Rejoice, rejoice! On this Gaudete (Rejoice) Sunday, the Third Sunday of Advent, I’ll be taking up the question “Why does the Church year start with Advent?” and explore some ideas to reflect on the “O Antiphons” of this season-within-the-season of Late Advent.
One of the questions I have heard recently is “Why does the Church year start with Advent?” It is a fascinating story of Christians rejecting other definitions of the calendar and thus the authority of those that made those calendars (such as that of Caesar) which manifests in liturgical and musical practices. The Roman Missal is a treasure trove of prayers including those of the sanctoral (cycle of celebrating saints’ memorials on specific dates), Ritual Masses (for example, for weddings, funerals, confirmations, or dedication of churches), Masses and Prayer for Various Needs and Occasions (such as for Harmony in Families), and Votive Masses (offerings made, for example, through the Sacred Heart of Jesus, or for the repose of the soul of our deceased loved ones). Last week I mentioned that we have a specific (or proper) Collect for each weekday of Advent. And while this may seem like liturgical minutia it is worth noting that we don’t have a text proper to (assigned for) weekdays of Ordinary Time. A priest might therefore select from the many optional texts on weekdays of Ordinary Time or even choose to extend the use of the same prayer given for the Sunday that started that week. But in Advent, Christmastide, Lent, and Eastertide the Church provides a proper prayer for every single Sunday and weekday. The same is true for the chants for each of these days. There are proper Introits (Entrances) and Communions for every day of these seasons. And someone had to write or gather these texts! As Sundays and other solemnities are the principal days of the Church’s celebration of the Liturgy of the Eucharist many of the prayer and musical texts for Sundays and some feasts can be dated back to as early as the fourth century with anonymous patristic authors and were woven together organically over about a 100 year period scholars often refer to as the “springtime of the liturgy.” But, as the celebration of the Liturgy of the Eucharist on weekdays became more common in the West and as certain communities of monks and canons took this up as their primary vocation, the need for a uniform and formal set of texts arose. The canons of the schola cantorum (chanting school) of Rome began “an Advent project” (as James McKinnon has termed it) outfitting the liturgy with proper texts and chants for each day beginning with Advent. They began the work with a new season of Advent—“coming toward”—a season not found in the Eastern Church. And the focus of this season of Advent was not only to prepare to remember Christ’s first coming at his Nativity now 2000 years ago but also on Christ Second coming (Parousia) for which we ready ourselves here and his Advent now in our heart. And so we have the canons of that schola cantorum in the late seventh century to thank for the beauty of a season of Advent and reorienting the Roman ecclesial calendar to begin with this pre-season and leading to birth of Christ as the anchor of all time for it is was in this Year of our Lord (Anno Domini) that Christ was born and around which all the years of history will come to be reckoned (also the work of a Benedictine monk, St. Bede the Venerable, in 725AD).
One of the most highly regarded creations of this schola cantorum are the “O Antiphons.” If you have ever sung “O Come O Come Emmanuel” you are singing these “O Antiphons” in a hymn form (in a translation by the amazing J.M. Neale who has brought countless medieval treasures into use in English). The “O Antiphons” were composed as the antiphons (elaborate musical-textual bookends) sung before and after the Gospel Canticle for Evening Prayer (Vespers), the Magnificat or Canticle of Mary (Luke 1:46-55), on December 17 through December 24. For a touching “fan fiction” musing on how the Magnificat might have come to be known to St. Luke see last year’s Christmas episode of The Chosen, “The Messengers” https://youtu.be/a9s7OUspzes which invites us to reflect with Mary how she “pondered all these things in her heart” (Luke 2:19). In the Liturgy of the Hours (Divine Office) on each evening of December 17 through 24, during these shortest days of the year, at the very moment of the lighting of the lamps and the rising of incense, a millennium of Christians have chanted these “O Antiphons,” messianic names from the Old Testament given to Jesus as the fulfillment of the ancient types: “O Wisdom,” “O Adonai,” “O Root of Jesse,” “O Key of David,” “O Radiant Dawn,” “O King,” and “O Emmanuel” (see https://www.usccb.org/prayers/o-antiphons-advent from our trusty Catholic Household Blessings and Prayers for the full text of each). Using the vocative “O” (“You” form of address from Latin) we are crying out to God incarnate in Jesus, “You, Jesus, come and save us! You, Jesus, sign of God’s love for all people and fulfillment of the promise you made that through Jesse’s line you would raise up a worthy king to be anointed (1 Samuel 16:1-13), come now and save us!” My personal favorite is on December 21, the Winter Solstice, as we cry out “O Oriens [Radiant Dawn, Dayspring from on high], splendor of eternal light, sun of justice: come and shine on those who dwell in darkness and in the shadow of death” which harkens to how we greet the sun each morning of Morning Prayer (Lauds) in the Canticle of Zechariah, the Benedictus (Luke 1:68-79). This “O antiphon” for the solstice (when our senses perceive the sun to be the most distant) gives us hope and reminds us that Jesus is coming to dispel the darkness of whatever gloom, whatever regret, hurt, suffering, anxiety, or sin may be overshadowing your life! Just the Holy Spirit overshadowed Mary as God became incarnate in her womb the Holy Spirit desires to fill you so you too will be a “bearer of God” (Theotokos) and magnify him by your song and deeds. I encourage you to slowly ponder each of these “O Antiphons” each evening of December 17-24 and find a creative way to reflect on them. Some years ago my children made colored pages for each of the antiphons while we looked through the Old Testament to see which stories helped us understand each antiphon. Here’s a set of coloring pages http://tinyurl.com/mr28v767
This weekend also brings a highlight of our St. John Vianney parish Nativity and Carols at 4:00 PM on Sunday, December 17. There is no better way to begin this season-within-the-season of Late Advent than to gather to remember the story of Jesus birth in song with our own schola cantorum. See you there! “O Come O Come Emmanuel!”
iCasad 