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Posted on by Adam Bartlett

Supper of the Lamb: The Mass as Heaven on Earth Conference

The Franciscan University of Steubenville has now posted videos for the five talks given at the October 15th Liturgical Conference entitled “The Supper of the Lamb: The Mass as Heaven on Earth” which was centered around the new translation of the Roman Missal.

I had the great privilege to present a talk entitled “Perspectives on Liturgical Music”, one that was very similar to the talk that I gave to the Steubenville liturgical musicians a month earlier at their Fall retreat.

The talks given by Dr.’s John Bergsma and Scott Hahn are a must-watch for a profound deepening of an understanding of the liturgy’s scriptural roots, made ever more clear with the new translation. His Excellency Bp. Serratelli gave some insight into the process of producing the new translation. Dr. Denis McNamara gave a one hour summary of his new book Catholic Church Architecture and the Spirit of the Liturgy and I was able to follow his lead and apply many of the same principles to sacred music.

It was incredible to see how the five different topics complimented one another and built on each other (entirely coincidentally) throughout the day. Watching them all in succession would be of great benefit to those who have the time to watch the entire conference.

Below are the five talks given in the one day conference by Bp. Serratelli, John Bergsma, Denis McNamara, Adam Bartlett and Scott Hahn. Thanks to Franciscan University and Christ the King Chapel for filming the entire conference and for making it available for all online.

Posted on by Jeffrey Tucker

Wonderful Article in Priest Magazine

This article is a real surprise in every way: it gets the big picture and the implementation of sacred music. It is fantastic to see something like this in a large circulation mainstream publication. It is by Brian MacMichael & Michael Roesch.

Also worth noting is the increased interest in singing the propers of the Mass — the Introit, Offertory, and Communion chants that are almost universally supplanted by hymns. These proper texts are actually the preferred option in the GIRM, but resources for their singing in English have only been rolling out in the past few years. Their use is beginning to gain traction, often in addition to the hymns Catholics have come to love.

All of these preferences for singing amount to what those closest to the translation have called “singing the Mass” rather than merely “singing at Mass.” The liturgical ideal has always been a sung Mass, and too often in the English-speaking world we have maintained a “Low Mass” mentality from pre-Vatican II days. Singing the prayers of the Mass in a simple tone, or at least on a single pitch, is doable for any priest with a little practice, does not add a significant amount of time to the liturgy, and can greatly enrich our worship. Imagine if, instead of reserving sung dialogues and prefaces for high feast days, singing them was the norm for all Sunday Masses. The Gospel and Eucharistic Prayer could then be chanted when we wished to express added solemnity.