What an amazing weekend! We had the great pleasure of listening to the Charleston Symphony perform some of the most beautiful pieces of music--Samuel Barber's Agnus Dei (swoon), Schubert's Mass in G (my heart soared at the Sanctus), and more. I bought tickets at the last minute because we weren't sure whether we'd be going to the priestly ordinations at the St. John the Baptist Cathedral that very night, but with six priests being ordained, I knew there'd hardly be any room. So we went to the concert instead and given that all of it is a prayer, I felt good about offering it for the new priests. Dagny made an interesting observation--that one can sing these beautiful Mass settings for a concert, yet in many places, the Latin Mass is being suppressed. How can that which has always been holy be restricted is beyond my understanding. But that's a discussion for another day. Many in our Charleston Sound Chorus were able to come to listen to our own Danielle Simonian sing. She's amazing. Listen to her hold a looooong note at the very end in her quartet Encore: How Many Hearts Have You Broken (near).
Saturday we sang at Fr. Justin Damask's first Mass at Sacred Heart Catholic Church. It was the old Pentecost Vigil, lesser only than the great Easter Vigil, and so very beautiful. Fr. Wilson gave a rousing homily, reminding that in the early church, vigils would go long into the night as the faithful listened to the Word, prayed, and were exhorted to live a good Christian life, and so we participate in that tradition of the Apostles and Mary. Yes, she was there! He spoke about pride, how language becomes a tool to control and the great reversal of Babel at Pentecost. From the beginning, the church is Catholic. It doesn't erase differences, but brings order to chaos. We see the New Covenant reflected in the Old, the Holy Fire, that doesn't annihilate, but transforms. And when we are open, the graces that rain down to us from above overflow. So many blessings!
Finally, I share a bit of my own artwork. On First Fridays, our local library hosts Crafternoon, so I go there to play for a couple of hours, then off to First Friday Mass (devotion to the Sacred Heart). Given the plethora of AI-generated art that's trained on the work of humans who are not compensated, I wanted to share my first efforts at painting animals. I made the collage for Put a Ring on It quartet that sing the cutest song: A Dress with Pockets (my mother sewed pockets in all of our dresses). The stained glass is a gift from Dagny. Fitting for Pentecost! Come Holy Spirit! May this be a summer of great growth in all the gifts that God has bestowed upon us.
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