Correspondents, erudite ones, point out that the conjunction of Ss Anna and Joachim was filched by Bugnini from the Benedictine Calendar, which had the bright idea back in the time of Pius X, when it was thought good to liberate the Sunday Masses from being obscured by festivals which had previously been permanently lodged on to Sundays (S Joachim previously occupied the Sunday in the Octave of the Assumption). Incidentally, the main point I wished to make was the unfortunate placing of S Anna, who has a considerable and ancient cultus, second to S Joachim, who doesn't. Common Worship put S Anna first; whether out of deference to tradition, feminism, or both, one might wonder!
I also wonder what happens in Brittany (and in other places and churches where S Anna is Patron). Under the Novus regime are they allowed to have a special Mass and Office just of S Anna, or do they have to use the conflate Mass? Incidentally, the Benedictine Office, although forcing S Joachim to muck in with his wife, does keep some fetching old Office Hymns of S Anna. (At an early stage of the conciliar revision, Dom Lentini did propose the adoption, also from the Benedictines, of a 16th century hymn to S Anna, rather a nice one, in the style and metre of Ave Maris Stella.)
Today we have S Martha. Common Worship conjoins her with Ss Mary and Lazarus ... which I think I noticed (I can't check) is an idea from the current Benedictine Calendar. Since S Mary Magdalen has her feast; and so among Anglicans and Benedictines does S Mary the sister of Lazarus; this means that, out of the three biblical characters from which the traditional liturgical picture of S Mary Magdalen was confected, only Saint Sinful Woman is now liturgically frozen out. Unfair to Working Women (Latine meretrices), sez I.
Saint Lazarus? All I can think of right of the top of my head is Leonid Andreyev's depiction of him - expressionism and all that stuff crepuscular; I'm rather partial to it. Neither can I find S Lazarus in Fr Butler.
ReplyDeleteThe Benedictine Calendar shows no evidence of the coupling of SS. Martha & Lazarus. July 29 is the commemoration of the martyrs SS. Felix, Simplicius, Faustinus and Beatrice. The volume 'Documenta' produced by Solesmes to accomodate the Antiphonale Monasticum to the new calendar gives texts for the office of St Martha on July 29. It is interesting to note that in the Eastern Rites, St. Martha is commemorated on Lazarus Saturday, the day before Palm Sunday.
ReplyDeleteMeretrix!? Am I being stupid but that seems a tad unfair...?
ReplyDeleteUpdate - the modern Benedictine calendar does give July 29 as the Memorial of SS Martha, Mary & Lazarus, hosts of the Lord. The Benedictine Daily Prayer published by Collegeville gives a Matins reading from St Augustine (Sermon 103).
ReplyDeleteMgr. Wadsworth (and others) may wish to note that the Diurnal Monastique published by the Abbey of Sainte-Madeleine du Barroux contains an Appendix for those who wish to observe the modern Benedictine Federation kalendar; it suggests that the Memorial of Ss. Martha, Mary & Lazarus, Confessors not Bishops, be observed by taking the propers from Ss. Maurus and Placid from October 5 and simply changing the names. I did it this morning at Lauds and it worked quite well.
ReplyDeleteFr LR: St Lazarus is buried in the church of (unsurprisingly) St Lazarus at Larnaca in Cyprus. He is portrayed as an ikon.
ReplyDeleteA.A. King says in his Liturgies of the Religious Orders that the Carmelites, I recall, kept the joint feast of these three...
ReplyDeleteDid any of you in England commemorate St. Olaf of Norway on July 29th? His links to England, including several churches dedicated to him, would seem to merit a mention.
ReplyDeleteI examined a 1953 set of the Breviarium Monasticum I have at the weekend. I was shocked to find no mention whatsoever of St. Martha (likewise in the reprint of the 1962 Monastic Diurnal from Farnborough). St. Martha is firmly in my 1884 Monastic Breviary.
ReplyDeleteIn the 1953 edition I noticed some other strange/interesting features. The Benedictines adopted the revised Roman deformation of Lauds for the Triduum and the Office of the Dead and All Souls.
On March 8th St. John of God is joined with St. Camillus. Likewise on July 20th St. Jerome Aemilian is lumped together with St. Joseph Calasanctius and St. John Baptist de la Salle.
Thankfully the Octave Day of the Assumption remains free of any cardiac problems and the ancient Office of the Assumption remains free of Pius XII's mutilations.