BLESSED CHRISTMAS to each and every one of you! It is hard to believe how time flies (cliché alert). My first blog entry at Views from the Choir Loft was posted a little over two years ago, on December 22, 2012. Since that time, I have contributed 100 Thursday columns. It has been tremendous fun and a lot of work, as we have explored all kinds of liturgical topics, reform and renewal, Vatican II, tradition, liberalism, music and fine art, culture and inculturation, silence, spiritual classics, social teaching, and more.

Due to some developments in my career—principally my role on a team of scholars undertaking a massive Aquinas translation funded by the NEH, and my upcoming sabbatical work on academic projects—I have had to make the difficult decision to step down from the band of regular contributors to Views from the Choir Loft. I have enjoyed contributing to the amazing “sacred music empire” that is Corpus Christi Watershed. I am particularly grateful to my fellow bloggers for their excellent posts, which gave me lots of good advice, ideas, and resources, and I am no less grateful to you, dear readers from across the world, for your steady support, encouragement, and enthusiasm for all things Catholic.

I have always been and continue to be an ardent supporter of Corpus Christi Watershed, which will remain the permanent host site for my Sacred Choral Works. I am also happy to confirm that an archive of my blogs from December 2012 to the present will remain online and accessible as the Views from the Choir Loft blog goes forward. Having poured so much love and thought into those 101 articles, I wanted to see them remain a force for good in the Church, and Corpus Christi Watershed has been most obliging in that regard. Meanwhile, I will continue as a staff writer at New Liturgical Movement and Rorate Caeli, although my contributions may thin out as the grant and sabbatical projects loom larger.

Friends, musicians, countrymen, Catholics—thank you and please say a prayer for me. May our Lord Jesus Christ, Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace, pour out His mercies upon you.