Sing!

...Jesus is Coming..

Readings for Sunday, November 29/ 1st Sunday of Advent:
Jeremiah 33:14-16
Psalm 25
1 Thessalonians 3:12-4:2
Luke 21:25-28, 24-26

Happy Advent! What joy to come to this blessed time of year when we begin again, a time of rejoicing at the things God has done and looking forward to the new things He has in store for us. As we begin a new liturgical year today, I want to start by changing things up a bit and inviting you all to stand up for a moment. Now I want you to repeat after me: I love the Lord! [Congregation responds] Now I’ve heard y’all talking after Mass, so I know you can get a little louder than that: I love the Lord! [Congregation responds louder] That’s much better, but I know we have some Italians in the congregation and just being good Louisiana people, we have to use our hands when we talk, so lets make sure to use our hands this time: I love the Lord! [Congregation responds, with hand gestures!] Beautiful! I’m glad y’all love the Lord! I love Him too. Y’all can sit now.

So, Advent has arrived once again, that season when Mother Church invites us to reflect upon what she calls the ‘twofold coming of Christ’ – the expectation of His arrival at Christmas, as well as the final coming of the Lord in glory that will take place on the Last Day, whenever that might be. It’s a time when we don once more the penitential purple and prepare our hearts for the Lord to come, but it is a penance that is marked with joy at the nearness of the Lord to us. Much like Lent, it is easy to have Advent simply pass us by and miss the great gift that it can be. I find for myself also that it is easy to get caught up in reflections that are rather spiritual rather than practical in my own ‘preparing the way’ for the Lord. So my intention for these four weeks of Advent is to provide practical, concrete ways for us to prepare our hearts, homes, and lives for the coming of Christ Jesus. I hope they are helpful for you as I pray they will be for me.

A few years back I went with some friends who were still in seminary to Houston over Christmas break for a ‘Chant Intensive’ workshop on how to read, understand, sing, and (somewhat) direct Gregorian Chant. When we arrived they split us into our groups and sent us to our practice rooms. My friends and I went to our assigned room with all of our books in hand ready to chant to our hearts content. The director arrived and, after a brief introduction and overview of the workshop, he asked us to stand. We all listened and he did with us the same exact activity I just did with y’all. At the end of it he asked us to be seated and said, “Alright, so now I know how loud y’all can sang.” So… *grins* … now I know how loud y’all can sing. Which brings me to practical point number one: sing!

It is scientifically proven that music has a profound impact on the human mind and body, that playing music has short-term and long-term effects on our brain, and that singing has a way of changing our mind and body both, but especially our heart. Johnny Cash once sang “Get rhythm when you get the blues” and with that he reminds us that music is able to move us. It moves our hearts and if there is anything in the time of preparation for the coming of the Lord Jesus, it is most certainly our hearts.

Rock the Mic!

In the Gospel passage we just heard, Jesus warns us not to let our hearts become drowsy with worldly pleasure. Having experienced every aspect of human life but sin, He knows well how easy it is to get caught up in the pleasures of the world, in festivities, in the mundane things, and to lose the burning fire of love for God that is given us at our baptism. And so we come to this Advent season and we do that which brings life to a fire or brings flames from a burning ember – we breathe out life, we sing. The experience of singing is one in which we are able to pray not only with our voice but with our whole self and in the process of inhaling and exhaling the fire of our soul can be ignited and renewed. So we sing – at Mass, in the car, at home, in the shower, at work, wherever. All the time I hear it said ‘Father, you don’t want me to sing…or them to sing’ but the thing is that I do. If everyone sings it will be a beautiful noise! So I invite you to do one little thing at different times through the week and to sing.

Sing like this little guy.

As I said at the beginning, Advent is a time when we can begin again and bring new resolutions to our own life. For Advent this year I want to invite you to join with me in a new piece in the liturgy. In case you’ve not beaten me to the punch yet – it involves singing. Every day priests and religious brothers and sisters across the world stop at various times of day to pray the Liturgy of the Hours, a collection of psalms, scripture readings, hymns and intercessions. There are five different times it is done at the day, mostly in the same format. The last prayer of the day is a bit different though because after the concluding prayer and blessing, a hymn is sung to the Blessed Mother. A sort of goodnight lullaby where the tables are turned and rather than our mother singing to us, we sing to our mother. The first time I heard this done was when I was at the seminary in Covington. I went to the monks’ Night Prayer with a friend and at the end they all processed out in silence to the rear of the church and the lights were turned out. They wrapped around the rear of the church and came down the side aisle to the image of the Blessed Mother, which was illuminated by the only light in the church. And in that moment of darkness and quiet the Abbot intoned the hymn and the monks joined with him in solemn song. I got goosebumps then as I have them right now thinking about it. It is that same loving devotion to Our Lady that I hope to bring into our Masses here at St. Ann & St. Vincent. There are four different hymns through the course of the whole year, each one being sung for 2-4 months. I know it will be tough to learn them initially, but know that it will be well worth the effort and will great joy to Mary’s heart – and to mine and hopefully yours too. May Mary, who is ever watchful of us, her children, fill us with joy in this blessed season and may she bring to completion that great mission of bringing us closer to the Heart of Jesus. Come, Lord Jesus. Come, O Come, Emmanuel.

Tota Pulchra Es

In honor of Our Lady, the Immaculate Conception, here is a beautiful piece named 'Tota Pulchra Es'. It comes in many different arrangements, but this is my favorite version. Enjoy! 

Thou art all fair, O Mary! Thou art all fair, O Mary! And the original stain is not in thee! And the original stain is not in thee! Thou art the glory of Jerusalem! Thou, the joy of Israel! Thou art the honor of our people! Thou art the advocate of sinners! O Mary! O Mary! Virgin most prudent! Mother most tender! Pray for us, intercede for us with our Lord Jesus Christ.

Focus on the Trinity

Not this Trinity...

Readings for Sunday, May 26/ Trinity Sunday:
Proverbs 8:22-31
Psalm 8:4-9
Romans 5:1-5
John 16:12-15

As we come this weekend to celebrate Trinity Sunday, we rejoice in the great mystery of the self-revelation of God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Through the Scriptures we hear of these three Persons who are One God and as I was reflecting on them throughout the past week the question continued to come to mind: where is my focus? For all of us, where is our focus? Is our focus truly on the Lord our God, or is it rather on us?

In the past century a great change has happened that moved the focus from God to men. The Church, representative of God in our midst, was the center of community life. It was the place where we gathered, found encouragement, guidance, and direction in daily life. Now the Lord has been set aside and man has become the center and focus. ‘Man is the measure of all things’ is a phrase we’ve all heard before and it simply affirms that desire of many to have us be the determining factor of what we should do. Sadly this over-emphasis on the human person and humanity as a whole has even seeped into our faith. When I first began my theology studies in New Orleans, our Spiritual Theology professor asked us at the beginning of the course what the most important thing for each of us was. “Getting to heaven,” rang from our lips and he asked if we all agreed and we said yes. To this he responded, “You’re all wrong. The most important thing for each of us is glorifying God. Getting to heaven is just the means to doing that.” It’s not about us at all. It’s about Him.

We can also see this turn towards ourselves in the everyday life of the Church in the celebration of the Liturgy. Music in the past century has taken a dramatic turn from being mainly God-oriented to people-oriented. Listen for a while at the music that we sing regularly in Mass and look through the hymnals and note how often we sing about ‘me, I, mine, us, we, and our’ instead of actually singing in praise of God. It’s more about what we get from the deal than what God does. Architecture and Sacred Art, too, are places where we see that world around us turning our gaze from the Lord to ourselves. Rare is the newly built church a structure that lifts our minds, hearts, and eyes to Heaven. Instead, we oversimplify everything to the point of it being all-too-human. Most lamentable of all is the orientation of the liturgy. The ancient practice of the Church was the have the priest and people facing the same direction in the liturgy. Often it is termed as ‘the priest had his back to the people’ but truly it was simply the priest and people together awaiting the coming of the Lord Jesus, who was traditionally believed to return in glory from the East. And so the whole community focused on the East, symbolized by the Crucifix in the sanctuary, in worship. And yet now most often the Mass is celebrated with the priest facing the people rather than joining the people looking toward God. As Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI so powerfully pointed out in his book The Spirit of the Liturgy, we have turned in on ourselves, focusing on what we do and making humanity the center of the celebration. Interestingly, the Roman Missal still assumes that the priest is facing the same direction as the people. But since that cannot be done just yet I and other priests –following Benedict’s example - have begun to have a cross on the altar to remember the focus is not on the community, nor on ourselves, but on the Lord God Himself. He is the center, the focus.

Those are just a few of the many ways that the world has attempted to take our focus away from God. So how do we refocus? How do we ensure that the Lord truly is the center, not only of our worship, but of our entire lives? I would suggest three practical things that I myself am still trying to strengthen in my own life.

The first is prayer. When we come to pray before God we realize immediately that God is God and we are not. He has the power. With Him we can do all things; without Him we can do nothing that is good. To pray is to recognize our rightful place before the Lord, that His majesty is so great that in comparison we are nothing  and that helps us to remove the focus from me and turn it towards Him.

The second thing is a daily examen. And examen is a practice wherein at the end of each day we pause to ask God where He was that day. We pray that the Spirit would show us how He was active in our lives – where did He give us some special grace, where did we see Him active in another person’s life, and where did we see Him but struggle or fail to respond. To be able to stop and see what God is acting and what gifts He is bestowing forces us to realize that many gifts that come to us each day through God’s gracious providence. He cares for us immensely and blesses us accordingly. If we turn back to give thanks, we recall the reality that it is He who acts first to bless us and we simply respond.

The third thing is simply to have visual reminders of God’s presence with us. Having a religious image in a prominent place at home, a crucifix over the bed, a holy card on our work desk or a rosary in our car. These and many other things throughout the day are visible reminders of the Triune God who walks with us throughout every moment of our day. Never are we alone and never shall we be abandoned. The God who created the universe created us out of love and wants nothing other than for us to turn to Him in love and respond with the same love.

As we go throughout this week, let us be especially mindful of our focus and work always to keep it on our God that in all that we do it might not be for us but for Him that we act. To conclude this homily I invite you to join me as we together turn towards Our Lord and give Him the praise that is due: Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit, as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.

Chanting!

Wednesday through Friday of this week I had the privilege of going to Houston with three seminarian friends to the CMAA Winter Chant Intensive. For the better part of three days, we learned about and sang  Gregorian Chant (hence the workshop's name). It was a wonderful time and culminated in the celebration of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass with us chanting the prayers of the Mass, which we had used as the means to learning during the course of the workshop. Below is a little clip of us practicing the Communion Chant. It was a beautiful time and a blessed opportunity to meet some incredibly talented people. Now to try to grow in my skill and understanding....

The Beauty of Modern Media

Beautiful and fascinating. H/T to Jeffrey A. Tucker at The Chant Cafe