Views from the Choir Loft

“The Injustice of Traditionis Custodes” • (Private Meetings at the Vatican)

Corpus Christi Watershed · September 8, 2025

ŁAWOMIR CENCKIEWICZ—2nd from left below—national security advisor to KAROL NAWROCKI (Polish President), said yesterday that during their recent visit to the Vatican, he discussed “the subject of Catholic Tradition & the injustices of Traditionis Custodes.” Cenckiewicz wrote as follows:

I offered filial homage to the Vicar of Christ. I was also introduced to Cardinal Parolin and several prelates in the papal circle. My visit to the papal apartments, the opportunity to spend time in several of the rooms where Pope Saint Pius X lived, worked, and resided, and admiring the paintings of the great masters, El Greco, Dürer, and Caravaggio, was a profound experience for me! Deo gratias!
P.S.
And if you think the subject of Catholic Tradition and the injustices of Traditionis Custodes were absent during my two visits to the Vatican (and my private conversations with the prelates), you are mistaken…

It will be recalled that the Poles were the first to break the code of THE ENIGMA MACHINE at the beginning of World War II. Verbum sapienti…

During our times, may Witold Pilecki intercede for us. Poland is currently the most Catholic country in the world, according to some.

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

Music List • (2nd Sunday of Lent)

Readers have expressed interest in seeing the ORDER OF MUSIC I created for this coming Sunday, which is the 2nd Sunday of Lent (1 March 2026). If such a thing interests you, feel free to download it as a PDF file. This feast has magnificent propers. Its somber INTROIT is particularly striking—using a haunting tonality—but the COMMUNION with its fauxbourdon verses is also quite remarkable. I encourage all the readers to visit the feasts website, where the Propria Missae may be downloaded completely free of charge.

—Jeff Ostrowski

Like! Like! Like!

You won’t believe who recently gave us a “like” on the Corpus Christi Watershed FACEBOOK PAGE. Click here (PDF) to see who it was. We were not only sincerely honored, we were utterly flabbergasted. This was truly a resounding endorsement and unmistakable stamp of approval.

—Jeff Ostrowski

Which Mass?

In 1905, when the Vatican Commission on Gregorian Chant began publishing the EDITIO VATICANA—still the Church’s official edition— they assigned different Masses to different types of feasts. However, they were careful to add a note (which began with the words “Qualislibet cantus hujus Ordinarii…”) making clear “chants from one Mass may be used together with those from others.” Sadly, I sometimes worked for TLM priests who weren’t fluent in Latin. As a result, they stubbornly insisted Mass settings were ‘assigned’ to different feasts and seasons (which is false). To understand the great variety, one should examine the 1904 KYRIALE of Dr. Peter Wagner. One should also look through Dom Mocquereau’s Liber Usualis (1904), in which the Masses are all mixed up. For instance, Gloria II in his book ended up being moved to the ‘ad libitum’ appendix in the EDITIO VATICANA.

—Jeff Ostrowski

Extreme Unction

Those who search Google for “CCCC MS 079” will discover high resolution images of a medieval Pontificale (“Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 079”). One of the pages contains this absolutely gorgeous depiction of the Sacrament of Extreme Unction.

—Corpus Christi Watershed

PDF Chart • “Plainsong Rhythm”

I will go to my grave without understanding the lack of curiosity so many people have about the rhythmic modifications made by Dom André Mocquereau. For example, how can someone examine this single sheet comparison chart and at a minimum not be curious about the differences? Dom Mocquereau basically creates a LONG-SHORT LONG-SHORT rhythmic pattern—in spite of enormous and overwhelming manuscript evidence to the contrary. That’s why some scholars referred to his method as “Neo-Mensuralist” or “Neo-Mensuralism.”

—Jeff Ostrowski

PDF • “O Come All Ye Faithful” (Simplified)

I admire the harmonization of “Adeste Fideles” by David Willcocks (d. 2015), who served as director of the Royal College of Music (London, England). In 2025, I was challenged to create a simplified arrangement for organists incapable of playing the authentic version at tempo. The result was this simplified keyboard arrangement (PDF download) based on the David Willcocks version of “O Come All Ye Faithful.” Feel free to play through it and let me know what you think.

—Jeff Ostrowski