The Catholic Church of

St. Mary the Virgin

    Well, kind of, but no microphone to hold, or lyrics on a video in front of you, no recorded accompaniment, but maybe more like a sing-along in the folk era a few decades ago. This is the Hymn Sing scheduled for Saturday, October 7, in the    Parish Hall. 
    With great expectation (well… some expectation because most people do not know about it)  our Ordinariate will have its very own hymnal to use for all liturgies. The original target date was this coming advent or Christmas. It will not happen. With the help of the Choir of Angels and copyright experts and lawyers, it may be ready by next Advent or Christmas. Oh, and don’t forget the engraver. One man with quill pen and ink bottle actually producing a page of music with words. Actually, we have a very gifted man in Houston with a wonderful music writing program (that none of us understands) who loves doing this work, and this is not his first.
    Just a brief word about this: several of us musicians and liturgists and text scholars in or associated with the Ordinariate have been asked to do this job, produce an Ordinariate hymnal. “Sure” we all thought, a piece of cake, we have been doing this for many, many years so it should be easy. Boy, were we naïve! Most of our committee men were schooled in the 1940 Episcopal Hymnal, and a very few of us were used to the 1982 version. We all had our prejudices and, although we may not have liked it, we respected each other. My main focus was to bring the historical Roman Catholic music into the “fray.” My history included the old St. Gregory Hymnal and the old St. Basil Hymnal, neither of which were ever intended for communal singing.  Also,  Gregorian Chant, (original plain song), was my main study for years. Not much of this work can be in a hymnal for the people in the pew. Nonetheless, there are a few music gems that many of us remember and crept into the old Episcopal hymnals. I included these and a few more. Frankly, many of the pre-Vatican II hymns, although simple enough, are not very good by today’s standards. They are not as strong and vibrant as the Episcopal hymns. People like me who grew up in the pre-Vatican II tradition, may not like to admit that they do not fit our liturgy any longer, but we have to accept it.
    OK, so this hymnal will be extremely useful and necessary for our congregations to sing and, for us at SMV, we will continue to supplement it as needed. And what does this have to do with the Hymn Sing? We will be introduced to some of the new (or old) hymns that we have never seen nor heard before. We will fumble through them, and probably laugh at/with each other. We will also sing hymns from our own ’82 hymnal that we have never sung before but will probably appear in the new hymnal. And, lastly, we will sing some old favorites that we cannot get to on Sundays and feast days. After all, we have room in the Liturgy for only four hymns, usually, and not all of the verses because, we accompany the liturgical action on the altar, and we have to accommodate three Masses on Sunday.
    Come prepared to ask for your favorite hymn that you may not have heard lately. Come prepared to lead us in it if you desire. I would love a break. We still have the hymnals that we use to use and a few old ‘40’s hymnals. I will print some old pre-Vatican II hymns. And mentioning that, we will not sing any guitar driven music so prevalent today. Remember, we are music snobs and we like it.

The Music Director
Marion Nesvadba


P.S. And come ready to eat as well!
The evening will start with a free spaghetti supper. And a little wine to perhaps help the singing!
 

   In last week’s bulletin, we have an article about dress and phone courtesy. (Let me reiterate a main point from that article and ask us all to PLEASE mute your cell phones or leave them in your car when you enter the church) For my  article this week I would like to touch on what I’d like to term: “Confessional Courtesies”.  SMV offers Confessions twice a week – on Wednesday from 11:00 am to 11:50 am, and on Saturday from 10:00 am to 11:00 am. To be able to hear as many penitents as possible, it would be helpful if we all practiced these courtesies.
   Please have the list of which sins one wishes to confess ready before entering the confessional. Many of the waits experienced by those in line are due to penitents who wait until they are already in the confessional before thinking about which sins, they wish/need to confess. Making a list is fine and can often expedite the wait time.
   It is very helpful to give a general description of your station in life; “I’m a middle-aged father of four”, “I’m a widow”, “I’m a student in school (or college)”, “I’m unmarried”, etc.  These broad-brush strokes are very helpful for the priest to quickly assess an appropriate penance for each penitent’s milieu, and be able to impose one which shouldn’t be (in most cases) too onerous for the penitent to accomplish. 
   Please confess your sins, not those of others (family  members, coworkers, partners, spouses, etc.) Sympathetic as we may be, we can only absolve those sins of the actual
penitent – please leave lazy coworkers or ungrateful daughter in laws out of one’s own confession.
   Please try to keep the confession line moving. While there are plenty of seats along the south aisle leading to the confessional, it is very helpful if those in line move forward to the next nearest seat, as it becomes available, rather than staying four or five seats behind. This courtesy makes entering the confessional much smoother than walking three, four or five rows to the confessional.
   Parents, please prepare your children on how to make their confession. Our SMV supply priests, (Fathers Kennedy and Marziani), the guest Pastors who generously help us when we need them, Fathers Fogel and Wooten, and I, are all able to gently lead a child who doesn’t know how to make a confession by supplying the opening words “Bless me, Father…” and the Act of Contrition at the end of the
Confession just before the words of absolution, but it is most helpful if the child already knows what to say.
   By practicing these “Confessional Courtesies”, we hope to make the wait time much shorter, and the grace of the Sacrament available to more penitents.

Faithfully,
Your Friend and Pastor,
Fr. Christopher C. Stainbrook

 

   Since my arrival here, I have been working on the Bishop’s mandate to me at my installation as Pastor; "Keep making things more and more beautiful.” During my first year here, we painted the exterior of the Church and Parish Hall. Last year we finished the painting of the interior of the church, (using the same color as our predecessor, Fr. Dean, had wisely chosen when he began that project), and polished the concrete floor of the Nave, coloring it with a warm Burgundy glow. This year, we are replacing our old pews in the church. 
   The pews that we currently have were purchased very inexpensively (relatively speaking) and were used when we bought them. The upholstery on the pews is wearing out - many pews have holes or stains that make them unsightly. At first, we had it in mind to simply reupholster the old pews in a red color complementing the newly painted walls and the newly polished floor. We contacted the most-used vendor that does pew upholstery. The bid for simply reupholstering all the pews was substantial, and certainly more than we had anticipated.
   There are also several pews which are themselves damaged (not just with torn upholstery) - some by water leaks, some by our restive younger parishioners, and some by the diligent cleaning that went on during Covid time. There are kneelers throughout the building that no longer work correctly. Some of this damage might be inexpensively repaired, but others would take some substantial work (and money) to fix. That cost of "fixing up”, added to the cost of the reupholstery, made us question whether it was worthwhile to just "fix up”, or whether we should consider replacement instead. Based on those questions, we reached out to several vendors of pews and woodworking, following helpful recommendations from our friends at the Cathedral, St. Philips in Lewisville, and F. C. Ziegler (our church supplies vendor).
   We discovered that many vendors featuring pews do not actually do "traditionally styled" pews any longer. Their main business is with more modern styles. We had several estimates for this project from those vendors who did offer traditional pews that varied widely.
   The craftsmen from Imperial Woodworks, a local firm based in Waco, showed significant interest in bidding for and working on our project and gave us a very competitive bid. In addition, they came in person to talk to us and bring us samples and hear our ideas. 
   The Parish Council was on board with the contract being given to Imperial Woodworks.  A significant guarantee from the company that swayed our decision was that the company has agreed to stain the pews with a stain that will match our beautiful side shrines. 
   We will have brand new pews with completely new padding in a gorgeous red upholstery that complements the chairs in the Chancel, as well as our side altars and aisle chairs. I therefore signed the contract on Wednesday.
   We are now 90-120 days away from our new pews. This time frame largely depends on delivery of fabric we chose. We have not chosen an unusual fabric, however, so the company is very hopeful that we will be closer to the 90-day mark than the 120-day mark. Of course, there are no guarantees on that. They will let us know their best estimate in a week or two after talking to the fabric supply house.
   Our old pews have served us well for over a generation, but it is time to upgrade the seating to match our beautiful woodwork elsewhere in our Church. It is time to carry the beauty that exists in the sanctuary out to our people. 
   And finally, the parish has the money on hand to pay for these pews. 
   Your generosity has made this possible. Thank you.


Faithfully,
Your Friend and Pastor,
Fr. Christopher C. Stainbrook