This quarter's Music & Liturgy has just hit the door mat

[gwyn]

. . . and what an information-packed edition it looks to be. I can't wait to get home from choir rehearsal in order to delve into the pages therein.

Yeee-hah!

[musicus]

Yeee-hah ?

[gwyn]

Yeee-ha!

Good stuff therein. Guidance for us would-be composers, help in accompanying plainchant, in fact just the very sort of things I imagined I would find when I first subscribed.

Brilliant!

Well done.

[docmattc]

Good stuff indeed. As we're looking at our liturgical environment at the moment Ann Blackett Moynihan's article is especially timely. I played at a baptism this afternoon where the child was baptised in a birdbath!!

Look forward to carrying on the board's current topics in the bar at Worth tomorrow.

[oopsorganist]

Yes

Good stuff I enjoyed it. Not quite enough to fill a day sat in jury room though.

I am still wondering why no Mass at Confirmation. I might add that at our Service of the Word, which was praised by all including clergy (ta to Joe Burns) we sang Happy Birthday Dear Bishop which really made it most festive. With a Mass it would have been a two hour plus service. Without having a number of "spare" songs rehearsed it would have been a lot of walking about too.

And I always wondered why I can hear the congregation singing a bit after the organ, thought they were just being subversive! Not really but interesting article and just the sort of thing we need.

Also liked the Environment item and now wondering why we have a whole lot of our church - the old High Altar unused save for a good place for the Christmas Tree. Did try positioning the music group up there but it did not work, too exposed and too much like a performance. We have got a birdbath too. Food for thought.

[gwyn]

Ooops said

" . . . the old High Altar unused save for a good place for the Christmas Tree"

In Cardiff Cathedral the tabernacle no longer occupies the central position but rather has been reduced to sideshow status. It looks all but dejected in the south-east of the church - as someone once rather unkindly said "like a parrot's cage covered over for the night".

This seems to happen a lot these days, I don't understand why. I can see the sense in big city churches of historical significance where Joe Public shuffles around looking at artwork and architecture, jabbering as he goes. In such a church it makes good sense that the Blessed Sacrament be enthroned with dignity in a quiet chapel set aside for prayer and devotion, away from the throng many of whom perhaps do not understand or respect the Presence. But in Cardiff ? ? ? Most fine artwork there was destroyed by airborne visitors between 1939-45, anything that might have survived would've been destroyed following the Council.

Our Lady of The Rosary, Merthyr Tydfil has relegated the tabernacle to the north east corner of the church. No chance of a heathen throng there, it's locked up when there's no Mass being celebrated.

Should not the tabernacle take centre position in our midst? Or have I got it all very wrong (again)?

[oopsorganist]

Yes I should not have forgot that the tabernacle is there too. Oops.

But it is so far away from the rest of the church that you have to take a pack -up if you go up there to it.

Tis a space of about 25 feet by 25 feet. Loadsa space.

[PaulW]

Testing a new feature of the board, here's a picture of this issue's front cover.

Keep the feedback coming - it is all useful to the editors, even if it is conflicting: whilst most of you seem to have welcomed the inclusion of music in the articles, there is a vocal minority that thought there was too much . We do try to maintain a balance, but it is over the volume, not in any one issue, and it does need good material on the subjects to be submitted…

One thing we do need is good pictures for the front cover. As you can see below, the top right and bottom left are where the text goes, so the picture needs to be across the top left/bottom right. If you have something that you think is suitable, PM me and we can discuss what's needed in more detail.

[obekosomatic]

very nice indeed

[docmattc]

Its a niggling point but I would greatly appreciate consecutive issues having different coloured covers. I'm a simple soul and often forget to look at the volume number.

[docmattc]

Should not the tabernacle take centre position in our midst?

Its a contentious one this, but GIRM envisages that the tabernacle is not a prominent feature whilst the sacrifice of the cross if being re-enacted during the Mass. The 'making present' theology is a bit dulled if the tabernacle is more prominent than the altar.

Let's remember that the Blessed Sacrament is reserved in the first place so that Communion may be taken to the sick and the dying. While I'm not criticising it at all, Eucharistic adoration is secondary to that function. In all of John 6, which (apart from this Sunday) we're hearing at the moment, Jesus feeds the people with the bread of life. The wonderful thing for me about the Eucharist is that we are fed, not that we can pop into church and adore it.

[musicus]

Its a niggling point but I would greatly appreciate consecutive issues having different coloured covers. I'm a simple soul and often forget to look at the volume number.

OTOH, I file them on my bookcase by year, and having them distinguished by colour makes it much easier to find what I am looking for. Also, I'm sure that if the editors had to come up with a new colour for each issue they would soon be tearing their hair out.

[musicus]

Let's remember that the Blessed Sacrament is reserved in the first place so that Communion may be taken to the sick and the dying. While I'm not criticising it at all, Eucharistic adoration is secondary to that function. In all of John 6, which (apart from this Sunday) we're hearing at the moment, Jesus feeds the people with the bread of life. The wonderful thing for me about the Eucharist is that we are fed, not that we can pop into church and adore it.

Or as the Church of England puts it so nicely, 'The Sacrament of the Lord's Supper was not by Christ's ordinance reserved, carried about, lifted up, or worshipped.' (Article XXVIII, Articles of Religion, The Book of Common Prayer)

[contrabordun]

Is that conclusively for, or against?

[gwyn]

. . . and the 39 Articles go on to say

. . .Transubstantiation (or the change of the substance of bread and wine) in the Supper of the Lord, cannot be proved by Holy Writ, but is repugnant to the plain words of Scripture, overthroweth the nature of a Sacrament, and hath given occasion to many superstitions.

You'll be hard pressed to find many CofE ministers who adhere to the 39 Articles.

Article XXI is a cracker

General Councils may not be gathered together without the commandment and will of Princes.