Views from the Choir Loft

Fr. Christopher Smith Weighs In

Jeff Ostrowski · November 4, 2014

I discovered some beautiful words by Father Christopher Smith, who was recently featured in The Catholic World Report. Here’s an excerpt:

N THE NARTHEX you will find a sample copy of the new Saint Isaac Jogues Missal. This beautiful pew missal will allow you follow all of the prayers and readings for the Ordinary Form in English, in a beautiful hardback edition that will be with us for many years to come.

Why am I excited about this Missal? Well, every year we spend about $4,000 on those paperback missalettes. We have looked into all kinds of different options, and have found very few that were not expensive, wasteful and unattractive. Every time a new edition of the missalette comes around, we have to throw all of that money and energy into the trash. And some of our parishioners have rightly complained that the missalette is really hard to read.

Here are some images of the Jogues Illuminated Missal :

709 Jogues Illuminated Missal

710 Jogues Illuminated Missal

711 Jogues Illuminated Missal

712 Jogues Illuminated Missal

713 Jogues Illuminated Missal

714 Jogues Illuminated Missal

Opinions by blog authors do not necessarily represent the views of Corpus Christi Watershed.

About Jeff Ostrowski

Jeff Ostrowski holds his B.M. in Music Theory from the University of Kansas (2004). He resides with his wife and children in Los Angeles.—(Read full biography).

Father Adrian Fortescue on the “Agnus Dei”

Speaking about the AGNUS DEI, Father Fortescue wrote: “Agnus as a vocative is curious, evidently in order to reproduce the original text (John 1:29) exactly.” [Altera die vidit Joannes Jesum venientem ad se, et ait: Ecce agnus Dei, ecce qui tollit peccatum mundi.] Father Fortescue, as usual, is correct; but in some medieval manuscripts you can find “Agne Dei.” Here’s an an example of that.

—Jeff Ostrowski

List • Responses by each bishop!

This incredible website gives each bishop’s response to the recent MOTU PROPRIO Traditionis Custodes, a decree by Pope Francis which seeks to reduce the number of celebrations of the “Extraordinary Form” (Traditional Latin Mass): traditioniscustodes.info

—Jeff Ostrowski

Tomorrow is Sunday…

When you were in school, you would have gotten in trouble if you wrote the Roman Numeral “9” as viiii. You were supposed to write: IX. But look how an ancient manuscript writes “9” as a Roman Numeral. That’s the Introit Ecce Deus for tomorrow’s feast in the Extraordinary Form: The 9th Sunday after Pentecost.

—Jeff Ostrowski