On Saturday October 26, pilgrims to the Summorum Pontificum pilgrimage in Rome processed to St. Peter’s Basilica led by his Excellency Marian Eleganti, bishop emeritus of Chur, Switzerland.
31 Oct
2024
On Saturday October 26, pilgrims to the Summorum Pontificum pilgrimage in Rome processed to St. Peter’s Basilica led by his Excellency Marian Eleganti, bishop emeritus of Chur, Switzerland.
29 Oct
2024
Last weekend for the Feast of Christ the King, Catholics from around the world gathered in Rome for the Summorum Pontificum Pilgrimage to demonstrate their devotion to the Traditional Liturgy of the Church.
On Friday Evening, October 25, Solemn Vespers of the Blessed Virgin Mary were celebrated in the Pantheon, Basilica of St. Mary and the Martyrs, in Rome. The celebrant was Bishop Marian Eleganti O.S.B., auxiliary bishop emeritus of Chur, Switzerland.
22 Oct
2024
We recently attended Saturday afternoon mass at the Priory of the Annunciation in Charles Town, West Virginia together with some other pilgrims who had participated in the National Latin Mass Pilgrimage in Washington. This was the (only?) opportunity to attend a traditional mass that afternoon in the greater Washington area. (Charles Town is more than an hour’s drive from Arlington, Virginia, where the pilgrimage commenced.)
Mass was celebrated by a priest of the Augustinian Canons Regular of the New Jerusalem. Since our last visit in 2014, the canons have accomplished remarkable things in restoration of their priory. The sumptuously decorated chancel (sanctuary ) and side altars are reminiscent now of medieval England, now of a Byzantine church. This is Catholic art as it should be: overflowing and superabundant.
(Above) The priory today; (below) in 2014.
8 Oct
2024
On Saturday morning , the National Latin Mass Pilgrimage took place, with a 7-mile procession from St. Thomas More Cathedral, Arlington to St. Matthew Cathedral in Washington DC.
3 Jun
2024
This past Sunday, St. Mary Church, Norwalk, CT held its annual Corpus Christi Mass and procession.
30 May
2024
Today Regina Pacis Academy, the Catholic classical preK through 8 school in Norwalk, Connecticut celebrated the Feast of Corpus Christi with a Solemn Mass, Procession and triple Benediction at the church of St. Mary.
24 May
2024
A few weeks ago I had the opportunity to attend services several times at the Church of Saint-Eugène, Paris. This is a diocesan parish. Here the Traditional Mass is celebrated and a splendid musical culture is cultivated led by several noteworthy musicians. The Traditional Sunday Mass (the main Mass of the day) was thronged by an overflowing congregation of all ages – a rarity in France! The music, although in a style somewhat unfamilar to me, was of course most impressive. The Novus Ordo is also celebrated but in a manner extremely traditional. Even the parish bulletin grappled fearlessly with major issues of the day.
It was here that the late Nicholas Krasno – a long-standing member of this Society – sang in the schola. Indeed, it was the opportunity, after Summorum Pontificum, to attend and sing in such a church that inspired him to join the Roman Catholic Church. For it was after Summorum Pontificum that a Catholic could, at least in some places, regularly experience the fullness of the traditional liturgy in ceremony and music.
And perhaps for Nicholas Krasno there were additional factors that explained his attachment to this church. For does not Saint-Eugène in several respects resemble Krasno’s former beloved Anglican parish of Saint Mary the Virgin in New York City? Both are 19th century recreations of the style of the high French Gothic. Both used innovative construction methods, the earlier Saint-Eugène was built around an iron framework, while Saint Mary the Virgin was the first steel-framed church.
(St. Mary the Virgin) is in fact the earliest ecclesiastical use of constructional steel – a technique that had been first tried for office buildings in Chicago only 4 years previous. 1)
Both churches feature beautiful windows and decoration. In both the musical culture was fostered:
The musical program of St. Mary’s expressed an unabashed preference for works of the great musicians of the Roman Church: favorite composers included Beethoven,Haydn and Weber, and most of the French romantic school – Gounod, Franck. Faure and Guilmant. 2)
And both were despised by modernist taste – only to experience a reassessment in more recent years.
1. Krasno, Nicholas, A Guide to the Church of Saint Mary the Virgin, New York City at 17( 2nd edition revised, New York, 1999). The architects, Napoleon and Pierre Le Brun, were Roman Catholic. For Saint-Eugène-Sainte-Cécile, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint-Eugène-Sainte-Cécile#History.
2. Krasno, op. cit. at 63- 65. Of course, in the Roman Catholic Church these works later fell victim (in the US) to the strictures of Pius X.
29 Mar
2024
Yesterday evening, Traditional Mass of the Lord’s Supper was offered at St. Mary Church, Norwalk, CT.
28 Mar
2024
A beautiful Tenebrae was sung at St. Mary Church, Norwalk, CT yesterday evening.
24 Mar
2024