Traditional Latin Masses this Month 1 Sexagesima 11:30 a.m. Sunday 7 February Missa Cantata AD 202 AD Most Holy Trinity, Ledbury | Fr Adrian Wiltshire Quinquagesima 11:30 a.m. Sunday 14 February Missa Cantata February Most Holy Trinity, Ledbury | Fr Adrian Wiltshire Ash Wednesday 07:30 p.m. Wednesday 17 February Missa Cantata Most Holy Trinity, Ledbury | Fr Adrian Wiltshire 1st Sunday in Lent 11:30 a.m. Sunday 21 February Missa Cantata Most Holy Trinity, Ledbury | Fr Adrian Wiltshire 2nd Sunday in Lent 11:30 a.m. Sunday 28 February Missa Cantata Most Holy Trinity, Ledbury | Fr Adrian Wiltshire Septuagesima Dom Prosper Guéranger OSB, abbot of Solesmes from 1837-1875, devoted a whole volume of his great work – The Liturgical Year to Septuagesima. In his Preface, Dom Guéranger referred to Septuagesima as a season of “transition, inasmuch as it includes the period between two important Seasons, – Christmas and Lent”. Reading the image below from the base of the cross, moving up toward the cross, we see the first step is SEPTUAGESIMA, the second SEXAGESIMA, the third is QUINQUAGESIMA. They make up the three Sundays of the Septuagesima season, which leads us up to ASH WED. (on the left of the circle that signifies LENT). The meaning of the Latin names for the Sundays of the Septuagesima season are explained below. In the Gospel of Septuagesima Sunday, the master invites workers into his vineyard, and he pays the ones who came last the same as the ones who worked all day in the heat of the sun. “The last shall be first, the first shall be last.” Continued on next page … 1 Public Mass Centres around Malvern Most Holy Trinity Ledbury HR8 2EE Holy Hour: 1 hr before Mass Mass: 11:30 - Sunday Rosary: After Mass website | map | contact Belmont Abbey Hereford HR2 9RZ No public Masses until further notice In the chapter titled “The History of Septuagesima”, Dom Guéranger added, “The Church, therefore, has website | map | contact instituted a preparation for the holy time of Lent. She gives us the three Prinknash Abbey weeks of Septuagesima, during Gloucestershire GL4 6EX which she withdraws us, as much as may be, from the noisy No public Masses until further notice distractions of the world, in order that our hearts may be the more readily impressed by the solemn warning she is to give us, at the commencement of Lent, by marking website | map | contact our foreheads with ashes”. Septuagesima Sunday is the ninth Sunday before Lent, and it is the day that begins the Septuagesima Some Broadcast Masses & Services season, which is made up of three The Oratory Sundays: Septuagesima (which means seventieth), Sexagesima Cardiff (Cong. Orat.) (which means sixtieth), and Quinquagesima (which means Low Mass: 08:00 - Sunday fiftieth), and then it extends until Ash Wednesday. High Mass: 11:15 - Sunday Quadragesima is the name given in website | broadcasts most languages to the season of Lent that starts on Ash Wednesday. For a few examples, in Spanish the ICKSP International Seminary name is cuaresma, in Portuguese quaresma, in Gricigliano, Italy French carême, and in Italian quaresima. In English, in High Mass: 09:45 - Sunday contrast, the word for spring, “lent”, Compline: 19:45 - Daily was used, which derives from the German word for long, because at this time of year the days get longer. website | broadcasts Also in “The History of Septuagesima” Dom Guéranger explained that the names of the Sacred Heart (ICKSP) Sundays in Septuagesima are in Limerick, Ireland V94 HK29 reference to Quadragesima: “The first Sunday of Lent being called Quadragesima (Forty), each of the Missa Cantata: 10:30 - Sunday three previous Sundays has a name expressive of an additional ten: the nearest to Lent being called Quinquagesima (Fifty); the middle one, Sexagesima (Sixty); the third, website | broadcasts Septuagesima (Seventy)". He wrote: “The words Quinquagesima, Sexagesima, and Septuagesima, 2 tell us of the same great Solemnity as looming in the distance, and as Latin Mass Society being the great object towards which the Church would have us now begin to turn all our thoughts, and desires, and devotion”. Mass of Ages – Winter 2020 So it is obvious that in this season Mass of Ages is the quarterly magazine of the as in all aspects of the Catholic faith, numbers are always highly Latin Mass Society. It contains reports on our weighted with symbolism but they many activities across the country, news of often are not used literally. For Traditional Catholic events, articles on aspects more examples, although of traditional Faith and culture, and opinions on Quinquagesima means fiftieth, it is actually forty-nine days before developments in the Catholic Church. Easter. It is fifty days before Easter only if you include the day of Easter The latest edition, is available online on the itself. (Similarly, Pentecost is supposed to be fifty days after LMS website. Members of the LMS receive Easter, but that is true only if you their own personal copies in the post. count Easter and Pentecost in the numbers of days.) The numbering of the Sundays in Septuagesima become more approximate the further back each Sunday is from easyfundraising Quinquagesima. Sexagesima, which means sixtieth, is actually Support the Latin Mass Society every time you fifty-six days before Easter, and Septuagesima (seventieth) is shop online – including Click & Collect – by actually sixty-three days. subscribing to easyfundraising. And as Dom Guéranger explained, the mysteries of this Septuagesima “season of holy mourning” are based on the number seven, which is one of the most significant of all the numbers associated with the doctrine of the Catholic faith. In one Opportunities to serve way, the season of Septuagesima can also be seen as embracing the whole time between the Sunday of Altar serving Septuagesima and Easter: “The season upon which we are If you would like to serve at Mass please now entering is expressive of contact Fr Adrian Wiltshire, parish priest of several profound mysteries. But Most Holy Trinity, Ledbury. these mysteries belong not only to the three weeks which are preparatory to Lent: they continue throughout the whole period of time which separates us from the great feast of Easter. … The people of Israel, whose whole history is but one great type of the human race, was banished from Jerusalem and Singing kept in bondage in Babylon. Now, this captivity, which kept the Israelites exiles from Sion, lasted seventy years; and it is to express If you are interested in singing Mass please this mystery, as Alcuin, Amalarius, contact Alastair Tocher, director of the Schola Ivo of Chartres, and all the great Gregoriana Malverniensis. liturgists tell us, that the Church fixed the number of seventy for the days of expiation. It is true, there are but sixty-three days between Septuagesima and Easter; but the Church, according to the style so continually used in the sacred Scriptures, uses the round number T: 01684 – 893 332 instead of the literal and precise W: extraordinarymalvern.uk one.” E: [email protected] F: Extraordinary Malvern Read more at SpritualDirection.com 3 .