The Parable of the Laborers in the Vineyard from the Codex Aureus of Echternach (c. 1030-1050) So shall the last be first, and the first last. For many are called but few chosen (Matthew 20:16). |
Dear Friends in Christ,
Welcome
to our weekly Sunday update. The liturgy for this Sunday (January 28,
2024), the first in the pre-Lenten season of Septuagesima, features the
parable of the laborers in the vineyard. As we begin to prepare for the
season of fasting and penance that will culminate in our remembrance of
His passion and death, Jesus tells us that it is never too late to take
up our cross and follow Him.
Even those who come late will be rewarded in the Kingdom of Heaven. Septuagesima Sunday is so-named because it falls within the seventy days prior to Easter. (This year Easter will actually be on the seventieth day following the end of the Christmas season celebrated last Sunday as the Third Sunday after the Epiphany.)
Traditionally, it initiates a period of prayer and solemn reflection leading to the more rigorous weeks of self-denial, penance and good works during Lent. Septuagesima Sunday will be followed during the next two weeks by Sexagesima (“the sixtieth”) and then Quinquagesima (“the fiftieth”), the last Sunday before Lent.
As it is meant to be a period of preparation for the penitential forty days preceding Easter, the liturgy during these weeks takes on added solemnity, omitting the alleluias and the Gloria. In this update we share information about Sunday’s Mass and other Latin Masses scheduled during the week ahead.
Welcome to the Carolina Traditional Liturgy Society
As mentioned in our announcement Thursday, the Saint Ann Latin Mass Ministry is now the Carolina Traditional Liturgy Society.
This change was made to reflect our growing mission and scope to promote the Traditional Latin Mass across the Diocese of Charlotte and the Carolinas. We are grateful for the guidance and support of Fathers Reid and Jones, as well as other diocesan priests during this transition. To view the announcement and our mission click here.
Please add our new email address to your address book (newsletter@carolinaliturgy.org). Readers already subscribed to our email list do not need to resubscribe.
We are also pleased to share our new website: carolinaliturgy.org
Close of Christmas Celebration Followup
We thank everyone who braved the chilly weather last Sunday for our Close of Christmas celebration; shared something for the potluck, and the Cantate Domino Latin Choir for their joyous singing to festively close the Christmas season.
Septuagesima Sunday
The links provided below can be used to download printable copies of the Proper Prayers for Septuagesima Sunday with either English or Spanish translation. The English version includes a commentary, extracted from Dom Prosper Guéranger’s The Liturgical Year, on the reading from the First Epistle of Saint Paul to the Corinthians. In the Gospel reading Jesus adopts His customary parabolical approach to address the pursuit of the Kingdom of Heaven in the metaphorical terms of labor. In the Epistle Paul employs the metaphor of running in a race to convey more explicitly what is necessary to achieve the same reward.
We also offer a link to an article by Dr. Michael P. Foley on “Septuagesima: The Time that the Land Forgot” (originally printed in The Latin Mass magazine and republished with permission by New Liturgical Movement) that provides a comprehensive overview of the history and significance of the season.
Calendar of Saints and Special Observances
Celebrations listed are those on the traditional liturgical calendar found in the Roman Missal of 1962.
Schedule of Latin Masses for Sunday, January 28th (Septuagesima Sunday)
Charlotte Area Latin Masses
Other Diocese of Charlotte Latin Masses
Diocese of Charleston Latin Masses
Schedule of Weekday Latin Masses
Wednesday, January 31st, Saint John Bosco
Thursday, February 1st, Saint Ignatius of Antioch
Friday, February 2nd, Purification of the Blessed Virgin Mary
Saturday, February 3rd, Saint Blaise
Note: The Traditional Latin Mass is offered daily at Prince of Peace in Taylors, South Carolina: Monday-Friday at 12:00 p.m. and Saturday at 8:00 a.m., in addition to the Latin Mass on Sunday at 12:00 p.m.
* The Traditional Latin Mass previously celebrated at Saint Elizabeth of the Hill Country in Boone has been moved to the mission church of that parish, the Church of the Epiphany, located at 163 Galax Lane in Blowing Rock.
Ash Wednesday (as announced)
Wednesday February 14 (Masses include distribution of ashes)
Note: We will share more Latin Mass times as they are announced.
Holy Face Devotions
Prayers of Reparation to the Holy Face of Jesus will be offered at the following churches during the coming week:
Special Events
Relic of Saint Jude’s Arm to Visit Saint Ann
As mentioned by Fr. Reid from the pulpit last Sunday, the relic of Saint Jude’s arm will visit Saint Ann on Thursday February 15. The current schedule calls for veneration of the relic from 1:00 p.m. until 10:00 p.m. (excepting the hour between 7:00 p.m. and 8:00 p.m. reserved for celebration of the Novus Ordo Mass). The relic is currently on a national tour of parishes. Saint Ann was afforded a late opportunity to serve as a host parish.
Blessing of Candles on Candlemas
The traditional Blessing of Candles will take place at Saint Ann prior to the 7:00 a.m. Latin Mass on Friday, February 2nd, the Feast of the Purification of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Our Lady of Grace parish in Greensboro will also bless candles prior to their 7:00 p.m. Latin Mass that evening.
Also called Candlemas, the feast celebrates the first presentation of the Light of Christ in the Temple at Jerusalem. The liturgy for Candlemas recalls the day on which Mary went with the Holy Infant to undergo the rite of ritual purification following the birth of Jesus. Please place candles to be blessed on the table table near the altar rail before Mass begins.
Traditional Carmelite Lenten Enrollment
Lent will commence in less than three weeks with the celebration of Ash Wednesday on February 14th. Looking ahead, we share a wonderful Lenten offering by the Discalced Hermits of Our Lady of Mount Carmel. Our readers are invited to enroll those in need this Lent in order to benefit from 40 Masses and 40 days of prayer and penance by the Hermits. Click on Lenten Enrollment at the top of the home page (The Discalced Hermits of Our Lady of Mount Carmel) or use the link provided below. Enrollment will remain open until Tuesday, February 13th, the last day before the beginning of Lent.
The Hermits will be offering the following for the benefit of those enrolled:
These benefits may be secured for those most in need, whether living or deceased. There is no charge for enrollment, but the Discalced Hermits survive entirely on alms received from the laity to support their apostolate. Please remember the Hermits in your almsgiving now and during the Season of Lent, recalling the words of Saint Lawrence Justinian regarding the benefits of the Mass:
No human tongue can enumerate the favors that trace back to the Sacrifice of the Mass. The sinner is reconciled with God; the just man becomes more upright; sins are wiped away; vices are uprooted; virtue and merit increase; and the devil’s schemes are frustrated.
To learn more about the Discalced Hermits of Our Lady of Mount Carmel see this inspiring video. Enrollment in the Lenten offering is available at https://www.edcarm.org/lent.
Latin Mass and Liturgical News
Saints and Special Celebrations
Saint Ignatius of Antioch, Bishop and Martyr, was one of the three first-century bishops who are together called the Apostolic Fathers of the Church because they actually knew the Apostles and passed on what they had been taught by the first followers of Our Lord. The others were Saint Clement of Rome and Saint Polycarp, Bishop of Smyrna. Saint Clement, a follower of Saint Peter who became the fourth Bishop of Rome, suffered martyrdom in 99 A.D. Saint Polycarp, who was Bishop of Smyrna, ended his life as a martyr at the age of 86. Saint Ignatius was the third Bishop of Antioch, occupying a see that had first been held, like that of Rome, by Saint Peter. He and Polycarp were close friends and associates, and both were followers of Saint John the Evangelist.
Ignatius was born around the year 50 A.D. and was Bishop of Antioch during the persecution of Christians under the Emperor Domitian. Having successfully guided his flock through that storm, he faced another when Trajan came to power in Rome. The Martyrdom of Ignatius, composed by two associates of the bishop who accompanied him on his final journey to Rome, begins by praising his performance in the face of this renewed threat to the Christian community:
When Trajan, not long since, succeeded to the empire of the Romans, Ignatius, the disciple of John the apostle, a man in all respects of an apostolic character, governed the Church of the Antiochians with great care, having with difficulty escaped the former storms of the many persecutions under Domitian, inasmuch as, like a good pilot, by the helm of prayer and fasting, by the earnestness of his teaching, and by his spiritual labour, he resisted the flood that rolled against him, fearing lest he should lose any of those who were deficient in courage, or apt to suffer from their simplicity.
A temporary relaxation of the persecution brought peace to the community for a time but left Ignatius longing for that consummation of his own life that would be the ultimate realization of his love for Christ. “For he inwardly reflected, that the confession which is made by martyrdom, would bring him into a yet more intimate relation to the Lord.”
In the ninth year of his reign, Trajan demanded that all of his subjects worship the pagan gods of Rome. Ignatius imparted to the Christians of Antioch the courage to remain true to their faith. Called before the emperor, when that ruler was at Antioch, Ignatius spoke eloquently in defense of his flock and his faith. Trajan responded by ordering that the bishop be sent to Rome in chains to be fed to wild beasts for the entertainment of the people.
Ignatius was accompanied on his journey to Rome by Philo, a deacon from Tarsus, and a Syrian named Rheus Agathopus. In The Martyrdom of Ignatius, they wrote of the great hardships endured by the bishop as he traveled to his place of execution. Writing himself to the Christians at Rome, while enroute to that city, Ignatius said, "From Syria even to Rome I fight with wild beasts, by land and sea, by night and by day, being bound amidst ten leopards, even a company of soldiers, who only grow worse when they are kindly treated."
Ignatius and his captors traveled overland from Antioch to Seleucia before setting sail from that city for Rome. “And after a great deal of suffering he came to Smyrna, where he disembarked with great joy, and hastened to see the holy Polycarp, his fellow disciple and bishop of Smyrna. For they had both, in old times, been disciples of St. John the Apostle.” Throughout the journey he was greeted with effusive expressions of love and concern by the members of local churches. Along the way he composed six letters addressed to the Christians of Ephesus, Magnesia, Tralles, Rome, Philadelphia and Smyrna, and a seventh sent to Polycarp. Saint John Henry Newman summed up the importance of these letters when he said that "the whole system of Catholic doctrine may be discovered, at least in outline, not to say in parts filled up, in the course of his seven epistles."
Upon his arrival in Rome, Ignatius knelt with his fellow Christians there and “entreated the Son of God on behalf of the Churches, that a stop might be put to the persecution, and that mutual love might continue among the brethren” before being “led with all haste into the amphitheatre” to be cast to the wild beasts ready to consume him.
The Church dates his martyrdom in the year 110 A.D. and celebrates his feast on the 1st of February each year. [Source: Catholic Encyclopedia, New Advent.org]
Closing Commentary
Finally, as we move into the pre-Lenten season of Septuagesima, we turn again to The Liturgical Year of Dom Prosper Guéranger for an illuminating account of “The History of Septuagesima” followed by an explanation of why the uttering of Alleluia is suspended on the eve of Septuagesima Sunday.
The Season of Septuagesima comprises the three weeks immediately preceding Lent. It forms one of the principal divisions of the Liturgical Year, and is itself divided into three parts, each part corresponding to a week: the first is called Septuagesima; the second, Sexagesima; the third, Quinquagesima.
All three are named from their numerical reference to Lent, which, in the language of the Church, is called Quadragesima, — that is, Forty, — because the great Feast of Easter is prepared for by the holy exercises of Forty Days. The words Quinquagesima, Sexagesima, and Septuagesima, tell us of the same great Solemnity as looming in the distance, and as being the great object towards which the Church would have us now begin to turn all our thoughts, and desires, and devotion.
Now, the Feast of Easter must be prepared for by a forty-days’ recollectedness and penance. Those forty-days are one of the principal Seasons of the Liturgical Year, and one of the most powerful means employed by the Church for exciting in the hearts of her children the spirit of their Christian Vocation. It is of the utmost importance, that such a Season of grace should produce its work in our souls, — the renovation of the whole spiritual life. The Church, therefore, has instituted a preparation for the holy time of Lent. She gives us the three weeks of Septuagesima, during which she withdraws us, as much as may be, from the noisy distractions of the world, in order that our hearts may be the more readily impressed by the solemn warning she is to give us, at the commencement of Lent, by marking our foreheads with ashes. [History of Septuagesima]
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Our holy mother the Church knows how necessary it is for her to rouse our hearts from their lethargy, and give them an active tendency towards the things of God. On this day, the eve of Septuagesima, she uses a powerful means for infusing her own spirit into the minds of her children. She takes the song of heaven away from us: she forbids our further uttering that Alleluia, which is so dear to us, as giving us a fellowship with the choirs of angels, who are forever repeating it. How is it that we poor mortals, sinners, and exiles on earth, have dared to become so familiar with this hymn of a better land? It is true, our Emmanuel, who established peace between God and men, brought it us from heaven on the glad night of His Birth; and we have had the courage to repeat it after the angels, and shall chant it with renewed enthusiasm when we reach our Easter. But to sing the Alleluia worthily, we must have our hearts set on the country whence it came. It is not a mere word, nor a profane unmeaning melody; it is the song that recalls the land we are banished from, it is the sweet sigh of the soul longing to be at home. [Saturday Before Septuagesima Sunday]