Holy days of Obligation

[JW]

The church I attended, close to where I work did this:

Kyrie - Polyphonic (Choir)
Gloria - De Angelis (Choir - I think the organist was trying to do this antiphonally with choir alternating with congregation but it didn't work.
Psalm: Motet "Tu es Petrus"
Alleluia - the familiar plainsong one.
Creed: Omitted.
Prayers of the Faithful: Omitted (they are not said here)
Offertory: Another motet - pass - couldn't make it out.
Sanctus - Polyphonic (Choir)
Benedictus - Said by priest (only) - the rest of us weren't expecting it.
Agnus Dei - De Angelis.
Communion - Motet
Voluntary while priest exiting

[organist]

asb That is an obvious trap for the unwary in the Gloria and Peter Jones should have thought of it!

[gwyn]

someone in the congregation repeated the words "Lord God, Lamb of God"

He/she'll prob only ever do that once. The embarrassment of it will prevent him/her ever doing it again.

[musicus]

asb That is an obvious trap for the unwary in the Gloria and Peter Jones should have thought of it!

Possibly, though it"s never happened to me. But there are other traps in this piece, not least the opening phrase. Many's the time I have set off at mezzo-forte to accompany the choir's initial statement of the refrain, and the congregation sings it! Even in my own parish. where we have an animateur and (usually) set the text out in full on the service sheet, they get it 'wrong'. Vox populi, no doubt.

[nazard]

Call me an old fuddy-duddy but I'm never completely comfy with anything other than For All The Saints being sung to Sine Nomine. Same goes for Eventide and Abide With Me, Repton and Dear Lord & Father of Mankind. Rockinghan and When I Survey The Wondrous Cross. To sing anything else to such tunes as these smacks of One Song To the Tune of Another in ISIHAC.

You really should try "Abide with me" to Woodlands, it does put a bit of life into it!

[gwyn]

Nazard suggested

You really should try "Abide with me" to Woodlands, it does put a bit of life into it!

Or "The Old Rugged Cross" to Elvis's "Ol' Shep".

[Peter]

Nazard suggested

You really should try "Abide with me" to Woodlands, it does put a bit of life into it!

Or "The Old Rugged Cross" to Elvis's "Ol' Shep".

One music master at my good old Benedictine school taught us the words of Tantum Ergo by getting us to sing them to Clementine. We never did it that way in Benediction, though!

[docmattc]

I refer the honourable posters to this thread and this thread for one song to the tune of another.

For those not familiar with the rules, its a bit like holydays and closest Sundays. The holyday, or 'words' is made to fit to a Sunday in its vicinity or 'tune'. Sometimes this fits wonderfully, but sometimes leads to confusion and people coming in at the wrong time ... here's Colin Searl at the piano.

Does that get us kind of close to back on thread Mr Bear?

[musicus]

Does that get us kind of close to back on thread Mr Bear?

LOL! Thanks, Doc - even my own post was OT. But you're right, so back to Holy Days, folks!

[gwyn]

It's 2012 before all three holidays fall on weekdays. By then will the habit have died?

It's a very good point, Nick.

[oopsorganist]

That is interesting Nick, ...2012, I think Holy Days will be dead by then, and maybe some of the priests who celebrate them too....... come to think of it, a lot of the people who go to them might not be that active either.....

.......weren't they in the far pre industrial past holidays, off work, you know, well back in the past so ordinary people would go to Mass because they should could.

I used to think it was the right thing to do, to include a hymn that referenced the Holyday that me and a few others might just have missed. Before I used the planner that was.

I was very surprised that our parish Vigil people had not sung to Our Lady when I went to change the hymn numbers on Sunday morning.... then I realised they were the same numbers I had put up the previous Sunday. Ho hum. I bet they sang 4 hymns to Our Lady on Assumption but I didn't mind because I was listening to a choir rehearse in Exeter Cathedral and very nice it was too. (That was when I remembered it was a Holyday).

Maybe we could celebrate those Holydays without complicating the theme of the next Sunday by including liturgical dancing on that day. So only on Sundays that mark the missingness of Holydays would dancing be allowed or encouraged.

[gwyn]

It strikes me that with the recently permitted freedom to use the traditional mass, its associated calendar does not shift feasts and solemnities of Our Lord to the nearest Sunday but rather, retain Ascension Day nine days before Pentecost, Corpus Christi on the Thursday following Trinity Sunday etc.. There! Saved.

[musicus]

I don't think so, Gwyn, and neither do you, I suspect. Though I daresay some buffoon will suggest it in the UK Catholic press.

[docmattc]

It strikes me that with the recently permitted freedom to use the traditional mass, its associated calendar will not shift fasts of Our Lord to the nearest Sunday

But of course opinion differs as to whether use of the extraordinary form also means use of the former calendar. Having two diocesan Ordos (ordi? ) running concurrently would be ...interesting. But that's a whole different thread.

.......weren't they in the far pre industrial past holidays, off work, you know, well back in the past so ordinary people would go to Mass because they should could.

Oops is absolutely right, feast days used to be precisely that- days of feast- but now a holyday means the added pressure of celebrating Mass around the pressures of the normal working week. Hence the observation here that many choose not to add that pressure and the movement of the day to Sunday (for the 'premier league' ones).

If the holydays as we knew them have gone, should we be looking at ways of elevating them when they fall on Sundays and the whole parish is gathered?

A very good point Nick. We can make them that bit more solemn than a Sunday in OT, but the collection of big events around Pentecost (Pentecost, Ascension, Trinity, Corpus Christi) give us a bit of a feast overload, with Pentecost the biggest of the four in my book, not to be outshone by the others.

All this makes me wonder how much the rhythm of the liturgical year is appreciated by most people in the pew. Is the progression of the seasons (and their associated, or intervening, feasts) understood, or is it 'every Sunday on its own merits'?
I'm reminded of someone in another parish who asked the RCIA group when they met in the evening of the first Sunday of Advent "What was different at Mass this morning?" Not one had noticed the move into purple or the absence of the Gloria. I wonder how many of the congregation even notice that next week's Gospel follows on (ish) from this week's? Or am I doing them an injustice?

[oopsorganist]

From where I stand,

I am sure that no one in the pews understands the rhythm of the Liturgical Year. Not sure the person in the organ loft does either. The rhythm used to be determined by those Holy days we are talking about..... that and the notion that certain months were like, er, May the month of Mary, and October the month of the Angels etc etc. When I took over! I was sent to look at the Diocesan Directory to find out what hymns to play.......dear me.