‘Factus est repénte’ – Communion Proper for Pentecost

Once again, Stan Metheny has written a wonderful commentary on the Pentecost Communion Proper, ‘Factus est repénte.’

The chant composers often painted ‘musical pictures’ with their melodies to illustrate events and/or emotions in the text. The chants of today’s formulary, like those of the Ascension last week, are all rich with such melodic images. But the Pentecost Communion is such an exceptionally vivid one that I can’t resist making at least some brief comments. The immediate rise and fall of the intonation phrase immediately calls to mind the scene in the Upper Room: the apostles were gathered together in prayer with other disciples and our Blessed Mother, when the sound of a rushing wind coming down from above drew their eyes upward, whence the quick rise in melody of Factus est, and then the tongues of fire suddenly fell, whence the just as sudden fall of the melody in the ultima of repente. We can almost feel in our bodies the breathless, stupefied wonder that those in that room must have felt. But we don’t have any time to dwell on that because we’ll soon have work to do. The soaring lift of the melody on sonus confirms what the texts says, viz., that the sound—and its accompanying reality—came from heaven. Then the gentle lowering of the melody over ubi erant sedentes reflects the seated posture of the group. And then the melody lifts up again to depict the effect of their being filled with the Holy  Spirit: they immediately got up and went to announce the mirabilia Dei, the wonderful works of salvation that God has done in this Jesus who was crucified and is now risen. Alleluia. (And as Fr. Harrison reminded us in his homily on 5^th Sunday of Easter, we have the same work to do now.)

We were also fortunate enough to study this piece with the choirmistress Sister Bernadette at St.Cecilia’s, Ryde. As she turned the page of her Graduale to the Communion Proper her face lit up and she smiled and said, this is one of favourite phrases. “Loquentes magná lia Dei.’  ‘The great things God has done.’ She then continued to talk about the wonders of Mode 7, a mode so appropriate for Pentecost because it is full of drama. It has an energetic propensity for ascending and descending passages and as with the other Pentecost chants, the range is large, the notes soar to the top of the stave. And so this chant must be sung with great energy. No slowing at the first alleluia before the full bar line. On the second Torculus on the ‘rant’ of ‘erant’  there is a instruction in the St Laon neumes to slow down. We must also be very careful with the Latinised pronunciation of ‘alleluia.’ The pretonic syllables (a Hebrew expression for the syllables before the tonic syllable or the accented syllable) of ‘al’ and ‘le’ must be as equally emphasised as the ‘lu’.

Sing this glorious piece with as much energy as you can muster up. Let the high notes of ‘sonus‘ or ‘sound’ reverberate throughout the church. Be filled with the Holy Spirit! Alleluia indeed.

Stan Metheny on ‘Oculi Mei’ the Introit for 3rd Sunday of Lent

Stan continues his series on the Introits of Lent, exclusively for this site.

In the Rome of the early Christian centuries the solemn services on the third Sunday of Lent were held in the Church of St. Lawrence, to thank God for the grace of Baptism and the sonship of God, which was attained through it. The catechumens joined the baptized for the beginning of the liturgy. At the church of the deacon St. Lawrence, their patron, they were examined today, as on seven other days of Lent, about the doctrine they had studied, and inquiry was made into their manner of life. So the present Sunday was also called the Sunday of scrutinies. Prayers were said over the catechumens and the first exorcism performed in order to destroy the power of the devil in their souls.

So the composer of this Introit was concerned in a special manner to give prominent expression to one word, the word which predominates over the rest of the antiphon: evellet—He liberates me, plucks my foot from the snare, frees me. Whatever of consolation and joy—a joy like that of Easter—this word contained, was to penetrate into the heart of the catechumens; at the same time it was to arouse a powerful longing for happiness, for the freedom of the children of God. Evellet takes the part of a leitmotif, receiving a wonderful development especially in today’s Gospel. However great Satan’s power may be, a superior power will take the field against him. Christ will conquer him, will cast him out from the souls of men and despoil him of the weapons in which he had placed his trust. Thus prays the Introit: Oculi mei—my eyes are ever fixed upon the Lord. Text and melody exhibit a pleasing, symmetric construction.

In the first part we look up to God; in the second we beg Him graciously to look down upon us. Each part, in its second phrase, adduces a reason. “My eyes are towards the Lord,” quia. . . ” for He shall pluck my feet out of the snare;” in the second part: “look Thou upon me,” quoniam. . . “for I am alone and poor.” In the first phrase, the melody, corresponding to its text, tends upward: Oculi mei…and especially evellet. In the second phrase we must regard it as more than mere coincidence that there are four descending fourths over the petition: Look Thou upon me. Oculi, setting in with an interval of a fifth, reminds us of the first word of the Introit for the third Mass of Christmas, Puer. The melody over me is also known to us from the same Introit. There it occurs over the word nobis. Similarly the close: sum ego, sounds like that of the Christmas Introit over Angelus. Then, like imperium in the Christmas melody, evellet ascends to high f. In the present Introit, however, the development is more ornate, it is drawn on a grander scale, and the accents with the frequent pressus forms are more energetic. With unflinching eye the singer gazes upward to God. This is shown not only by the protraction of the dominant, but especially by the annotated manuscript reaching back as far as the tenth century. Over semper they demand a broad rendition of all the notes—a valuable psychological indication. We meet the cadence of Dominum again at the end of the second part over unicus, and in a somewhat extended form over (miserere) mei. The unsatisfactory cadence at the close of the first part would lead us to expect a continuation. The second part, respice—”look upon me”—is melodically more tender, more fervent, more suppliant, but its range is less extended.

Respice still has a range of a sixth (g-e); the subsequent members of the phrase, however, confine themselves to a fifth (f-c). The harsh triton over pauper agrees well with the subdued feeling. In the psalm-verse a light secondary accent on the third syllable further increases the rest and the rhythmic clearness. Thus, after the introductory formula over Ad, quiet two-note groups follow. In the second half of the verse the significant little word te “(in Thee . . I put my trust”) must not be neglected; still the flow of the whole must not be interrupted by it.

If, in the first place, the Church prayed in the stead of those who are preparing for Baptism, she has to pray for many today who after Baptism have again become the prey of the devil, who have again strayed into his snares, from which they cannot or will not liberate themselves. From our own experience we know that he does not very readily resign his domination over a man; that, like a spider, he spins his webs, employing our evil propensities and the seductions of the world to ensnare us. We are well aware of the difficulty of the struggle and the extent of our weakness. This calls for much and fervent prayer; we must fix our eyes on the Lord (Oculi mei semper ad Dominum), we must implore Him to look down upon us in his mercy. And this we do eloquently in the words of the Collect:

Deus, omnium misericordiarum et totius bonitatis auctor, qui peccatorum remedia in ieiuniis, orationibus et eleemosynis demonstrasti, hanc humilitatis nostrae confessionem propitious intuere, ut, qui inclinamur conscientia nostra, tua semper misericordia sublevemur.
God, author of all mercies and all goodness, who has shown us the remedies of our sins in fasting, prayer, and almsgiving, look graciously upon this admission of our lowliness, so that we who are bowed down by the weight of our conscience might always be lifted up by your mercy.

Tibi Dixit Cor Meum – 2nd Sunday in Lent. Stan Metheny

On the 2^nd of the Lenten Sundays, in the Ordinary Form, the chants echo those  of the   feast of the Transfiguration, which is the Gospel of the day.

In the Introit, Tibi Dixit cor meum, we sing in the ethereal Mode 3, which Guido  D’Arezzo called  mystical, as we contemplate the majesty of the face of God  revealed to us in  Jesus transfigured  on the mountain. The melody clearly portrays  this with  several sustained notes on the   dominant do. We reach for the heights to  which  the transfigured Jesus calls us and  which he shows us are our destiny, if we  really hear Him. The words of the psalmist here are clear: it is my heart that seeks  to  contemplate God as he is. Heart is most  often used in the Scriptures to  represent the    deepest dimensions of the human person, the font of life, the will, the  desire, a type of  understanding that surpasses that of the mind—although the liturgy  tells us that the  mind provides important underpinnings and support to the emotions of the heart that  drive us and our behaviour. We keep our feet solidly on the ground, even though we  are on holy ground and reaching for the One Who Is beyond us.

Tibi dixit cor meum, quaesivi vultum tuum, vultum tuum Domine requiram: ne faciem tuam avertis a me. Ps. Dominus illuminatio mea et salus mea: quem timebo?

My heart said to You, I have sought Your countenance; I will seek Your countenance again, Lord. Do not turn Your face away from me. Ps. The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom will I fear?

Here again, as we saw last Sunday, the chants have a very uplifting and positive thrust, despite the fact that we are in Lent, the season of penance and sorrow for sin. The Preface explains briefly why we need to hear this message today. Like the apostles, we will soon face the reality of the passion and death of the Lord. We must not forget that it leads to His resurrection. [in monte sancto suam eis aperuit claritatem, ut per passionem, etiam lege prophetisque testantibus, ad gloriam resurrectionis perveniri constaret. He showed them his brightness, so that it would be clear that he would come through to the glory of the resurrection, as the law and the prophets bear witness.] For a more thorough explanation of this, read the extract from a sermon of Pope St. Leo the Great found in the Office of Readings for the day. (An English version is available at www.universalis.com.)

The psalm verse in the Introit speaks to this very directly. Confronted by the startling gap between the glory of God revealed in Jesus and our own sinfulness, we do not need to fall down in fear, as the apostles did on the mountain. The cross and resurrection of Jesus, pre-figured in his transfigured body, are now a living reality in our world. Fear is driven away when we can see the Lord as our true light and our salvation. No wonder that the chant is triumphant; it is a chant to accompany our entrance onto our own holy mountain, as the priest goes before us to ascend the altar of sacrifice on our behalf: Jesus Christ going to the cross to offer Himself to the Father. It is a powerful reminder that our Lenten self-denial is not negative for its own sake, but as a means to transform ourselves into the fully human person we are called to be. Only by stripping away the false and transitory can we see what is true and enduring.

In recent decades, it’s become popular to think that our Lenten self-denial should generate monetary savings and that in turn will fund our almsgiving. Not a surprising way of thinking in an age when economic ‘quid pro quo’ measures loom large in our minds. But . . . well . . . ‘not exactly,’ as the popular expression goes. Eating less, drinking less, speaking less, shopping less, less media stimulation, or however else we might deny ourselves customary comforts, are all ways to provide more time for prayer and silence, and to strengthen us for the struggles we face. Then, in that quiet, we learn the transforming value of prayer and the liberating exhilaration of almsgiving. In their turn, praying and sharing change us; they make us richer. Just as we ask God to not turn his face from us, so we must not turn our face away from the needs of the poor, in whose face we behold Him. Or as the Collect succinctly says it: verbo tuo interius nos pascere digneris, ut, spiritali purificato intuitu, gloriae tuae laetemur aspectu. deign to feed us inwardly with Your word, so that, once our understanding has been purified, we may rejoice in the sight of Your glory.

In doing these things, we will be telling others of the great vision we have seen. And Christ is now raised from the dead, so it’s indeed time to tell the vision. Sing this Introit with gusto!

Lent : Lent is More by Stan Metheny

This article is published  in the March edition of  ‘Oremus’  the  Westminster Cathedral  magazine. Stan has  kindly let me reproduce  the entire article for this  site.

Hold on! Has Lent come around again already? Where does the time go? It seems we just finished celebrating Pentecost, and here we are again coming right up to Ash Wednesday. And these days, at least for those of us who follow the Ordinary Form calendar, we move directly from Ordinary Time to Lent without Septuagesima, Sexagesima, and Quinquagesima Sundays to serve as a warning. A bit harsh, really, to send me there without any warm-up time to ease into it. Lent’s too often half over before I get my Lenten act together. And that’s a waste, now that I’ve finally come to appreciate Lent’s stark beauty.

In my younger years I was not much of a fan of Lent. All that fasting and sacrifice and darkness and depriving really put a damper on things. We eased into it in stages, burying the Alleluia on the Saturday before Septuagesima Sunday, chanting the haunting melody of the Introit Exsurge on Sexagesima, using the purple Vestments, and not bringing flowers to decorate the altars. Then it began in earnest on Ash Wednesday with the pointed reminder that we are humans and destined for death: Memento, homo, quia pulvis es, et in pulverem reverteris. The changes in our diet and music reinforced the message that we needed to make some changes in our lives if we were to be properly prepared for that moment of death and what lay beyond. After 40 days of the diet changes, I welcomed no day of year as much as I did Holy Saturday. After the long and lovely Vigil, we saw the return of regular meat and sweets to the dinner table and I could again have snacks between meals. And the organ was back again! This left me with no doubts that the Resurrection of our Lord from the dead was the most important event in history, and the annual celebration of that day was certainly my most important annual mood shift. Winter was finally ending and Lent was done for another year, thank God! That lifted my spirits and was in turn its own resurrection of sorts for me.

Through the years, my perceptions have changed. I’ve come around now to a point where I actually welcome Lent. The reduction in my consumption of conversation, food, drink, sleep, and fun offers a certain satisfaction. It helps heighten my awareness that this is a sacred time, a special gift of a season to prepare for my redemption from self-absorbed over-consumption and stimulation and other obstables to the freedom that God wants His children to enjoy. Pope St. Gregory the Great put this in poetry, in a wonderful hymn, Ex more docti mystico, that we sing in the Office of Readings (Matins) on the Sundays of Lent until Holy Week.

Utamur ergo parcius verbis, cibis et potibus, somno, iocis et arctius perstemus in custodia

More sparing therefore let us make, our words and food and drink we take, our sleep and mirth—and closer barr’d be every sense in holy guard.

 

Even in the secular world today, it’s become fashionable to see certain deprivations as cleansing and healthy. Some fasting from food, some abstaining from alcohol or sweets, some limits to conversation, television, and media stimulation, are all techniques recognised as helping restore balance to areas of our lives that have become distorted. Dedicated time for meditation and sharing of our material goods with others are also ways the self-help industry has identified and promoted as being important steps along the road to greater self-actualization. Less is more.

In Christian spirituality, such focused activities have a long history. We have traditionally labelled them fasting, prayer, and almsgiving; they constitute the ‘three pillars’ of a good Lent. The deprivations of pleasure and external stimulation along with the time for prayer that I impose on myself are, as the self-help gurus will agree, not designed to make me miserable or to encourage suffering for its own sake. Rather, I do these things to remove distractions that can prevent me from seeing who I really am, God’s own likeness and dwelling place, and learning to love myself so that I can then truly love the image of that same God in others. In silentia procedit pius animus, Thomas a Kempis writes in The Imitation of Christ, ‘in silence the devout soul makes progress.’ In the quiet, with external distractions moved, I can begin to have time to hear the voice of the indwelling Spirit who calls out to me in love. The cares and pleasures of the world are all too quick to drown out that call. St. Gregory’s hymn continues:

Memento quod sumus tui, licet caduci, plasmatis; ne des honorem nominis tui, precamur, alteri.

Remember Thou, though frail we be, that yet Thine handiwork are we; nor let the honor of Thy Name be by another put to shame.

 

In addition to the joy of self-discovery, the discipline involved in these traditional practices, done properly, also has other beneficial side-effects. I find it less difficult to avoid doing things that are harmful or to correct or modify bad habits I’ve developed. In more traditional language, I find it easier to ‘turn away from sin.’ Once again, St. Gregory’s hymn puts it in poetry:

Vitemus autem pessima quæ subruunt mentes vagas, nullumque demus callido hosti locum tyrannidis.

Avoid the evil thoughts that roll like waters o’er the heedless soul; nor let the foe occasion find our souls in slavery to bind.

 

This radical pruning of all the encumbrances that I’ve allowed myself to develop, the removal of obstacles to a re-discovery of my real self, is an important step in preparing myself for the ‘new life’ that Easter offers to those who live the Paschal mystery. Becoming a ‘new being in Christ’ won’t happen if I try to include all of the unnecessary baggage I’ve been lugging along.

It goes without saying that all of this is ultimately intended, as the formula for the imposition of ashes so clearly states at the outset, to help me re-align my priorities in life with what is truly important and in line with the goal of life without end when this earthly body returns to dust. To use the well-known quote from Epistle to the Hebrews: non enim habemus hic manentem civitatem. ‘We have not here a lasting city.’ Although the grace of God is with me here and now, I am on the way to somewhere else. Lent is to remind me of that, and to prepare me to celebrate the mystery of the passing over from this life to the next, by way of Christ’s death on the cross and resurrection from the dead. His passover, or ‘paschal’ mystery, is the first fruits of what is intended to be my destiny and yours: quo procéssit glória cápitis, eo spes vocátur et córporis, we pray in the collect for the feast of the Ascension, ‘the hope of the Body is that of being called to where the glory of the Head has gone on before.’

St Gregory concludes his hymn with this prayer:

 

Laxa malum quod fecimus, auge bonum quod poscimus, placere quo tandem tibi possimus hic et perpetim. Præsta, beata Trinitas, concede, simplex Unitas, ut fructuosa sint tuis hæc parcitatis munera

Forgive the sin that we have wrought; increase the good that we have sought: that we at length, our wanderings o’er, may please Thee here and evermore.Blest Three in One, and One in Three, Almighty God, we pray to Thee, that this our fast of forty days may work our profit and Thy praise.

 

This is the real fruit we hope to produce from our Lenten endeavours: a cleansed, renewed, refreshed person, body and spirit, ready to be raised up to new life to the glory of God. And we cannot separate one element of this fruitful result, our gain, from the other, God’s glory, as St Irenaeus wrote: gloria Dei vivens homo [the glory of God is the human person fully alive.] As a winemaker carefully prunes his vines to improve the quality of his fruit, so we allow God in His loving mercy to prune us to bear ever richer fruit. May He in His loving mercy grant us all a holy and blessed Lent.

p.s. I owe a debt of gratitude, as is so often the case, to the eminent John Mason Neale for his rendering of Pope St. Gregory’s hymn into English.