Hymns in honor of St. Paul

I had thought that when the Holy Father annunced the Pauline Year, there would be a sudden flurry of hymn writing in St. Paul's honor. No such flurry has occurred to my knowledge, but I have been able to contribute a couple of hymns in honor of this inimitable Saint, one of the two pillars of our apostolic Church.

I've received a number of requests for use of these hymns--more from the UK, in fact, than from the States. An Anglican parish named St. Paul's, in Sheffield, for example, sang one at the anniversary service for their parish. And this morning my translation of Excelsam Pauli Gloriam was sung at Morning Prayer by Bishop D'Arcy and his priests in the diocese of Fort Wayne-South Bend. I was delighted to be asked to contribute in this small way to their diocesan Lenten Day of Recollection for priests, and even more so in light of recent events.

One of the verses says:

The shining of the lamplight gleams
And drenches earth with heav'nly beams.
The dark of error's night is past.
The reign of truth has come at last.

So the Pope gets on a plane...

Whenever you see a picture of Pope Benedict talking to people, he's got this shy smile thing going on. And yet, he's brilliant, and although welcoming of people, he's ruthless about ideas.

Actually, he's theologically much more welcoming than I am. For example, if I'm not mistaken he recently made a positive reference to Rene Girard, my theological arch-nemesis. Perhaps there is some good there that I just fail to see--but I digress. Regarding liturgy he can see nonsense claims coming from miles away--and then he devastates them.

A lot of electronic ink has been spilled over the Pope's recent plane ride TO Africa, mostly because his remarks had something to do with sex. But his remarks on the way back FROM Africa were much more dramatic. As I read them, I thought I heard the echoes of the old Bat Man comics' fight scenes.

Speaking of the Masses he celebrated in Cameroon and Angola, the Pope said,

"[I was] moved by the spirit of meditative absorption *POW!*
in liturgy, the powerful sense of the sacred *BIFF!*;
in the liturgies there was no self-presentation *BANG!*
of groups, no self-animation, *ZAP!*
but the presence of the sacred, of God Himself; even the movements were always movements of respect and awareness of the divine presence. *KAPOW!*

This multi-whammie, smiling pre-emptive measure undermines all future attempts to point to the African liturgies as a positive example of the multi-cultural fad in liturgy. Yet another ephemeral wave in the endless cycles of fads that have mainstreamed since the last Council, multiculturalism (like all the others) effectively downgrades the liturgy from the most intimate possible sharing of heavenly and earthly realities available to us on earth, to an anthropological celebration.

The most astonishingly candid expressions of the superficiality of multiculturalist liturgy are the various Dancing Puppet Liturgies, in which non-human, non-animate artifacts are dressed up to represent various colors and genders--which then "participate" in the liturgy.



I'm sure that we can all see the difference between Africans dancing at Mass vs. midwesterners, and their puppets, dancing at Mass. Yes? But the Pope wisely made a very public and clear distinction.

It's not wrong to express ourselves in the liturgy. But we must express ourselves liturgically, and in Christ. We are at Mass to open ourselves to God and to come into direct, real contact with the Father through Him--never losing the "sense of the sacred" and the "respect and awareness of the divine presence."

Via Media

I've just added Amy Welborn's new Beliefnet blog Via Media ("the middle way") to my (very short) list of mobile favorites.

Amy is smart, super Catholic, and has a remarkable ability to think through things in publishable prose.

You can find Amy's blog here: http://blog.beliefnet.com/viamedia/

Missus Est

With all the powers my poor Heart hath

The Adoremus Hymnal contains an abbreviated version of Richard Crashaw's unusually free, unusually brilliant translation of St. Thomas Aquinas' hymn to the Eucharist, Adoro Te Devote.


With all the powers my poor Heart hath
Of humble love and loyal Faith,
Thus low (my hidden life!) I bow to Thee
Whom too much love hath bowed more low for me.
Down down, proud sense! Discourses die!
Keep close, my soul’s inquiring eye!
Nor touch nor taste must look for more
But each sit still in his own Door.

Your ports are all superfluous here,
Save that which lets in faith, the ear.
Faith is my skill. Faith can believe
As fast as love new laws can give.
Faith is my force. Faith strength affords
To keep pace with those powerful words.
And words more sure, more sweet, than they,
Love could not think, truth could not say.

O let Thy wretch find that relief
Thou didst afford the faithful thief.
Plead for me, love! Allege and show
That faith has farther, here, to go,
And less to lean on. Because then
Though hid as GOD, wounds writ Thee man.
Thomas might touch; none but might see
At least the suffering side of Thee;
And that too was Thy self which Thee did cover,
But here even that’s hid too which hides the other.

Sweet, consider then, that I
Though allowed nor hand nor eye
To reach at Thy loved face; nor can
Taste Thee GOD, or touch Thee MAN,
Both yet believe; and witness Thee
My LORD too and my GOD, as loud as He.
Help, Lord, my faith, my hope increase;
And fill my portion in Thy peace.
Give love for life; nor let my days
Grow, but in new powers to Thy name and praise.

O dear memorial of that death
Which lives still, and allows us breath!
Rich, royal food! Bountiful BREAD!
Whose use denies us to the dead;
Whose vital gust [taste] alone can give
The same leave both to eat and live;
Live ever Bread of loves, and be
My life, my soul, my surer self to me.

O soft self-wounding Pelican!
Whose breast weeps Balm for wounded man.
Ah this way bend Thy benign flood
To a bleeding Heart that gasps for blood:
That blood, whose least drops sovereign be
To wash my worlds of sins from me.

Come love! Come LORD! and that long day
For which I languish, come away;
When this dry soul those eyes shall see,
And drink the unsealed source of Thee,
When glory’s sun faith’s shades shall chase,
And for Thy veil give me Thy FACE. Amen.

Found among the excellent hymns here.