ABOUT THE MUSIC ON CHRISTMAS EVE, DECEMBER 24

A Selection of Choral & Congregational Carols at 9:30 PM

Arnold Bax (1883–1953) was a British composer, poet, and author, who was born into a prosperous London family which encouraged his musical development. He was educated at the Royal Academy of Music and eventually, in 1942, he was appointed Master of the King’s Music. Bax is remembered for his songs, choral music, chamber pieces, and solo piano works, but he is probably best regarded for his orchestral music which has grown in favor in recent decades.

FROM FATHER WOOD: 100 DAYS OF DANTE

For me, 2022 will go down as the year I fell in love with Saint Mary’s — and Dante. 

Back in the summer, I joined “100 Days of Dante,” billed as “the world’s largest Dante reading group.” Each day, I’d read one canto of Dante’s Divine Comedy, his fourteenth-century epic poem universally recognized as one of the marvels of world literature, and then watch an eight- or nine-minute video of some academic explaining to me what on earth I’d just read. Within a few days, I was hooked.

FROM FATHER PETER POWELL: ON STIR UP SUNDAY

This coming Sunday, December 11, is of course Rose Sunday. It is also known as Gaudete Sunday. But it is also Stir Up Sunday, and I’d like to say a few words about why this is so. The term comes from the opening words of the collect appointed for the Third Sunday of Advent in the Book of Common Prayer 1979.

FROM DR. DAVID HURD:
THE CHOIR OF SAINT MARY’S 2022-2023

For most of the documented history of the Church, singing has been integral to its gatherings for worship. We at Saint Mary the Virgin, where Solemn Mass is the primary Sunday morning expression, have experienced on a week-by-week basis and participated in the great song of faith which has been offered in praise and thanksgiving through the ages to the Giver of all gifts.

George Herbert (1593-1633)
Gratefulnesse

THou that hast giv’n so much to me,
Give one thing more, a gratefull heart.
See how thy beggar works on thee

By art.

He makes thy gifts occasion more,
And sayes, If he in this be crost,
All thou hast giv’n him heretofore

Is lost.

FROM FATHER JAY SMITH: BUT JOY COMES IN THE MORNING

Richard Mammana is a friend of Saint Mary’s and the founder of Project Canterbury, “a free online archive of out-of-print Anglican texts and related modern documents…” Richard is, among other things, an archivist. He understands the importance of primary sources: the pamphlet, the obscure essay, the parish magazine, the out-of-print volume by the long-forgotten theologian. These documents can sometimes seem to be of only limited or local interest. But suddenly there they are on the website, authentic voices from the past, just waiting to be heard, prepared to answer the very question that needs answering today.

FROM ANGELINE BUTLER: ON MY EXPERIENCE WITH THE CIVIL RIGHTS MOVEMENT

I am Angeline Butler. My parents were teachers: the Reverend and Mrs. Isaac Bartley Butler, a Baptist minister, a principal of the Crossroads School in Eastover, South Carolina, a farmer, and a community leader. College for me was Fisk University, in Nashville, Tennessee. I was only fifteen. I was favored by Dr. John W. Work II of the Fisk Jubilee Singers and Dr. and Mrs. Nelson Fuson, who were American Friends. We went to the First Baptist Church to see the Rev. James Morris Lawson, Jr., speak about Jesus Christ, Gandhi, the Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr., and the practice of nonviolence, a creative strategy for changing segregation in the South.

FROM BLAIR BURROUGHS: CENTERING PRAYER

Centering Prayer is a method of silent prayer that prepares us to receive the gift of contemplative prayer, prayer in which we experience God's presence within us, closer than breathing. This is the official definition of Centering Prayer from Contemplative Outreach, the organization that was founded to promote Centering Prayer. In essence, Centering Prayer is a Christian form of what we usually think of as meditation.

FROM FATHER WOOD: ON STEWARDSHIP

When I arrived as your interim rector back in February, I couldn’t know I’d come to love this place so much so fast! And I had no idea the treasure I’d discover Saint Mary the Virgin to be.

Here’s one reason Saint Mary’s is so very important. Back in May, a New York Times article said 300,000 people are visiting Times Square every day — still 20% under the pre-pandemic high, but that’s over 50 million visitors this year!

FROM DR. HURD: FEAST DAY ORGAN RECITALS 2022-2023

The organ at Saint Mary’s, Aeolian-Skinner Opus 891, dates from 1932 with additions in 1942 and 2002. It is a legendary instrument due to its high rear-galley installation and the resultingly rich musical voice it has given to the legendary worship tradition of Saint Mary’s, its sonic refinement (in contrast with its strikingly unfinished appearance), its thrilling engagement of the lively acoustics of the church, and the remarkable musicians, too many to name, who have brought it to life, performing on it through the years in the liturgy, in recital, and on recordings.

FROM MARYJANE BOLAND: ALL OUR NEIGHBORS IN NEED

For many years, Saint Mary’s Neighbors in Need program has provided gently-used clothing, newly-purchased underwear, and toiletries to neighbors in need. Some of our clients are just that: people who live nearby; others are homeless. Some have jobs, some do not, all find it difficult to make ends meet. They all come to us seeking the sort of assistance that we offer.

FROM FATHER WOOD: TO WHOM THAT WATER CAME WERE HEALED

If you've been at Sunday Mass recently, no doubt you’ve noticed the return of the Asperges. This rite, which precedes the Mass, is the practice of sprinkling worshipers with holy water as a reminder of our baptisms, and the name comes from the Latin version of Psalm 51, “Thou shalt sprinkle me with hyssop.”

FROM FATHER WOOD: ON PROGRAMS AND COMMUNITY

I’m writing this looking out on Mount Monadnock in New Hampshire, where I’m on my annual clergy Covenant Group retreat — a group of men, mostly priests, who cycled through the same little parish church on the North Shore of Boston back when I was in Seminary.

FROM DR. HURD: THE CHOIR OF SAINT MARY’S RETURNS

Following the choir’s customary summer break, fully choral Sunday Solemn Masses will resume on 2 October. For the fourteen Sundays between Corpus Christi and the end of September, individual cantors, all members of the choir, have provided musical leader at Sunday Masses.

FROM FATHER WOOD: HOLY CROSS DAY & THE HOLY LAND

This past Wednesday was Holy Cross Day, a feast the Church keeps every September 14. In the East, it is called the Exaltation of the Holy Cross. It is said that Saint Helena, the mother of Constantine the Great, the Roman Emperor, traveled to the Holy Land in search of lost holy sites and relics, and she ordered the excavation that uncovered the true cross of Christ.

FROM FATHER JACOBSON: COMMUNITY AT THE CROSSING

A few weeks ago, in the July 31 issue of the Angelus, Father Wood wrote to us about Christian unity on the occasion of the Lambeth Conference, where unity even within Anglicanism seemed challenging. Of course, despite these challenges, we need to be even more ambitious and pray not just for unity amongst ourselves, but pray for and work towards unity of the entire Body of Christ.

FROM FATHER SMITH: THE LOVE OF LEARNING

In March 2020, it was not apparent to many of us how disruptive COVID-19 would be to everyday life in New York and in the lives of people around the world. But disruptive it has surely been. One of the great disruptions has been to education.

FROM THE EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE: SEARCHING FOR THE NEXT RECTOR

The Executive Committee of the Board of Trustees, which consists of the President, Vice President, Secretary, and Treasurer of the Board, is delighted to announce that Mary Robison and Mark Risinger have graciously agreed to serve as co-chairs of the Rector Search Committee, which begins its work this fall. Their first task is to select the membership of the committee itself.

FROM GLADYS RAMOS-REYES: MY SPIRITUAL JOURNEY

Raised by a staunch Roman Catholic mother, I spent many of my childhood days reading and debating the Bible with my brother. One of life’s adversities led me to disconnect from the Roman Catholic faith during my teenage years. I then spent what felt like a lifetime searching for a new faith. Throughout this time, my own spirituality began to unfold, and I began using language such as “I’m one of God’s helpers,” a very active role in my personal life.

FROM FATHER JACOBSON: PRAY FOR US O HOLY MOTHER OF GOD

“O God, you have taken to yourself the blessed Virgin Mary, mother of your incarnate Son: Grant that we, who have been redeemed by his blood, may share with her the glory of your eternal kingdom; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.” (BCP, 243)

The first thing one may notice in this collect for the Assumption from the 1979 Book of Common Prayer is that it doesn’t say anything about the Blessed Virgin Mary being assumed bodily into heaven. Given that the day is simply entitled “Saint Mary the Virgin” in the BCP, it is consistent with the Episcopal Church seeming to sidestep somewhat this aspect of Marian tradition, while leaving enough room for each to interpret “O God, you have taken to yourself the blessed Virgin Mary” as they see fit.