Traditional Latin Mass in Maryland

Ars Catholica follows up an earlier post on its mediation on art, beauty and God with some troubling news from secular atheists . The summation holds a key: But let’s think here - can art really point to a better, nobler life without belief in God? What is to define beauty, if truth has no meaning other than what humans decide? What is there to lift us up to, if there is no example beyond ourselves? And isn’t the concentration of today’s ‘art’ on shock and surprise directly related to a decline in faith? This is precisely why a loss of Catholic traditions in art, music, liturgy, and architecture and the influence of contemporary theories of art in the mass is so poisonous. Just as contemporary art chooses only to offer us veneration of ourselves with no possibility of transcendence, modern church architecture and ‘mass in the round’ wreakovation attempts to bring the focus on the congregation, that group of “morally troubling fellow human beings” rather than pointing us to Christ.

The New Liturgical Movement : Sing to the Lord a New Song The Recovering Choir Director : Music List for the Papal Votive Mass (at St. Patrick's today, audio links to EWTN ) What Does the Prayer Really Say : Music lineup for Mass at Yankee Stadium Bonfire of the Vanities : The Pope Says 'Hi" (Washington, DC) Whispers in the Loggia : Grand Inquisitor Faces Inquisition

WDTPRS : "two steps forward and three steps backward " The New Liturgical Movement: To what extent has the Vatican been involved in planning music for Masses for the Pope's Visit The New Liturgical Movement : First Augustinian bishop since the Reformation

Michael E. Lawrence, writing for the New Liturgical Movement , has discovered this gem. Uwe Siemon-Netto, in residence at Concordia Seminary in St. Louis has a beautiful piece from the January, 2008 issue of the Asian Times . It is on the throng of Asians who will visit Weimar, Germany to see where Bach composed most of his organ works and was jailed. Here is a snippet from this marvelous essay: The influx of Asians to Bach sites in Germany has been perplexing musicologists and theologians alike for decades now. They come in droves not only as tourists but also as serious students of music. Of the 850 students at Germany’s oldest state conservatory, the Hochschule für Musik und Theater Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy in Leipzig, 148 are Asians, chiefly South Koreans and Japanese, according to Ute Fries, dean of students. Bach was musical director of Leipzig’s Thomaskirche for the last 27 years of his life and wrote most of his cantatas there. Leipzig’s late “superintendent” (regiona