circumcisio Domini (au lieu de l’Octava Domini des livres romains).” Batiffol, p. 251, footnote: “This title is, in fact, the ancient Roman one, while the custom of keeping the festival of Our Lord’s circumcision is of pre-Carolingian Gallican origin.”

[2] Deus, qui nobis nati Salvatóris diem celebráre concédis octávum: fac nos, quaesumus, ejus perpétua divinitáte muníri, cujus sumus carnáli commercio reparáti.

[3] O admirábile commercium! Creátor géneris humáni, animátum corpus sumens, de Vírgine nasci dignátus est; et procédens homo sine sémine, largítus est nobis suam Deitátem.

[4] Omnípotens sempiterne Deus, qui in Unigénito tuo novam creatúram nos tibi esse fecisti; custódi ópera misericordiae tuae, et ab ómnibus nos máculis vetustátis emunda: ut per auxilium gratiae tuae, in illíus inveniámur forma, in quo tecum est nostra substantia, Jesu Christi, Dómini nostri.

[5] The term “uncircumcision” is used by the Douay-Rheims and King James Bibles as a slightly more delicate term for “foreskin.”

[6] VD. Per Christum, Dóminum nostrum. Cujus hodie octávas nati celebrantes, tua, Dómine, mirabilia venerámur; quia quae péperit et mater et virgo est; qui natus est, et infans et deus est. Mérito caeli locúti sunt, Angeli gratuláti, pastóres laetáti, Magi mutáti, reges turbáti, párvuli gloriósa passióne coronáti. Lacta, Mater, cibum nostrum; lacta panem de caelo venientem, et in praesépi pósitum velut piórum cibaria jumentórum. Illic enim agnóvit bos possessórem suum, et ásinus praesépe Dómini sui, circumcisio scílicet et praeputium. * Quod etiam Salvátor et Dóminus noster a Simeóne susceptus in templo pleníssime dignátus est adimplére. Et ídeo.

[7] Sermon 369. Its authenticity as a genuine work of St Augustine was long considered doubtful, and it is listed as such in the Patrologia Latina, but seems to have been vindicated by more recent scholarship.

[8] Homily 13 on the Gospel of Luke.

[9] This Gospel was later shortened to match the older Roman Gospel, and again in 1594, when it was shortened to the single verse of the Missal of St Pius V, and the section of the preface related to the Presentation excised.

[10] PL 26, 246C-251C

[11] Book 2 on chapter 2 of St Luke, read in part as the Homily on the Gospel of the Circumcision in the Roman Breviary (PL 15, 1572B)

[12] Sermon 196/A

Veni, Creator Spiritus!

And to invoke His blessings upon the year of grace 2026 that now begins.

Oremus. Deus, qui corda fidelium Sancti Spiritus illustratione docuisti: da nobis in eodem Spiritu recta sapere, et de eius semper consolatione gaudere. Per Christum Dominum nostrum. Amen.

Let us pray. O God, Who hast taught the hearts of the faithful by the light of the Holy Spirit, grant that in the same Spirit, we may be always truly wise, and ever rejoice in His consolation. Through Christ our Lord. Amen.

Te Deum Laudamus

Let us give thanks to the Lord for all the benefits, mercies and blessings which He has bestowed upon us over the course of the year of grace 2025...

Oremus. Deus, cujus misericordiae non est númerus, et bonitátis infi­nítus est thesaurus: piíssimae Majestáti tuae pro collátis do­nis gratias ágimus, tuam semper clementiam exorantes; ut, qui peténtibus postuláta concédis, eosdem non déserens, ad praemia futúra dispónas. Per Christum, Dominum nostrum. Amen.

Let us pray. O God, of Whose mercies there is no number, and of Whose goodness the treasure is infinite, to Thy most gracious majesty we render thanks for the gifts bestowed upon us, ever imploring Thy clemency, that as Thou dost grant the petitions of them that ask, Thou may never forsake them, and prepare them for the rewards to come. Through Christ, our Lord. Amen.

The Third Anniversary of Pope Benedict XVI’s Death

Deus, qui inter summos sacerdótes fámulum tuum Benedictum ineffábili tua dispositióne connumerári voluisti: praesta, quáesumus; ut, qui Unigéniti Filii tui vices in terris gerébat, sanctórum tuórum Pontíficum consortio perpétuo aggregétur. Per eundem Christum, Dóminum nostrum. Amen.

God, Who in Thy ineffable providence, did will that Thy servant Benedict should be numbered among the high priests, grant, we beseech Thee, that he, who on earth held the place of Thine Only-begotten Son, may be joined forevermore to the fellowship of Thy holy pontiffs. Through the same Christ, Our Lord. Amen.

As we pray for the eternal repose of His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI, who died three years ago today, let us also remember with gratitude the gift of his papacy, his graciousness and good humor, his many wise and well-considered writings, his paternal love especially for priests and religious, but of course above all, his restoration to the Church of the incomparable treasure of the traditional Roman Rite, an act which will continue to bear great spiritual fruit and lead the way for much-needed reform. “What earlier generations held as sacred, remains sacred and great for us too, and it cannot be all of a sudden entirely forbidden or even considered harmful.”

Joseph Ratzinger serving an open-air solemn Mass in the town of Buchfelln in 1947, when he was 20. Tradition will always be for the young!

The Peculiarities of Constantine’s Basilica of St. Peter

We continue Luisella Scrosati’s series on the orientation of Christian worship with her fifth part, “Le singolarità della basilica costantiniana di San Pietro”, originally published in Italian on the website of La Nuova Bussola Quotidiana on November 30, and reproduced here by permission of the editors. (Read Part 1; Part 2; Part 3; Part 4)

The rule of praying towards the east, which determined the orientation of churches, had some exceptions. This is neither surprising nor scandalous. It has already been mentioned that the east-west axis was sometimes not feasible, either because the buildings already existed and were converted for religious use, or because new buildings had to take into account the presence of roads and other factors that made traditional orientation impossible.

Karl Otto Nußbaum argued (see Part 4) that Italy, and Rome in particular, had no traces of oriented prayer, at least until the eighth century. On the contrary, Monsignor Stefan Heid has shown that evidence of such exists both archaeologically and literarily.

The churches of Rome deserve special attention, particularly the Constantinian Vatican Basilica. Guillaume Durand (1230-96), bishop of Mende, who lived for many years in Rome in the service of Clement IV and Gregory X, stated in his Rationale Divinorum Officiorum (V, 2, 57) that “although God is everywhere, nevertheless the priest at the altar and in divine offices must pray towards the east, by order (ex institutione) of Pope Vigilius.”

He explained more precisely that in those churches where the entrance was located to the west, and therefore the priest celebrated facing the apse, he had to turn towards the faithful for the liturgical greeting (Dóminus vobiscum); if, on the other hand, the entrance was located to the east, it was not necessary for him to turn towards the faithful, since he already had them in front of him.

The reference to Pope Vigilius indicates that, as early as the sixth century, prayer in Rome was also directed towards the east. The expression ex institutione does not necessarily indicate that he was the first to establish this rule. According to Heid, it is possible that the provision arose from the fact that this rule was not universally followed, not so much because someone celebrated “towards the people,” but rather because some priests celebrated facing the apse, and therefore with their backs to the faithful, even when the entrance was to the east. It is also unclear whether Pope Vigilius’ provision was addressed to the churches of Rome or the churches of Gaul.

It seems clear, however, that Vigilius wanted prayer to be directed towards the east, regardless of where the entrance (and therefore the nave) was located; and it seems rather unlikely that he gave this instruction in opposition to a previous tradition, rather than to restore a practice that was no longer understood and was partly disregarded, in Rome or in Gaul.

In fact, in the wooden door (5th century) of the early Christian basilica of Santa Sabina on the Aventine Hill, we find a panel depicting the Parousia. The woman, placed between Saints Peter and Paul, symbolizes the Church in prayer, recognizable by the position of her hands, awaiting her Lord and facing the sun, the east. This important relief testifies that the orientation of prayer and its meaning were also well established in Rome.

Complicating the understanding of liturgical orientation in the ancient basilicas of Rome is the fact that they contained a singular “pole” of orientation, namely the tombs of the martyrs. Churches had to be built in such a way as to combine the orientation of prayer with the possibility of celebrating super corpora martyrum.

If we consider the basilica of St. Peter in the Vatican from the Constantinian era, we can note some peculiarities. It is well known that the basilica had (and has) its façade facing east; on the western side there was a mosaic apse, with the traditional depiction of the Traditio legis in the center, that is, Christ, between Saints Peter and Paul, offering the scroll of the new law to the former. A few meters from the apse, where the altar is normally located, was the Trophy of Gaius, a small funerary aedicule indicating the location of the tomb of the Apostle Peter, protected by a marble structure with a pergula, almost a sort of early Christian canopy. The structure was about 3 meters wide and high and 1.80 meters deep. The aedicule appeared lower because the new flooring had raised the level by 35 centimeters, thus incorporating part of the Trophy, which now rose just over a meter above the floor.

It is not at all clear where the altar was located, nor whether it was fixed, but it is more than likely that, due to the extreme importance of the presence of Peter’s tomb in the basilica, celebrations were held not towards the east but towards the monument, thus ending up accidentally facing west. To hypothesize a celebration towards the east, in the architectural context of Constantine’s basilica on Vatican Hill, would have meant turning one’s back on Peter’s tomb; it is therefore understandable that the focal point of the liturgical celebration was the tomb of the Apostle.

There is no shortage of evidence to support the idea that the travertine slab of the first aedicule was used as an altar; the celebration would thus have taken place inside the shrine that incorporated the Trophy, right above the tomb of the Apostle. The importance of the celebration super corpus should not be underestimated, as evidenced by the clash between the presbyter Vigilantius and St. Jerome. Among the practices in use in the fifth century that were challenged by the presbyter was the custom of offering the Holy Sacrifice over the bones of the martyrs. In Contra Vigilantium 8, Jerome asks rhetorically whether perhaps the popes were wrong to offer sacrifices to the Lord above the venerable bones of Peter and Paul – thus supporting the hypothesis that, at the time, in the Vatican basilica, the celebration took place inside the shrine itself and not simply in its vicinity.

Whatever the case, in the fifth century it was not possible to celebrate towards the east in St. Peter’s because of the location of the Confession. It was only with the elevation of the altar that both the super corpus celebration and the correct orientation could be preserved.

An interesting hypothesis is that Pope Vigilius’s decision, mentioned above, may have been motivated by the need to correct incorrect prayer orientations, which arose from the fact that the pope himself celebrated facing west in the Vatican basilica. The misunderstanding of why, in St. Peter’s, the pope had to celebrate in the opposite direction to the traditional one may have led others to celebrate towards the west in churches with an east-facing façade.