FROM THE RECTOR: CHRISTMAS 2020

Reservations are coming in for the 4:00 PM Christmas Eve service and the 11:00 AM Christmas Day service. We hope we can seat everyone who makes a reservation on or before Monday, December 21, 2020. Reservations will be made on a first-come/first-served basis. The total seats available to be assigned will be determined by the order in which reservations are made for households (some more than a couple) and individuals. Instructions for making reservations can be found here. The services on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day will be live-streamed on Saint Mary’s Facebook page. I will be celebrant and preacher on Christmas Eve, Father Jay Smith on Christmas Day.

The Christmas Eve service will begin at 4:00 PM with a ten-minute music program. The pre-service musical offering is Gloria, Gloria–A Christmas Carol Fantasia by David Hurd, Saint Mary’s organist and music director. The Holy Eucharist will begin at 4:10 PM. The setting of the Mass is Missa Dixit Maria by Hans Leo Hassler (1564-1612). The motet will be known to many as a new Christmas hymn in The Hymnal 1982. The text of “A Stable Lamp is Lighted” is by Richard Wilbur (1921-2017), a distinguished Pulitzer Prize-winning American poet, set to music composed by Dr. Hurd.

On Christmas Day, beginning at 10:50 AM, David’s Gloria, Gloria–A Christmas Carol Fantasia will be a musical prelude. The Eucharist begins at 11:00 AM. The Mass ordinary is the four-voice Missa secunda of Hans Leo Hassler. The motet Hodie Christus natus est by Luca Marenzio (1556–1599) will be sung during the ministration of Communion. As is our custom, we conclude the Christmas Day service with the Angelus. I think Dr. Hurd has put together a program that will bring Christmas praise and joy to us.

I hope Matthew the Evangelist was right about Jesus being born in the town where Joseph and Mary lived, Bethlehem. No woman nearing childbirth should be traveling eighty miles during the ninth month as in Luke. But Mary doesn’t get to be at home with her child. After the magi have done homage to “the king of the Jews,” they don’t return to Herod. Before Herod’s soldiers arrive to kill all of the young boys in Bethlehem, an angel in a dream tells Joseph to take his wife and child to Egypt. Later, when Herod is dead, Joseph thinks the danger is over. Another dream will warn him not to return to Bethlehem. He will take Mary and Jesus to Nazareth.

On Friday, December 18, I was very thankful to hear from Father Jay Smith that his physician cleared him from isolation and quarantine. He has been working from home during his recovery. He will be celebrant and preacher for the Fourth Sunday of Advent. Sunday’s gospel is Luke's annunciation narrative: the angel Gabriel visits Mary (Luke 1:26–38). In Matthew, the annunciation is to Joseph—and in a dream, no angel (Matthew 1:18–25). In neither gospel does Mary attempt to run away from God's plan for her life.

Since first reading the Catechism in The Draft Propose Book of Common Prayer (1976), which becomes our present Prayer Book in 1979, I've always liked its answer to the question, “What is prayer?” The answer is, “Prayer is responding to God, by thought and by deeds, with or without words” (page 856). I hope all of us may find the grace we need to rejoice in God’s plan for our lives as we celebrate the birth of our Savior. Happy Advent. Merry Christmas. —Stephen Gerth

YOUR PRAYERS ARE ASKED FOR Caroline, Barbara, Mark, Ashley, Kim, Matt, Carmen, Shalim, Quincy, Evan, John, Marilouise, Alexandra, Dennis, Ethelyn, Emil, Abraham, Burton, Robert, and Margaret; for all who suffer from COVID-19; for Leo, Robert Hugh, and Nicholas, religious; for Gaylord and Louis, priests, and Charles, bishop, for all those who work for the common good, for all the members and friends of this parish; and for the repose of the souls of Jo Ellen Haire, Luis Vasquez, and Rafael, religious . . . GRANT THEM PEACE . . . December 20: 1884 Louis M. Schmidt; 1886 Maggie E. Troy; 1898 Margaret Gillan; 1901 Mary Amelia Lee; 1902 Hartman Vreeland; 1904 Louisa Camps; 1921 Elizabeth de Mandeville; 1936 Edwin G. Wagenseller.

IN THIS TRANSITORY LIFE . . . Jo Ellen Haire, a close friend of parishioners Eloise Hoffman and Patricia Rheinhold, died on Wednesday, December 16, 2020, in Texarkana, Texas. She was seventy-two years old . . . Brother Rafael Campbell-Dixon, OHC, died early on Friday, December 18, from complications of COVID-19, at a care facility near Holy Cross monastery in West Park, New York. He was eighty-six years old and in the fiftieth year of his life profession. Please keep Jo Ellen, Eloise, Pat, Rafael, the brothers of the Order of the Holy Cross, their family and friends, and all who mourn in your prayers.

THE ORDINARY FRIDAYS OF THE YEAR are observed by special acts of discipline and self-denial in commemoration of the Lord’s crucifixion. Abstinence is dispensed during the Twelve Days of Christmas.

STEWARDSHIP CAMPAIGN 2021 . . . Our stewardship campaign is well underway, and we are receiving pledge cards each day here at the parish. Some statistics may be helpful. We mailed packets to 117 households that pledged last year; to 47 households that did not pledge last year, but did pledge at some point during the previous four years households; and to 698 households that have expressed an interest in supporting the parish in the past. Our goal for the campaign is $400,000. As of Tuesday, December 15, we have received pledges from eighty households. $270,244.00 has been pledged to date. This is only 67.6% of our goal. We encourage all the friends and members of the parish to return their pledge cards before the end of December. This will help the Budget Committee in its work. However, if making a commitment by that date is not possible, we will gladly receive pledge cards at any point during the coming year. Our needs are urgent, especially in these days of the pandemic. Our mission is clear. We invite your support.

NEIGHBORS IN NEED . . . Our clothing ministry outreach, like most everything else in our world today, has faced plenty of challenges in the past nine months. We had to suspend services for much of the year, and, since resuming our distributions, we have adapted our plans and procedures several times to increase social-distancing to keep everyone safe, guests and volunteers alike. Most recently, we’ve decided to return (at least temporarily) to a monthly (instead of a weekly) distribution, which allows us to have more volunteers on distribution day. More volunteers make it possible for us to monitor the use of face coverings, social-distancing, and keeping the flow of people moving efficiently, while making sure our guests are welcome and valued as well. We’ve also added a Plexiglas barrier at the main distribution point (like those you see in most stores these days) and have begun to collect information for contact tracing. We recognize that our guests are often more vulnerable to infection, likely to have one or more underlying health issues, and very often have inadequate access to healthcare should they become ill. So, it is vitally important we do all we can to prevent volunteers from potentially infecting guests, and vice versa.

At the same time, we’ve continued to dream about where this ministry is headed in the future. We’ve expanded and refined our vision, and our sense of who we serve and how we can best sustain this ministry. One thing we’ve realized is that this outreach has been referred to in many ways, but never officially named. So, we’re pleased to formally introduce our newly named “Neighbors in Need” program to the Saint Mary’s community. We believe this title reflects the breadth of our current service and our future vision. We serve a diverse population, some experiencing homelessness or housing insecurity, some unemployed or underemployed, some seniors with limited resources, all of whom we gladly call our neighbors here in the Times Square area. And we’ve attempted to address several needs: primarily clothing and hygiene needs, but also partnering with other services in the past (and again, we hope, in the near future) like free legal aid and social-work services.

The functional word in this new name is surely neighbors (which we’d suggest instead of an abbreviation or acronym as “shorthand” for the title). It evokes the parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:25–37), in which Jesus points out our responsibility to be neighbors rather than to figure out who qualifies as our neighbor. We have provided and continue to provide our assistance to whoever asks, without qualifications or demands. We hope to respond to Christ’s question in the parable, “Which of these was a neighbor?” We hope that our response will always be “We are!”

If you’d like more information, if you’d like to make a financial or clothing donation, or if you’d like to know about volunteering with Neighbors in Need, please contact Brother Damien or Brother Desmond.

THIS WEEK AT SAINT MARY’S . . . Saturday, December 19, The Year’s Mind of the Reverend Thomas McKee Brown, priest and first rector of Saint Mary’s. Father Brown died in the rectory on December 19, 1898 . . . Sunday, December 20, The Fourth Sunday of Advent: Adult Education 9:30 AM; Mass 11:00 AM. The church opens at 10:00 AM and closes at 12:30 PM. The preacher is the Reverend Jay Smith. The service is played by Dr. David Hurd. He will be joined by cantor, Daniel Santiago Castellanos, tenor. This service is live-streamed . . . Thursday, December 24, Eve of The Nativity of Our Lord Jesus Christ. The sun will set on Christmas Eve at 4:34 PM. Christmas Music & The Holy Eucharist 4:00 PM. The Mass itself will begin at 4:10 PM and conclude by 5:10 PM . . . Friday, December 25, The Nativity of Our Lord Jesus Christ: Christmas Day. The church will be open today from 10:00 AM until 2:00 PM. Angelus & Mass 11:00 AM . . . Saturday, December 26, Saint Stephen, Deacon and Martyr, Mass 12:10 PM.

AROUND THE PARISH . . . Bishop Andrew Dietsche issued a message to the diocese this week in which he described and discussed the shooting at the Cathedral of Saint John the Divine on Sunday, December 13. You may read the bishop’s letter on the diocesan website. Please keep the cathedral community, the neighborhood’s first responders, and Luis Vasquez, the man who was shot and killed on Sunday afternoon, in your prayers . . . We heard this week that parishioner Barbara Klett is now at Mount Sinai Saint Luke’s Hospital on 114th Street and Amsterdam Avenue. Please keep her in your prayers . . . Father Peter Powell celebrated the forty-fourth anniversary of his ordination to the priesthood this week. He was ordained on December 18, 1976, at Saint Andrew’s Church, Murray Hill, New Jersey, by John McGill Krumm, VI Bishop of Southern Ohio. Please keep Father Peter in your prayers . . . Father Jay Smith received permission to come out of quarantine on Friday, December 18. He will celebrate Mass on Saturday, December 19, at 12:10 PM, and on Sunday, December 20, at 11:00 AM . . . It makes us very happy to be able to open our doors again for public worship, on weekdays as well as on Sundays. The surge of infections in our city and around the country is concerning. We have committed ourselves to redoubling our efforts to keep every member of the community safe and healthy. If you are at all unwell, do not come to church. If you are experiencing symptoms, contact your primary-care physician and get tested. If you have a fever of 103.5, which is not being handled by an analgesic, and/or you are having difficulty breathing (by difficulty we mean you must stop talking in order to focus on your breathing), go to an emergency room immediately.

NYC HEALTH + HOSPITALS COVID-19 TESTING SITES . . . COVID-19 testing is walk-in only. No appointment is needed. Walk-in testing is available at no cost to you at NYC Health + Hospitals locations. Please visit the NYC Health + Hospital website for further information and for a listing of testing locations. The site also provides information about tests for children both above and below the age of two.

MUSIC AT SAINT MARY’S . . . The organ prelude on Sunday consists of two organ settings of Magnificat by Dieterich Buxtehude (1637–1707), the first based on psalm-tone one and the second based upon psalm-tone nine, commonly called the wandering tone or tonus peregrinus. Buxtehude composed two organ settings for Magnificat on the first tone, the shorter of which begins today’s prelude. This shorter setting resembles many organ Praeludien of the period; it consists of several sections of imitative counterpoint preceded by an improvisatory opening section. These several sections, taken together, are a grand embellishment of psalm tone one. Magnificat noni toni, by contrast, consists of two distinct versets. These two may be the only extant movements of an originally larger set of versets. The ninth-tone melody had been adapted as a chorale for the German Magnificat translation Meine Seele erhebt den Herren. This chorale melody can be heard clearly as a cantus firmus in the first of Buxtehude’s two noni toni versets. The second verset, which is labeled “Versus 5,” is a fugal treatment featuring the opening pitches of this plainsong-derived chorale melody.

Sunday’s postlude is by the celebrated African-American composer Adolphus Hailstork (b. 1941), currently professor of composition at Old Dominion University, Norfolk, Virginia. In Hailstork’s Toccata on “Veni Emmanuel” one can hear fragments of the fifteenth-century Advent hymn O come, O come, Emmanuel, based upon the “O” Antiphons, although the entire chant melody is never stated as such. The unusual meter of five beats to the bar gives the Toccata a curious off-balanced rhythmic energy, and the harmonic dissonances may reflect a world in chaos awaiting the birth of the Savior.

The musical setting of the Mass on the Fourth Sunday of Advent is from the traditional plainsong Mass XVII In Dominicis Adventus et Quadragesimae designated for use on Sundays in Advent and Lent. This setting, as presented in the Graduale Romanum, includes three options for Kyrie, the first two of which are in mode 1. All three are set forth in the traditional nine-fold format with an extended final iteration. The first, Kyrie salve, dates from the tenth century while the second and third (in mode 6) may be of somewhat later origin. The first option, Kyrie salve, will be sung today. Sanctus and Agnus Dei —both in mode 5— are dated from the eleventh and thirteenth centuries, respectively.

The cantor at the 11:00 AM Mass on Sunday is Daniel Castellanos. During the Communion he will sing Ave Maria in E by Camille Saint-Saëns (1835–1921). Saint-Saëns’ involvement in Paris church music began when he was appointed at age seventeen to an organist post at Saint Séverin. Soon thereafter he was appointed to similar post at Saint Merri. His last and most remembered tenure as organist was at the Church of the Madeleine where he served from 1857 to 1877. The genre of the “solo motet” may have originated in Italy with works by Lodovico Viadana (c. 1560–1627) that specified solo vocal performance. In France, this genre was distinguished from vernacular sacred songs (cantiques) by its adherence to Latin liturgical texts. Saint-Saëns’ settings of Ave Maria for solo voice and organ exemplify this genre. His catalogue of works published by Durand includes eleven motets for solo voice and organ. Such solo motets and similar works for two, three, or four voices and organ became fashionable in later nineteenth-century France as a practical response to the short supply of trained church musicians resulting from the social, political, and ecclesial instabilities which characterized the earlier part of the century. Saint-Saëns’ Ave Maria in E is in two sections: a simple Andantino in triple meter followed by a more animated Allegro moderato in duple meter.

More about Sunday’s Cantor: Daniel Santiago Castellanos is a composer, tenor, and pianist based in New Jersey. His piece for mezzo-soprano and piano, Death is nothing at all, won first prize at the 2019 NYC songSLAM competition. Ensembles that have performed his music include the Semiosis Quartet, The Orchestra Now (TŌN), Da Capo Ensemble, and The Saint Thomas Choir of Men and Boys. After graduating from Bard College Conservatory of Music in 2018, he will attend Mannes School of Music at the New School to pursue graduate studies in composition in the fall of 2021. Daniel has been a member of the Choir of Saint Mary’s since the autumn of 2018.

CHRISTIAN EDUCATION . . . Please note: all the adult-education classes this year begin at 9:30 AM, NOT at 10:00 AM.

The Adult Forum has begun its Christmas break. Classes resume on Sunday, January 10, 9:30 AM, in Saint Joseph’s Hall.

We are very grateful to Grace Mudd and to Father Peter Powell, who taught our classes this fall. We owe a debt of gratitude to Grace Mudd who made it possible to offer the classes via Zoom, which made it possible for those not able, or ready, to come to the class in person to participate in the discussions.

In January, after the Christmas break, Brother Damien Joseph SSF will lead the Sunday morning adult-education class in a discussion of Christian mysticism, focusing on five different figures from the Western Christian mystical tradition. The series is “Christian Mysticism and the Secret of Knowing God.” These classes will take place on the following dates and, after an introductory class, will focus on a different mystic each week: January 10, Introduction; January 17, Clare of Assisi (1194-1253); January 24, Ramon Llull (1232-1315); and January 31, Bonaventure (1221-1274). Brother Damien may also add a fifth and final session on February 7, during which he will discuss Francisco de Osuna (1492/1497–c. 1540) and his practice of recollection (akin to centering prayer) discussed in his Third Spiritual Alphabet.

For all these classes, seating in Saint Joseph’s Hall will be arranged to maximize social-distancing. Unfortunately, we will not be able to provide refreshments. All those attending the class must wear a face covering.

MARK YOUR CALENDAR . . . Monday, December 28, Saint John the Evangelist (transferred), Mass 12:10 PM . . . Tuesday, December 29, Holy Innocents (transferred), Mass 12:10 PM.

AT THE GALLERIES . . . At the Morgan Library and Museum, 225 Madison Avenue, at Thirty-sixth Street, Charles Dickens’s “A Christmas Carol,” December 7, 2020, through January 11, 2021. From the museum website, “Every holiday season, the Morgan displays Charles Dickens’s original manuscript of A Christmas Carol in J. Pierpont Morgan’s Library. Dickens wrote his iconic tale in a six-week flurry of activity beginning in October 1843 and ending in time for Christmas publication. He had the manuscript bound in red goatskin leather as a gift for his solicitor, Thomas Mitton. The manuscript then passed through several owners before Pierpont Morgan acquired it in the 1890s.

“Beginning a few years ago, the Morgan started advancing the Christmas Carol manuscript by one page each season. This year the manuscript is open to Scrooge’s vituperative remarks about Christmas, which, he believes, is nothing more than “a time for finding yourself a year older and not an hour richer.” For the obstinate Scrooge, “every idiot who goes about with ‘Merry Christmas’ on his lips, should be boiled with his own pudding, and buried with a stake of holly through his heart. He should!” Scrooge’s nephew Fred counters with a spirited vindication of the holiday, “though it has never put a scrap of gold or silver in [his] pocket”: “[it is] the only time I know of, in the long calendar of the year, when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut-up hearts, freely.”

Please visit the museum’s website for information about planning a visit and the museum’s COVID restrictions.

This edition of the Angelus was written and edited by Father Stephen Gerth and Father Jay Smith. Father Gerth is responsible for posting the newsletter on the parish website and for distributing it via mail and e-mail, with the assistance of Christopher Howatt.