Romanesque Sculptures in a Swiss Abbey

Following up on two recent posts, we continue with some more of Nicola’s photos of the abbey of St John in Müstair, Switzerland. The first part showed the surviving frescos from the Carolingian era, and the second those of the Romanesque period; here we will see a number of Romanesque sculptures.  

The marble front of this altar is a piece of the original sanctuary enclosure of the Carolingian period (first half of the 9th century), which was later dismantled. Several pieces of it (seen further below) were reutilized as building materials, and have been recovered during modern restorations, and put on display in the museum. Much of the region around the monastery is protestant; the painting of Assumption, made in 1621, was brought to the monastery in 1838 from the parish of one of the nearby towns when the last Catholic resident passed away.

This relief of the Baptism of Christ, a work of a much later period, was mounted into the wall of the abbey church in 1492.

A statue of Charlemagne, the founder of the abbey; date uncertain, partially restored.

Madonna and Child, ca. 1250.

Pietà, second half of the 14th century. In German-speaking lands, this motif is known as a “Vesperbild - evening statue”, from the common custom of putting them on the altar on the evening of Good Friday.

As noted above, the original marble fixtures of the Carolingian period were dismantled and reused as building materials. Here we see another part of the sanctuary enclosure, depicting the Lamb of God surrounded by angels, the hand of God the Father above Him, and of St John the Baptist at the lower left.

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Anglican Sarum Mass in London on Candlemas Eve

On Saturday, February 1st, the eve of Candlemas, the Oxford-based early music group Antiquum Documentum will hold a celebration of “Mass” according to the Use of Sarum at the Anglican church of Great St Bartholomew. The ceremony will begin at 7:00pm; the church is located on W. Smithfield, City of London (Cloth Fair.) - UPDATE: In my distraction over something else, I originally posted this as a celebration of Vespers; my apologies to the organizers.

Just under a year ago, we posted a video which they made of Vespers and Compline in the Sarum Use for the feast of St Cecilia, at the famous St Mary’s, where Oxford University began, and where St John Henry Newman began serving as vicar in 1828, earning his reputation as one of the great preachers of his time.

The Baptism of the Lord 2024

Seeing our enlightenment, that enlightened every man, come to be baptized, the Forerunner rejoices in spirit, and trembles with his hand: he shows Him, and says to the people “Behold Him that ransoms Israel, that delivers us from corruption. O sinless one, Christ our God, glory to Thee! (The first sticheron of Vespers of the Theophany in the Byzantine Rite.)

Mosaic of the Baptism of Christ, early 11th century, from the monastery of Hosois Loukas in Boetia, Greece. (public domain image from Wikipedia; click to enlarge.)

Τὸν φωτισμὸν ἡμῶν, τὸν φωτίσαντα πάντα ἄνθρωπον, ἰδὼν ὁ Πρόδρομος, βαπτισθῆναι παραγενόμενον, χαίρει τῇ ψυχῇ, καὶ τρέμει τῇ χειρί· δείκνυσιν αὐτόν, καὶ λέγει τοῖς λαοῖς· Ἴδε ὁ λυτρούμενος τὸν Ἰσραήλ, ὁ ἐλευθερῶν ἡμᾶς ἐκ τῆς φθορᾶς. Ὦ ἀναμάρτητε, Χριστὲ ὁ Θεὸς ἡμῶν, δόξα σοι.

Durandus on the Sunday after Epiphany

The great liturgical scholar William Durandus (1230 ca. - 1296) comments on the Mass of the Sunday after Epiphany, which now yields to the feast of the Holy Family. (Rationale Divinorum Officiorum, 6, 19)

The introit “On a lofty throne, I saw a man sitting, whom the multitude of angels adoreth,” is taken from (Isaiah 6, 1) “I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne”, … and the “multitude of angels” spoken of here is that which is mentioned in Isaiah, “the Angels sang ‘Holy, Holy Holy.’ ” And indeed, the lofty throne is the Church, in which God sits, and instructs us to adore Christ as the true king. …

Introitus In excelso throno vidi sedére virum, quem adórat multitúdo Angelórum, psallentes in unum: Ecce, cujus imperii nomen est in aeternum. Ps 99 Jubiláte Deo, omnis terra: servíte Dómino in laetitia. Gloria Patri... In excelso throno...

Introit Upon a lofty throne I saw a man sitting, whom a multitude of angels adoreth, singing together: Behold Him, the name of Whose empire is forever. Ps 99 Sing joyfully to God, o all the earth; serve the Lord with gladness. Glory be... Upon a lofty throne...

And it can be said that in order for us to become a throne on which the Lord may sit, three things are necessary: purity of the flesh, humility of the mind, and exultation in the Lord. We are invited to the purity of the flesh in the Epistle (Romans 12, 1-6), which says “Brethren, I beseech you (by the mercy of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, pleasing unto God) etc. We are invited to humility of the mind in the Gospel by the example of Christ, of whom it is said therein that He was subject to His parents. We are invited to exultation in the Lord by the Gradual, in which we bless the Lord, who alone hath done wondrous things, and in the Alleluja and in the Offertory, in which we are ordered to rejoice unto the Lord.

Graduale Benedictus Dóminus, Deus Israël, qui facit mirabilia magna solus a sáeculo. V. Suscipiant montes pacem pópulo tuo, et colles justítiam.

Gradual Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel, Who alone doth great and wondrous deeds forever. V. Let the mountains receive peace for the people, and the hills justice.

But there is this difference between the Alleluja and the Offertory, that that in the former, “Rejoice unto the Lord” is said only once, but in the Offertory, it is doubled, with a different melody, to signify that we must grow in the joy of the Lord, because we are the mystical body…

The Relics of the Magi in Cologne and Milan

In some liturgical books of the Use of Cologne, Germany, today is noted in the calendar as “Obitus tertii regis – the death of the third king”, but it appears that this feast was never in general use within the archdiocese. (It is missing from many books altogether, especially the post-Tridentine editions, and in others is relegated to an appendix.) The kings to which this title refers are the three Magi, whose relics were taken from the basilica of St Eustorgio in Milan in 1162 by the German emperor Frederick Barbarossa, after his conquest of the city. The relics were given to the imperial chancellor for Italy, Rainald von Dassel, who was also archbishop of Cologne, and installed in his see’s cathedral; to this day, Cologne still celebrates the feast of the translation of the relics on July 23rd. The impetus to build the city’s gigantic “new” cathedral (begun in 1248, but not completed until 1880, with a hiatus of over 280 years, from 1560-1842) came in no small part from the desire to build a space that could accommodate the large crowds of pilgrims who came to venerate these relics. (Images of and related to the Cologne reliquary from Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0 unless otherwise noted.)

Image from Wikimedia Commons by Raimond Spekking

In 1190, von Dassel’s successor as archbishop, Philip von Heinsberg, commissioned a goldsmith from Verdun named Nicolas to make a new reliquary for the Magi. It was finished after 35 years of work, and is one of the largest medieval reliquaries that survives: more than 3’ 7” by 7’ 2” at the base, just over 5 feet tall, and weighing over 1100 pounds. The core is made of oak, covered over with gold, gilded copper and silver, and decorated with small golden statues, precious stones, gems, cameos and enamels. Over the centuries, it has been kept in various parts of the cathedral; since 1948, it has stood in a display case right behind the high altar.

by Arabsalam

The reliquary seen from the back, within the ambulatory of the apse.

by Joseacaraballo

The front has a plate which can be removed to expose a grill, behind which can be seen the skulls of the three kings. This is done every year on the Epiphany, and on special occasions.

by Elya

The lower part of the front is divided by highly decorated columns which form an arcade. In the middle sit the Virgin and Child, as the Magi approach from the left. Behind the Magi stands the Holy Roman Emperor Otto IV (1209-18), who donated three golden crowns for the three skulls in 1200. (These were stolen and melted down in 1803.) To the right is shown the Baptism of Christ, and above, Christ in majesty flanked by two angels. Above Him are the archangels Gabriel and Raphael in round medallions; St Michael was replaced by a jewel. (Obviously, the glass case in which the reliquary is kept for security purposes makes for less than optimal photography. The next four images are all by Velopilger, CC0 1.0.)

On the back are shown on the left the Flagellation of Christ, and on the right, the Crucifixion, with the Virgin Mary and the Apostle John. The prophet between them is labelled as Jeremiah, but the text on his scroll is from Isaiah. Above the prophet is a portrait of Rainald von Dassel, and in the upper section, the personification of the virtue of Patience, flanked by the Milanese martyrs Felix and Nabor, whose putative relics were also brought to Cologne, and formerly kept in this reliquary.

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The Suscipe Sancte Pater

Lost in Translation #116

After the Creed, the priest begins the so-called Mass of the Faithful with the Offertory Rite. In the traditional Missal this rite consists of several prayers that were added to the liturgy of Rome from Gallican-transalpine sources around the fourteenth century. The style of these prayers is more florid and poetic than what Adrian Fortescue calls “the genius of the original Roman Rite,” which he characterizes as “almost bald” in comparison to “the exuberant rhetoric of the East” and other liturgical traditions. [1] Nevertheless, these Gallican additions are more of an enriching engrafting rather than an alien insertion. The prayers also provide an excellent summary of Eucharistic theology.

The first prayer, during which the priest offers the bread to God, is the Suscipe Sancte Pater, an early version of which first appears in the prayerbook of Charles the Bald (823-877).

Súscipe, sancte Pater, omnípotens aeterne Deus, hanc immaculátam hostiam, quam ego indignus fámulus tuus óffero tibi, Deo meo vivo et vero, pro innumerabílibus peccátis, et offensiónibus, et negligentiis meis, et pro ómnibus circumstántibus, sed et pro ómnibus fidélibus Christiánis vivis atque defunctis: ut mihi, et illis proficiat ad salútem in vitam aeternam. Amen.

Which the Baronius Missal translates as:

Accept, O holy Father, almighty and eternal God, this unspotted host, which I, Thy unworthy servant, offer unto Thee, my living and true God, for my innumerable sins, offenses, and negligences, and for all here present: as also for all faithful Christians, both living and dead, that it may avail both me and them for salvation unto life everlasting. Amen. [2]

The prayer is beautiful, in part because it contains gratuitous decorations: the Deo meo vivo et vero (my living and true God) rolls sweetly off the tongue but is logically unnecessary, and so is et offensionibus et negligentiis meis (offenses and failings) since both of these are covered by peccatis (sins). For although most translations treat peccata, offensiones, and negligentia as three different things, they are overlooking the et…et construction, which in Latin indicates “both…and.” The addition of et offensionibus et negligentiis meis, therefore, serves as an elaboration of sin (in this case, sins of commission and sins of omission), and so the line should be translated “for my innumerable sins, both my offenses and my failings.”

The priest refers to the bread he is holding in his hands with the paten as an immaculata hostia, which most translations render as an unspotted or immaculate host. The translation is valid but misleading insofar as the average Catholic thinks of the small unleavened wafer when he hears the word “host.” But the Latin hostia here refers to a sacrificial victim, and thus the prayer boldly conflates the unconsecrated wafer with a consecrated Host, Jesus Christ in the Eucharist. Examples of this kind of dramatic anticipation can be found in all apostolic liturgies. [3] In the Byzantine Rite, for example, all bow before the unconsecrated gifts of bread and wine when they are processed to the altar. Such practices are an admirable counterweight to neoscholastic reductionism, which only cares about defining the exact moment of consecration and nothing more, and they are well-suited to human psychology. As Peter Kwasniewski explains:

Beings like ourselves, who live, think, and speak in time, must pray in such a way that our anaphoras (and our liturgies as a whole) draw out, step by step as it were, the meaning of mysteries that occur timelessly…. We humans can only speak of an instantaneous coming-to-be in language of change and therefore of measurable duration (consider all the troubles theologians have had to face when speaking of “creation ex nihilo”). Thus, every orthodox Christian liturgy speaks at length of the conversion of the gifts—it calls down the Spirit, recalls or repeats the institution, offers up the gifts to the heavenly Father, and so on (in different sequences for different rites)—but really, these things are occurring simultaneously. This we cannot express with our time-bound language.

Further, just as immaculata hostia looks forward to the consecration, it looks back to the rich theology of sacrifice in the Sacred Scriptures. The Mosaic Law had five basic kinds of sacrifice or offering, and every one in some way appears in the traditional Offertory Rite. In the Suscipe Sancte Pater, we see shades of the Grain Offering (Minchah), since bread is being offered, and with the reference to a unspotted host we see an allusion to the Peace Offering (Shelem), which required an animal without defect for the sacrifice. The Peace Offering, in turn, could be used as a Purification Offering (Chattah), which purported to purge the offerer of sin, and which, according to this prayer, is the purpose of the priest’s offering of bread.

Two other words are worthy of note. The priest refers to himself as a famulus rather than a servus, the other Latin word for a servant. In so doing he draws from the linguistic world of the Roman orations, which likewise evince a preference for famulus, [4] perhaps because it is slightly more and is etymologically related to familia. Second, the priest refers to the assembled congregation as circumstantes, which literally means, “those standing around.” Circumstances, for example, are those things that stand around the essence of the matter and affect that essence but are not a part of it. It is possible that the prayer has in mind those standing around the altar, namely, the sacred ministers, but it is more likely that it is recalling those standing (and they would have been standing prior to the use of pews) in front of the altar in the nave.

Finally, when the prayer transitions to include all faithful Christians, living and departed, it uses a disjunction. Sed et, which means “But also,” adds here a hint of improvisation, as if the priest were formulating his intentions on the spot and just came up with the idea of including the whole Church militant and Church suffering. The convention is also used in the Canon at the Hanc Igitur, Unde et Memores, and the addition of Saint Joseph, thus providing a stylistic bridge between the Offertory and the Canon.

Notes

[1] Adrian Fortescue, The Mass: A Study of the Roman Liturgy (Longmans, Green, and Co, 1912), 183.

[2] The Daily Missal and Liturgical Manual (Baronius Press, 2007), 923-24.

[3] See Fortescue, 305.

[4] Mary Pierre Ellebracht, Remarks on the Vocabulary of the Ancient Orations in the Missale Romanum (Dekker & Van de Vegt, 1963), 30.

Romanesque Frescos in a Swiss Abbey

Following up on a post of two days ago, here are some more pictures which Nicola took in the abbey of St John in Müstair, Switzerland. The previous post showed the remains of the original fresco decorations of the Carolingian period; here will will see the Romanesque frescos in two of the churches three apses. (Unfortunately, the central apse is currently under restoration.) Here we see the apses from the outside.

Around the year 1200, when the abbey was over 4 centuries old, a new community of Benedictine nuns took possession of it, and commissioned a redecoration of the church’s interior; the new frescoes largely reproduced the iconographic program of the older one. (In the left apse seen here, we have episodes from the lives of Ss Peter and Paul.) As was done in countless other places, the older layer of fresco (from the first decades of the 9th century) was knocked full of holes to make it rougher, so the new layer would have more to grip on to. In this particular case, however, the procedure did not work very well, and much of the new layer simply slid off, exposed the older one. The frescoes were then further damaged by architectural changes at the end of the 15th century. Given all these vicissitudes, it is still remarkable how much remains, and how good a state it is in, relatively speaking.

At the top (Carolingian), the scene of the traditio Legis. Second register, left, Peter and Paul meet in Rome, right, the contest with Simon Magus. Third register: left, Nero condemns the Apostles. Under the window (the first surviving part of the Romanesque work), Peter and Paul praying, and the fall of Simon. In the bottom register, the deaths of the Apostles and their burial. 

In the right apse, at top (Carolingian), Christ in majesty surrounded by the symbols of the Evangelists, and the Virgin Mary in a medallion at his feet. In the second register, the ordination of St Stephen (?) and the celebration of a Mass. In the third register (Romanesque), the ordination of St Stephen, his mission, his speech to the Sanhedrin. At the bottom, his stoning, the preparation of his body, and his burial.  

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Pope St Gregory the Great on the Gifts of the Magi

The wise men brought gold, frankincense, and myrrh. Gold becometh a King, frankincense is offered in sacrifice to God, and with myrrh are embalmed the bodies of the dead. Therefore, by these mystical gifts did the wise men preach Him whom they adored; by the gold, that He was King; by the frankincense, that He was God; and by the myrrh, that He was to die.

The Meeting of the Magi with King Herod, and the Adoration of the Christ Child; from the Ingeborg Psalter, ca. 1195, now at the Musée Condé in Chantilly, France.

There are some heretics who believe Him to be God, but do not at all believe that He reigns everywhere; these offer unto Him frankincense, but refuse Him gold. There are some others who think that He is King, but deny that He is God; these offer Him gold, but refuse Him frankincense. There are some who profess that He is both God and King, but not deny that He took up mortal nature. These offer Him gold and frankincense, but not myrrh for the mortal nature which He assumed.

Let us, therefore, offer gold unto the new-born Lord, that we may confess His universal rule; let us offer unto Him frankincense, that we may believe that He Who hath appeared in time, was God before time was; let us offer Him myrrh, that, just as we believe Him not subject to suffering in His divinity, we may also believe that He was mortal in our flesh. (From Pope St Gregory the Great’s 10th Homily on the Gospels, read in the Breviary of St Pius V on the third day within the Octave of Epiphany.)

“Messe Dialoguée en Français”: A Glimpse into the Devolution of Liturgy in the 1940s

It is understandable that many would see liturgical disaster as a unique product of the last Council, and particularly of the implementary body headed by Annibale Bugnini, the Consilium ad exsequendam. Others who have read more widely will understand that it is linked to the gradual radicalization of the Liturgical Movement, as it went from the restorationist and educational model of Dom Guéranger to the pastoral utilitarianism of the postwar period. Relatively few, it seems to me, recognize that the roots of this disaster go far back to (in varying ways) the Protestant Revolt, the Enlightenment, and the age of industrialization.

Lately, a number of fine studies have been published that help us to see these more remote pretexts and premises of the liturgical reform of the 1960s, when the program of the Synod of Pistoia finally entered every suburban parish.

Nico Fassino’s recent article in the The Pillar, “The surprising history of the Children’s Mass” tells us:

It is commonly believed that Children’s Masses are a unique development of the modern liturgical reforms, a direct outgrowth of the Second Vatican Council. In reality, however, special Masses for children – including what might now appear to be shocking liturgical innovations – stretch back more than a century before the Second Vatican Council.
     These Masses began as a 19th century attempt to grapple with dramatic social changes and challenges wrought by the modern world. They gained widespread popularity and even gave rise to the creation of vernacular participatory Mass methods for adults years before Vatican II.
     In total, hundreds of editions of these methods for children and adults were published, running to millions of cumulative copies, between 1861 and 1961. They were published with approval, printed for decades, and used with permission around the world.
     This is the story of the surprising origins of “Children’s Masses” in the early 1800s, their widespread popularity around the world, their sudden fall from favor immediately before the Second Vatican Council, and their rebirth during the initial years of the revised Roman Missal of Paul VI.

While Fassino shows us how deeply the rot of bad liturgical ideas had already set in well before the Council, it also happily shows how men of principle strongly resisted this literally juvenile mentality. One does not have to question the good will of these would-be reformers in order to see that such efforts at promoting “participation” are bought at the expense of “dumbing down”—a superficialization that subtly implies that liturgy is a thing for children to grow out of, not a thing to which we are apprenticed in a lifelong process of assimilation.

Similarly, John Paul Sonnen relates the story of “The First Permanent Altar Facing the People in the United States,” which, as it happens, was installed as early as 1938, at a time when it would have been officially forbidden!

Archbishop John Gregory Murray (1877-1956), a native of Connecticut, became the Archbishop of St. Paul (Minnesota) in 1931. During his 24-year tenure he became a frequent visitor to the monks of St. John's Abbey in nearby Collegeville, Minnesota. In those years St. John’s was the largest Benedictine Abbey in the world and they had made a name for themselves as the American epicenter of the Liturgical Movement and what came to be called the liturgical apostolate, coming into fashion after the First World War. 

       In 1938 Archbishop Murray laid the cornerstone of the new English Gothic Revival church of the Nativity, under construction in a beautiful new residential neighborhood in St. Paul’s Groveland neighborhood. The architect of the church was a non-Catholic by the name of James B. Hills. It was during this time that Archbishop Murray approved a plan that was heretofore unheard of: the altar in the basement crypt chapel was to be set permanently facing the people.

       In those days this represented a forbidden stratum of liturgical experimentation that was not yet conceived by most, or sanctioned with approval by the Holy See. An innovation in its day, such a thing had not been tried anywhere in the country. Proponents of the Liturgical Movement in northern Europe had been slowly promoting the idea of Mass facing the people, but it was still a novelty concept in the rest of the world. 

Here is the altar John is talking about, in the only photo that has survived of it (today the room is a recreational space):

We can see this sort of thing in a 1930 photo from the Abbey of Maria Laach in Germany, a hotbed of progressive liturgism. Note that here, there is a more deliberate effort to make the altar look like a meal table:

Returning now to Fassino’s statement that “vernacular participatory Mass methods for adults” were being promoted “years before Vatican II,” I thought readers of NLM would appreciate seeing the photos of a section contained in a Missel-Vespéral Romain edited by the redoubtable Dom Gaspar Lefebvre, OSB, and published in 1946. The reader who kindly shared these photos noted that she also has another edition of the same missal from 1942, which contains the same section.

The photos were sent page by page; I cropped them and combined them for ease of viewing, which explains the mismatches from left to right. (As always, click to enlarge.)

Title page and copyright page

What is most striking about this entire method, which, as Yves Chiron describes, was also practiced by (indeed, pioneered by) Bugnini in Italy, is how much blathering is going on. Throughout the Mass there is “Une Voix,” presumably a layman, who acts as the reader or “commentator” in some cases; and there are many short texts and some long texts that “Toutes” (All) are supposed to say.

The priest, meanwhile, is doing his part at the altar in Latin, so there is a parallel Mass: his in Latin and everyone else’s in French.

A rather heavy-handed attempt is made to bring out the Trinitarian structure of everything: the Kyrie, the Gloria, the Credo... Yes, of course, it’s there and it’s important, but whatever happened to not hitting people over the head with a didactic shovel?

There is a lot of chatter DURING the Roman Canon, as Une Voix laboriously explains to Toutes that now we are praying for the Church militant, now we are offering the Victim, now we are praying for the dead... What strikes me the most is how the pious paraphrase being spoken throughout by the people is so much akin to the “methods of hearing the Mass” that the same Liturgical Movement held in such disdain! It’s as if they simply transferred private devotion into a public mode. This was surely a far cry from Pius X’s “don’t merely pray at Mass, pray the Mass!”

It is actually refreshing to see the act of Spiritual Communion placed right where it is, as a gentle reminder that not everyone should go up to Communion, but only those properly disposed to do so. And thankfully, this act is left... unannounced and unrecited by Toutes. Sadly, even the Last Gospel has to be paraphrased and simplified.

Even the thanksgiving after Mass is corporate and vocal.

It is very difficult to read a method like this and not to wonder, “What in the world were they thinking?” Just because you recite a lot of pious phrases about the Mass all along does not mean you are participating in the holy oblation, the ultimate sacrifice. In fact, you might just miss it altogether by skating on the surface and having no opportunity for recollection, assimilation, and self-offering from the depths of one’s soul.

In his 1975 Apostolic Exhortation Evangelii, Pope Paul VI—who only six years earlier had unleashed on the world a Mass that was patterned after this kind of “Messe Dialoguée en Français”—lamented: “Modern man is sated by talk; he is obviously tired of listening, and what is worse, impervious to words.”

Physician, heal thyself.

Visit Dr. Kwasniewski’s Substack “Tradition & Sanity”; personal site; composer site; publishing house Os Justi Press and YouTube, SoundCloud, and Spotify pages.

Carolingian Frescos in a Swiss Abbey

Our Ambrosian expert Nicola de’ Grandi recently visited the abbey of St John in Val Müstair, in the Swiss canton of Graubünden, at the extreme east of the country. (The Italian border is only three-quarters of a mile away.) This abbey is well-known to art historians as one of the few places which preserves a substantial amount of fresco from the Carolingian era, although they are not in the best condition, and many parts of the original cycle have been lost, including most of the pictures on the south wall. Their precise date is not certain; the general opinion holds that they date to the first half of the ninth century, a generation or two after the church was built ca. 775. In later phases of the abbey’s history, they were covered over by new layers of fresco, and then later whitewashed, only to be rediscovered during restorations carried out between 1947 and 1951.  The church and the attached museum contain a number of other artistic treasures, and there will be at least two more posts on them. Our thanks to Nicola for sharing his pictures with us. 

The large tower on the right, which now houses the museum, was built in 960, but gutted by a fire in 1499, and rebuilt by the abbess Angelina Planta, after whom it is now named. The first floor became the store room, the second the refectory, and the third the dormitory.

The painting in the nave are arranged in a regular grid, originally on five levels, showing scenes (in descending order) of the life of David (almost completely destroyed by the lowering of the roof, subsequent to a fire at the end of the 15th century), the early years of Christ, His public ministry, His Passion, and some episodes from the lives of the Apostle and early martyrs. Here we see part of the Passion cycle, Christ before the Sanhedrin, and before Pilate, and the crucifixion of a Saint (possibly the Apostle Andrew.)

The registers above the preceding: second register, the dream of Joseph (mostly destroyed by the insertion of a window) and the Flight into Egypt; third register (badly damaged), the multiplication of the loaves and fishes, and the Transfiguration.

Upper register: Christ among the Doctors, and the preaching of John the Baptist; second register, Christ blessing the children, Christ speaking to the women taken in adultery; third register: the Descent into the Limbo of the Fathers, and the woman at the tomb.

A closer view of the same.

Continue Reading this Article. . .

The Synaxis of the Holy Forerunner John the Baptist

In the Byzantine Rite, a “synaxis” (“σύναξις” in Greek, “собóръ – sobor” in Church Slavonic) is a commemoration held the day after a major feast, to honor a sacred person who figures prominently in the feast, but who is, so to speak, overshadowed by its principal subject. The most prominent example is the feast of the Holy Spirit, celebrated the day after Pentecost, since Pentecost itself is the feast of the Holy Trinity. Likewise, the Synaxis of the Virgin Mary is kept the day after Christmas, that of St Gabriel on the day after the Annunciation, etc. For those of the Byzantine Rite who follow the Gregorian date of Epiphany, today is therefore “The Synaxis of the Holy and Glorious Prophet and Forerunner, John the Baptist.” A synaxis is a commemoration, and not the principal feast of the person honored thereby; the Byzantine Rite celebrates the same two principal feasts of St John as the Roman Rite, the Nativity on June 24, and the Beheading on August 29. There is also a feast of his Conception on September 23rd, and of the various occasions on which the relics of his head were lost and recovered, the “First and Second Finding” on February 24, and the “Third Finding” on May 25th. (The Conception of St John is occasionally found on ancient liturgical calendars in the West, but never really caught on.)

St John the Baptist as the Angel of the Desert, 16th century, by the school of the Cretan icon painter Andreas Ritzos. (Public domain image from Wikimedia Commons.)

Troparion: The memory of the righteous (is celebrated) with hymns of praise, but the testimony of the Lord will be sufficient for thee, O Forerunner. For, being received in truth as the most honorable of the prophets, thou wert deemed worthy to baptize in the streams the One foretold (by them). And therefore, having suffered for the truth, with joy thou proclaimed even to those in hell God who was made manifest in the flesh, who taketh away the sin of the world, and granteth us great mercy.

Тропарь Памѧть праведнагω съ похвалами, тебѣ же довлѣетъ свидѣтельство Господне, Предтече: показалбосѧ еси во истинну и пророкωвъ честнѣйшїй, ꙗко и въ струѧхъ крестити сподобилсѧ еси Проповѣданнаго. Тѣмже за истину пострадавъ, радуѧсѧ благовѣстилъ еси и сущымъ во адѣ Бога, ꙗвльшагосѧ плотїю, вземлющаго грѣхъ міра и подающаго намъ велїю милость.

Τροπάριον Μνήμη δικαίου μετ’ ἐγκωμίων, σοὶ δὲ ἀρκέσει ἡ μαρτυρία τοῦ Κυρίου, Πρόδρομε. Ἀνεδείχθης γὰρ ὄντως τῶν Προφητῶν σεβασμιώτερος, ὅτι καὶ ἐν ῥείθροις βαπτίσαι κατηξιώθης τὸν κηρυττόμενον, ὅθεν τῆς ἀληθείας ὑπεραθλήσας, χαίρων εὐαγγελίσω καὶ τοῖς ἐν Ἅδη, Θεὸν φανερωθέντα ἐν σαρκί, τὸν αἴροντα τὴν ἁμαρτίαν τοῦ κόσμου, καὶ παρέχοντα ἡμῖν τὸ μέγα ἔλεος.

All feasts begin with Vespers of the preceding day, and there is no such thing as Second Vespers as there is in the Roman Rite; therefore, the Vespers of a Synaxis are celebrated on the evening of the main feast’s calendar day, and there is always a very clear thematic link between the liturgical texts of the two celebrations. At some of these Vespers, the responsorial chant called the Prokimen is sung in a longer and more solemn form than usual, and in the Slavic choral tradition, gives baritone deacons a chance to really show off! The Psalm from which this chant is taken, 113, is sung at Vespers of Epiphany and throughout its octave in the Roman Rite. (This video starts at the place marked with an asterisk in the translation given below.)

The refrain, sung first by the deacon, then repeated by the choir, Psalm 113, 11: Our God is in heaven: He hath done all things whatsoever He would.
The verses sung by the deacon:
- When Israel went out of Egypt, the house of Jacob from a barbarous people, Judea made his sanctuary, Israel his dominion. * Choir: “Our God is in heaven etc.”
- The sea saw and fled: Jordan was turned back.
- What ailed thee, O thou sea, that thou didst flee: and thou, O Jordan, that thou wast turned back?
Deacon: Our God is in heaven: Choir: He hath done all things whatsoever He would.

The Psalms of the Epiphany

In the traditional Roman Divine Office, the only Hours which change their Psalms according to the specific feast day are Matins and Vespers. [1] On the majority of feasts, the first four Psalms of Vespers (109-112) are taken from Sunday, but Psalm 113, the fifth and longest of Sunday, is substituted by another; on the feasts of martyrs, by Psalm 115, on those of bishops by 131, etc. There are, however, four occasions on which Psalm 113 is not replaced, three of which are very ancient indeed, and the fourth relatively recent in origin.

The three ancient feasts are Easter, Pentecost and Epiphany, on which it is said on the day itself and through the octave. (Some medieval Uses, however, vary this.) This custom reflects the traditional baptismal character of these celebrations, which goes back to the very earliest days of the Church.

The Psalm numbered 113 in the Septuagint and Vulgate is really two Psalms joined together, those numbered 114 and 115 in the Hebrew. [2] It is the first of these which speaks of the passage of the Jews out of Egypt, and then of the Crossing of the Jordan into the Holy Land.

The Crossing of the Red Sea, depicted on a Christian sarcophagus at the end of the 4th century from Arles, France. (Image from Wikimedia Commons by Marsyas, CC BY-SA 3.0; click to enlarge.)

“When Israel went out of Egypt, the house of Jacob from a barbarous people: Judea became his sanctuary, Israel his dominion. The sea saw and fled (i.e. the Red Sea): the Jordan was turned back. … What ailed thee, O sea, that thou didst flee: and thou, O Jordan, that thou wast turned back? … At the presence of the Lord the earth was moved, at the presence of the God of Jacob, who turned the rock into pools of water, and the stony hill into fountains of waters.”

The Church has always understood the story of the Exodus as a prefiguration of salvation in Christ, and specifically, the Crossing of the Red Sea as a prefiguration of the Sacrament of Baptism. The reading of the relevant passage from Exodus is attested in the very oldest surviving homily on the subject of Easter, the Paschal homily of St Melito of Sardis, from the mid-2nd century; it begins with the words “The Scripture about the Hebrew Exodus has been read”, and this custom continues into every historical Christian liturgy. Following the lead of St Paul, who says that the rock which provided water to the children of Israel in the desert was Christ (1 Cor. 10, 4), St Melito attributes all of the events of the Exodus directly to Him.

“This was the one who guided you into Egypt, and guarded you, and himself kept you well supplied there. This was the one who lighted your route with a column of fire, and provided shade for you by means of a cloud, the one who divided the Red Sea, and led you across it, and scattered your enemy abroad. This is the one who provided you with manna from heaven, the one who gave you water to drink from a rock, the one who established your laws in Horeb, the one who gave you an inheritance in the land, the one who sent out his prophets to you, the one who raised up your kings. This is the one who came to you, the one who healed your suffering ones and who resurrected your dead.”

Psalm 113, therefore, which speaks of the Red Sea fleeing to make passage for the children of Israel as they go out of Egypt, and the rock that becomes a pool of water, is perfectly suitable to the two most ancient feasts on which the Church celebrates the Sacrament of Baptism, Easter and Pentecost. Likewise, on Epiphany, the Church commemorates the Baptism of Christ in the waters of the Jordan, to which the Psalm also refers. On the fourth feast, that of the Holy Trinity, which was instituted much later, it reminds us that our Faith in the Trinity was first manifested on the occasion of Christ’s Baptism, when the Holy Spirit came upon Him in the form of a dove, and the Father spoke from heaven; and likewise, of the baptismal formula which Christ gave to the Church, as recounted in Matthew 28, 16-20, the Gospel of Easter Friday.

The Baptism of Christ, by Giusto de’ Menabuoi; fresco in the baptistery of Padua, ca. 1378.

The nine psalms of Epiphany Matins are 28, 45 and 46 in the first nocturn, 65, 71 and 85 in the second, and 94, 95 and 96 in the third. The antiphons with which they are sung, and which determine their meaning for the feast, are attested quite uniformly in the ancient antiphonaries. The choice of these psalms and antiphons reflects some very ancient interpretative traditions found in the writings of the Church Fathers.

Psalm 28 is sung with an antiphon taken from its first two verses: “Bring to the Lord, o ye children of God: adore ye the Lord in his holy court.” The full text of these verses is “Bring to the Lord, o ye children of God: bring to the Lord the offspring of rams. Bring to the Lord glory and honour: bring to the Lord glory to his name: adore ye the Lord in his holy court.” The antiphon removes the three objects from the verb “bring”; the act of bringing is in itself to sufficient indicate the gifts which the Magi brought to Christ at the Epiphany.

Although St Matthew does not specify how many Magi there were, the representation of three of them is one of the most ancient and consistent traditions of Christian art. It is commonly assumed that artists settled on three to correspond to their three gifts, which, in turn, have been read from very ancient times as symbols of Christ’s divinity, mortality and regality. This is undoubtedly true, but there is another, equally important reason for showing three. The Greeks, following the Babylonians, divided the world into three parts, Asia, Africa and Europe; this division predates Christianity, but was received by Christians and Jews as part of their sacred history. Each continent was believed to be populated by the descendants of one of the sons of Noah, Asians from Shem, Africans from Ham, and Europeans from Japheth. The three Magi are therefore the symbolic representatives of these three parts of world, coming to worship the Creator and Savior.

A third-century fresco in the Roman Catacomb of Priscilla, showing the three Magi each painted in a different color, to indicate that each one represents one of the three parts of the world.

Particularly in Rome, where people from every part of the Empire lived, an image of three Magi represents the revelation of Christ as the Redeemer of all men, and the coming of all peoples to salvation. The antiphon of Psalm 28 on Epiphany reflects the fact that the gentiles are also numbered among the “sons of God.” The antiphons of Psalms 65 and 85 are chosen on a similar theme. “Let all the earth adore thee, and sing to thee: let it sing a psalm to thy name, o Lord.” (Psalm 65, 4) “All the nations thou hast made shall come, and adore before thee, O Lord.” (Psalm 85, 9) Pope St Leo I quotes the second of these in his third sermon on the Epiphany. [3]

The Church Fathers also associate Psalm 28 with Christ’s Baptism. St Basil teaches that the words of verse 3, “the voice of the Lord is upon the waters” refer to St John the Baptist. (Homily 2 on Ps. 28) St Ambrose understands them to refer to the appearance of the Three Persons of the Trinity (De mysteriis 5.26), and likewise St Peter Chrysologus writes in a sermon on the Epiphany, “Today, as the prophet saith, the voice of the Lord is upon the waters. Which voice? ‘This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.” (Sermon 160)

A work known as the Breviarium in Psalmos, (traditionally but incorrectly attributed to St Jerome), explains the words of the antiphon of Psalm 45, “the stream of the river maketh joyful the city of God,” as a reference to both the waters of baptism and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. “After the worship of demons is overthrown, the washing of baptism and the pouring fourth of the Holy Spirit maketh joyful the soul, the city of God, or else the Church which is the city of God that is set upon a mountain, and is not hidden.”

The Adoration of the Magi, from the Benedictional of St Aethelwold, ca. 975. By this point the tradition has emerged of showing the Magi with royal crowns, inspired by the words of Psalm 71 cited below, and a verse of the Epistle of the Mass of Epiphany, “And the Gentiles shall walk in thy light, and kings in the brightness of thy rising.” (Isaiah 60, 3)

A commentary on the Psalms of the later 4th century, formerly attributed to Rufinus of Aquileia (345-411), reads the antiphon of Psalm 71, “The kings of Tharsis and the islands shall offer presents: the kings of the Arabians and of Saba shall bring gifts” (verse 10), in reference to the Magi. “The Magi, led by a star, fulfilled this bodily, and the kings and princes of all the earth still do not cease to imitate them even daily. … by these gifts which are said to be brought to Lord, those faithful men are indicated, whom the authority of kings brings into the society of the Church.” It then refers the following verse, “And all the kings shall adore him”, to the end of the worship of the Roman emperors, for the sake of which Christians were so often persecuted before the reign of Constantine. “All the kings shall adore him, who were formerly wont to be adored, … and all nations that were formerly wont to serve earthly kings, will serve Him, that is our heavenly King.” (Commentarius in LXXV Psalmos; PL 21, 0939B). The mention of kings from three places in the East (Tharsis, Arabia, and Saba) also fits in with the traditional artistic representation of three mentioned above.

Psalm 94 was clearly chosen for the close similarity between its words “venite, adoremus, et procidamus ante Deum – come, let us worship, and fall down before God,” (verse 6 of the Old Latin version) and those of the Gospel, “venimus adorare eum. … et procidentes adoraverunt eum – we have come to worship him … and falling down they worshipped him. ” (Matt. 2, verses 2 and 11.) The antiphon with which it is sung on the Epiphany is therefore “Come, let us worship Him, for He is the Lord, our God.” This Psalm is normally said at the beginning of Matins every day with a refrain called an invitatory, which is repeated in whole or part between its verses. On the Epiphany, however, the invitatory and Psalm 94 are omitted from the beginning of Matins, and the psalm is said in the third nocturn, with the antiphon repeated between the verses in the manner of an invitatory.

In his Rationale Divinorum Officiorum (6.16.9), William Durandus also notes this prosaic explanation for omitting the invitatory on Epiphany, the mere avoidance of repetition. Before it, however, he explains that the invitatory is omitted “to show that the Church in its first fruits came from the gentiles to the Lord, not invited, or called by a herald, but with only the star to lead it, … so that shame might be inculcated on those who are late to believe, even though they have many preachers. For the Magi came to worship Christ, even though they were not called.” He then gives a second explanation, a more traditional one which dates back to his ninth-century predecessor, Amalarius of Metz: “Secondly, so that we who are daily invited and urged to worship and beseech God, may be seen to detest the deceitful invitation of Herod when he said to the Magi, ‘Go and inquire diligently concerning the Child.’ ”

A page of 1490 Breviary according to the Use of Passau, Germany. In the right column, the rubics just above the middle of the page begins “At Matins, we do not say the Invitatory, so that we may differ from Herod’s deceitful invitation.”

[1] The regular psalms of Sunday Lauds (92, 99, 62-66, the Benedicite, and 148-149-150) were traditionally said on all feast days in the Roman Rite. In the reform of St Pius X, psalms 66, 149 and 150 were removed, but the group thus reduced continued to be used on all major feasts, including Pentecost. The psalms of the day hours were likewise traditionally invariable for all feasts (53 and the eleven parts of 118), and those of Compline always invariable; this was also changed in the reform of St Pius X, but not in a way that applied to major feasts like Epiphany.

[2] There are four places where the Psalms are joined or divided one way in the Hebrew and another in the Greek. There are also psalms which both traditions have as a single text, but are generally believed to be two joined together, (e.g. 26), and others which both traditions have as two (41 and 42), which are generally believed to have originally been one, later divided. It is quite possible that these variations come from ancient liturgical usages of which all knowledge has long since been lost. Likewise, the meaning of many words and phrases in the titles of the Psalms had already been lost when the Septuagint translation was made in the 3rd century B.C.

[3] It is tempting to think of this as proof that the antiphon itself goes back to the time of St Leo, but it is of course just as possible that its unknown composer was inspired to choose this text by reading Pope Leo’s sermon.

Station Churches of the Christmas Season (Part 3)

The liturgy of New Year’s Day, in both the Mass and the Divine Office, is one of the richest and most complex of the Church’s year, joining together elements of several different traditions. It is traditionally known as the feast of the Circumcision; the Gospel, St Luke 2, 21, recounts that the infant Jesus, in fulfillment of the ancient covenant given to Abraham, was circumcised on the eighth day after His birth. Likewise, following the custom of the Jewish people, He was named on the same day, with the holy name given to Him by the Angel before He was conceived. Saint Bernard of Clairvaux, following the tradition of the Fathers, refers to the Circumcision as the first shedding of Christ’s blood for our salvation: “Worthily indeed is He called ‘Savior’ when He is circumcised, this Child who was born unto us, because already from this moment He began to work our salvation, pouring forth that immaculate blood for us.” This Gospel is repeated on the feast of the Holy Name, the Sunday after the Circumcision, and the homily quoted above is read at Matins of that day.

The Circumcision of Christ, depicted in a stained-glass window by A.W.N. Pugin, Bolton Priory, 1853. Photograph by Fr. Lawrence Lew, O.P.

The first of January is, of course, the octave day of Christmas, and the circumcision and naming of Christ are set by the Mass as the consummation of the feast of His Nativity. The chant propers are repeated from the third Mass of Christmas Day, with the exception of a special Alleluja; the epistle, however, is repeated from the first Mass. In many uses of the Roman Rite, such as those of Sarum and of the Dominican Order, the three prayers of the Mass are an ancient set which refers explicitly to the octave of the Nativity. However, many ancient sacramentaries also have the prayers which are used in the Missal of the St Pius V, the first of which refers neither to the Circumcision, nor to the octave of Christmas, but to the role of the Virgin Mary in bringing the “author of life” to the human race. The Office of the Circumcision, one of the most beautiful of the entire year, brings together all three of these aspects of the day’s feast.

There is, however, a fourth element to the day’s observance, which was formerly of the greatest importance. In the ancient Roman world, as in our own, New Year’s was generally celebrated with a great deal of raucous behavior, dancing and drinking of a sort not in keeping with Christian morals. In many places, therefore the liturgy of the day was celebrated as a day of fasting and penance, against the excesses of the pagan world. A few traces of this survive in various places; for example, the Mass of the Circumcision repeats the epistle of the first Mass of Christmas because of the words “…instructing us that, denying ungodliness and worldly desires, we should live soberly and justly, and godly in this world.”

The station of New Year’s Day was originally assigned to the Pantheon, a building understood by medieval Christians to have originally been a “temple of all the gods”, which was dedicated as a church in honor of the Virgin Mary and all the martyrs in the year 609 by Pope Boniface IV. The choice was clearly made so that the commemoration of the Mother of God could be celebrated in a place which also symbolizes the victory of the Christian faith and the one God over all of the many gods of the pagan world.

Mass celebrated in the Pantheon on May 13, 2009, the 1400th anniversary of the building's dedication as a church. Photo courtesy of Orbis Catholicus.

The station for this day was later transferred to another Marian church, Saint Mary’s in Trastevere, the foreigners’ quarter of ancient Rome. We do not know why or when the change was made, but we do know why this particular church was chosen. The pagan historian Cassius Dio records that in the year 38 B.C., a fountain of oil sprang from the ground in Trastevere, near a tavern frequented by retired solders, (called a 'taberna meritoria' in Latin). This event is understood by Saint Jerome, in his continuation of the Chronicle of Eusebius, as a prophecy of the grace of Christ flowing forth to all of the nations; later on, the miraculous flow of oil was believed to have happened on the night of Christ’s birth. In the late thirteenth century, the Roman artist Pietro Cavallini added to the apse of Santa Maria in Trastevere a beautiful series of mosaics of the life of the Virgin; the third of these shows the birth of Christ, and the fountain of oil flowing forth from the taberna meritoria. (pictured right) The place believed to be the site of the fountain is now within the church, very close to the main altar; the motto of the church itself and of its chapter is still to this day “Fons olei.”

There are no stations assigned to the days between the Circumcision and Epiphany. The second, third and fourth of January were traditionally kept as the octave days of St Stephen, St John and the Holy Innocents respectively, and octave days very rarely have their own station. The feast of the Holy Name was only added to the universal Calendar in 1721, although the devotion is, of course, much older; it was not assigned to its current place, the Sunday after the Circumcision, until the reign of Pope Saint Pius X.

The very ancient vigil of the Epiphany on the fifth of January also does not have a station. It is possible that just as the vigil of Christmas was kept in the same church as the first Mass of Christmas, so the vigil of Epiphany was kept in the same church as the feast. The station for the feast is assigned to the basilica of St Peter, for the same reason that the third Mass of Christmas was originally celebrated there as well; a very large church was necessary to accommodate the large congregation on one of the greatest solemnities of the year.

Interior view of Saint Peter ’s Basilica, by the workshop of Raphael, ca. 1520

One of the most beautiful antiphons of the office of the Epiphany, sung at the Magnificat of Second Vespers, reads: “We celebrate a holy day adorned with three miracles; today a star led the Wise Men to the manger; today water became wine at the wedding feast; today in the Jordan, Christ did will to be baptized by John that he might save us.” All three of these aspects of the feast are mentioned daily in the office of the Epiphany and its octave; the Mass, however, has always been principally focused on the coming of the Magi. In the Byzantine rite, on the other hand, the Gospel of the Magi is read on Christmas, and the Epiphany is more markedly the feast of the Lord’s Baptism. The Latin church has reserved its principal commemoration of the Lord’s Baptism to the octave day of the Epiphany; despite the great antiquity of this custom, it does not have a stational observance.

As mentioned above, the Roman Rite has preserved a few traces of the early Christian reaction to the pagan celebration of the New Year; in the traditional Ambrosian Rite, this aspect of the day is far more pronounced. At Vespers, psalm 95 is sung with the antiphon “All the gods of the nations are demons; but our God made the heavens”, and psalm 96 with the antiphon “Let all those who worship the idols be confounded, and those who glory in their statues.” The first prayer of Vespers and of the Mass reads, “Almighty and everlasting God, who commandest that those who share in thy table abstain from the banquets of the devil, grant, we ask, to thy people, that, casting away the taste of death-bearing profanity, we may come with pure minds to the feast of eternal salvation.” All seven of the antiphons of Matins, and most of those of Lauds, refer to the rejection of idol worship. In the Ambrosian rite, there are two readings before the Gospel; on the Circumcision, the first of these is the opening of the “letter of Jeremiah”, (Baruch 6, 1-6 in the Vulgate), in which the prophet exhorts the people not to bow before the idols of the Babylonians.

The Basilica of Sant’Eustorgio in Milan. The previous church on this site was destroyed in 1164, and the relics of the Three Kings removed to the Cathedral of Cologne by the Emperor Frederick Barbarossa.