Ex More Docti Mystico

Jeff Ostrowski · February 19, 2018

Rare Lenten Hymns You’ve Not Sung

“Our hymnbooks know nothing of such a treasure as this, and give us pages of poor sentiment in doggerel lines by some tenth-rate modern versifier.” —Fr. Fortescue

3 June 2021 • Re: “Mass of the Angels”

In the past, we have provided thirteen organ accompaniments to Mass VIII (a.k.a. “Missa de Angelis”). Some versions of the KYRIALE use the melody from Sanctus VIII for Agnus VIII also. Dr. Peter Wagner’s 1903 edition of the KYRIALE does this, as we mentioned earlier this month. Please sing through Sanctus VIII and then sing O Quam Suavis Est from the feast of Corpus Christi. Do you hear it?

—Jeff Ostrowski

1 June 2021 • Unsure of Author

The editors of this 1667AD Missale Romanum weren’t sure who wrote the VEXILLA REGIS hymn, so they wrote this in the margin. (To be fair, the original text by Bishop Fortunatus was greatly altered under Pope Urban VIII.)

—Jeff Ostrowski

24 May 2021 • FEEDBACK

M.B. wrote to us: “Dear Corpus Christi Watershed: please keep posting beautiful hymns! You have no idea just how helpful it is to me! God bless the work and efforts that you pour into making the liturgy more beautiful for God’s glory!”

—Jeff Ostrowski

“I vividly remember going to church with him in Bournemouth. He was a devout Roman Catholic and it was soon after the Church had changed the liturgy (from Latin to English). My grandfather obviously didn’t agree with this and made all the responses very loudly in Latin while the rest of the congregation answered in English. I found the whole experience quite excruciating, but my grandfather was oblivious. He simply had to do what he believed to be right.”

— Simon Tolkien (2003)