John Schultz: December 2002 Archives

More on Christmas

Music for Christmas Eve is always an adventure. We do an extra 8 hours of rehearsal leading up to Christmas in order to prepare 20 minutes of prelude music along with the music for the liturgy. This year we ended our prelude with the chant "A Child is Born in Bethlehem," sung in unison, in English and straight out of hymnal. The church was packed but totally still; probably a combination of the sacredness of the moment and the trepidation of those who haven't been to church since Easter and are scared they will do something wrong, sit when they are supposed to kneel, say the wrong thing when receiving communion, etc.

We sang the Victoria "O Magnum Mysterium" before the Liturgy of the Eucharist. Text is found here - it's a gem of a Christmas motet. We had practiced with the organ but managed to do it a capella that night. I'm sure we had the blessing of the baby Jesus assisting us that night.

Christmas Eve in the past has been very showy, and we this year we did a few showy pieces but intermixed were a few chants and a latin motet. I wonder if the combination was effective...

We Made It

The choir did very well at 10pm Mass - it's a real blessing to have it all come together on Christmas Eve. One glitch - a key was stuck on one of the organ manuals, so the organist could only use 2 out of 3 manuals.

I'll blog more on our Christmas liturgy - it's 12:33am here in snowy DC and I'm going to bed... Merry Christmas!

Met a blogger

Steve and I met this fella at St. Mark's this weekend. He was in the neighborhood and went to the Mass after the one my choir sings at. Too bad, because we did a good job.

Choir Mayhem

During today's gathering hymn, I noticed one of the bass's fly was down. Not only that, his white shirt tail was having a liberation party. I had to ask one of the tenors to turn around and let him know that Mr. White was out of jail. Problem discretely taken care of, the rest of the Mass proceded without incident.

Huh?

Another Google search today. I'm sure the surfer didn't find what he was looking fer.

"homosexual christmas tree purple"

How to be Anti-Social in December

When you receive an invitation for an Open House, tell the host that you will not be able to make the event because you are having an Open House at that very time. Express your regrets that they will not be able to attend your Open House since the events will happen at exactly the same time.

How to get here from Google
My comments in italics
"pants modesty Catholic" - pants and modesty go together
"millie kondracke" - someone was probably disappointed after this one
"catholic beliefs sexual" - we have tidbits here but no detail
"roman catholic apolegetics" - I'm flattered

In My Backyard

Protesters Lash Out at Bishop

Advent Decorations

Why not put purple lights in your window candles during Advent and replace them with white lights for the Christmas season? My wife had that idea this weekend when we found purple lights at the store. I'm so excited about her idea that I am telling *everyone*.

1st Sunday of Advent

We sang all 7 verses of "O Come Emmanuel" during the Preparation of the Gifts. A good sign - no one threw hymnals at me after 4 verses.
We did the Kyrie and Agnus Dei to their respective non-English common chants.
Teresa and I put up about 85% of our Christmas decorations, including our window candles and our Christmas Tree. Unlike most Catholics, we live out the penitential aspect of Advent in the form of extra choir rehearsals.

Teresa did put purple lights in the window candles - a first for the Schultzes. We'll switch to white on Christmas Eve.