What Hobbits Can Teach Us About Music for Mass

by | Mar 13, 2023 | Ad maiorem Dei gloriam!, Music, The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass

MARCH 13, 2023 What Hobbits Can Teach Us About Music for Mass MARK HAAS As human beings, we experience life through our senses. What we hear, taste, see, touch, and smell can have lasting effects on our psyche. The Catholic Mass should sound, taste, look, feel, and smell like something from another world, as it is from another world. The Mass is heaven coming down to touch earth. When you step off the street and into a Catholic Church, you should be transported to something far different from your ordinary life. Music for the liturgy should embody an other-worldly nature. It should be counter-cultural. In 2007, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops gave instruction to music directors: “The liturgy, though it must always be properly enculturated, must also be counter-cultural.” (Sing to the Lord, 12) Similarly, in 2019, Pope Francis spoke about liturgical music: “[Liturgical music] is not just any music, but holy music…Above all, clearly distinct and different from that used for other purposes.” Liturgical music, at its best, expresses a beauty that draws us out of our current time/space/culture/etc. This music can lift us toward God, Who is outside of time and space. Such music nudges the spirit to...

“Courageous, the Salesians!” Pope Francis receives organizers and artists of the 2021 Vatican Christmas Concert

by | Dec 17, 2021 | Ad maiorem Dei gloriam!, Christmas, Christmas Joy!, Christmas Season Music, Pope Francis, Salesians of Don Bosco, SDB

15 December 2021 Photo ©: Vatican Media  (ANS – Vatican City) – This morning, Wednesday, December 15, Pope Francis received the promoters, organizers and artists of the Christmas Concert at the Vatican in audience, a concert sponsored by the Congregation for Catholic Education, and whose proceeds will be donated to the Pontifical Foundation “Scholas Occurrentes” and the Salesian Mission Office “Missioni Don Bosco” in Turin. Participating for the Salesians were: the Rector Major, Fr Ángel Fernández Artime, and Fr Daniel Antúnez, President of “Missioni Don Bosco”, together with Fr Simon Zakerian, Rector of the work of Al Fidar, in Lebanon, and Fr Danijel Vidović, in charge of reception at the Mother House of the Salesians in Turin. “Christmas invites us to fix our gaze on the event that brought God’s tenderness to the world – a word that I emphasize, tenderness, we miss so much – and so it aroused and continues to arouse joy and hope. Tenderness, joy, hope: sentiments and attitudes that you artists also know how to revive and spread with your talents. Thank you,” began the Pontiff, immediately creating an atmosphere of great openness with the audience. Then, after recalling the expressions of tenderness present in daily life (the...

Launching of the Laudato Si Action Platform 2027

by | Jun 1, 2021 | a current event, Accompaniment, Ad maiorem Dei gloriam!, Creation & the Creator, Laudato Si, Pope Francis, video

         Vatican City, Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development, 28 May 2021 — In the midst of the busy end of May we could just miss the conclusion of the Laudato Si’ Week (May 17-24) or the end of the Laudato Si’ Year (May 24, 2020-2021). At the same time, under direct inspiration of Pope Francis’ Encyclical published in 2015, the Vatican Dicastery for Integral Development (Card. Peter K.A. Turkson) launched the long planned ‘Laudato Si’ Action Platform’ (https://laudatosiactionplatform.org).        This means that 6 years after the publishing of the Laudato Si’ Encyclical (2015), the whole Catholic community around the world is invited to embark on another 7-year path, to bring about an effective global impact on caring for our common home. The Vatican-led tool will empower Catholic institutions, communities, movements, religious congregations and families to implement Laudato Si’ with concrete goals, strategies and resources. There is already an ambitious plan to motivate the ‘critical mass’ of 3.5% Catholics around the world in order to make this movement truly effective. Cardinal Louis Antonio Tagle has already officially sent out the first ‘Laudato Si Animators’ on the last day of the Laudato Si’ Year, May...

Vatican Hospital makes important breakthrough in cancer research – Vatican News

by | Apr 15, 2021 | Ad maiorem Dei gloriam!, Education

Vatican Hospital makes important breakthrough in cancer research Research conducted by the Holy See’s Pediatric Hospital, Bambino Gesù, in collaboration with the University of Rome “Tor Vergata” and other European and U.S. research centres, sheds light on the cycle of cell division. The relationship between the proteins Ambra1 and Cyclin D has been identified: an imbalance can cause the process leading to a tumour. Below is a working translation of a joint press release by Bambino Gesù Hospital and the University of Rome “Tor Vergata”. By Vatican News staff writer This new discovery opens the way to therapies that block the defense system of diseased cells. After decades of research and many hypotheses, it closes the circle on the mechanisms of the cell cycle, the process through which cells, including cancer cells, mature and proliferate. Researchers at the Bambino Gesù Children’s Hospital and the University of Rome “Tor Vergata”, in collaboration with other European and U.S. research centres, have discovered the missing piece: what regulates the life of Cyclin D, an essential molecule in cell division. The switch that turns the activity of Cyclin D on and off  is a protein called Amber1: when it does not work it...

What St. Benedict & His Order Can Teach Today’s Laity

by | Jul 10, 2020 | Accompaniment, Ad maiorem Dei gloriam!, Spiritual Life

Each and every one of us is called to holiness, and answering that call requires growth and strength in spiritual practices, like prayer, study, and works of mercy. Yet, as average lay people living in the world, working jobs, paying bills, and raising families, it is easy to let spiritual growth, thriving in the spiritual […] Source: What St. Benedict & His Order Can Teach Today’s...