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Monthly Archives: December 2013

Homily for the Holy Family

29 Sunday Dec 2013

Posted by Fr James Bradley in Homily

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christmas, holy family, homily, marriage, trinity

Altar in St Vincent Ferrer, NYC

Altar in St Vincent Ferrer, NYC

This homily was given at Saint Thomas Apostle, Woodley Park, Washington, D.C., on the feast of the Holy Family.

Meeting to prepare a wedding with a young couple, it is rather easy for a priest to get a cheap laugh – at least from the groom – if he simply suggests having today’s reading from the letter of Saint Paul to the Colossians at the wedding. ‘Wives, be subordinate to your husbands, as is proper in the Lord’, says the apostle. What often (and equally swiftly) wipes the smile from the young man’s face – if his bride-to-be hasn’t done so herself – is the next line: ‘Husbands, love your wives, and avoid any bitterness toward them’. The groom has his responsibilities too. He is to be a strong, characterful, moral family leader, and he is to accept the great and serious burden of protecting and caring for his wife, whatever that might bring on him. Just as in the old English wedding vows where the bride promises to love, honour, and obey, her husband, ‘be subordinate to your husbands’ is not a call to a master-servant relationship, but one of mutuality. We might say, in fact, that the bride is permitting herself to be looked after and cared for, above the husband’s own concerns and well-being.

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Homily for Midnight Mass

26 Thursday Dec 2013

Posted by Fr James Bradley in Homily

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christmas, homily, incarnation

From Saint Mary, Charleston, S.C.

From Saint Mary, Charleston, S.C.

This was given at Saint Mary, Mother of God, Washington, D.C.

Over the past four weeks of Advent, the Church has meditated on the coming of her Messiah. Tonight, in the beauty and majesty of her sacred liturgy, she celebrates that coming in the birth of Our Lord in the Bethlehem stable, and seeks to do him homage by her worship and praise and adoration. We, who have longed for the coming of the Christ child, receive now our reward in the babe in the manger. God is made Man to redeem us and bring us back to himself. Our Advent prayer – Maranatha! Come, Lord Jesus! – is answered; God has taken on our flesh and nature, and come amongst us. He who is above all things has condescended to our lowly state to save us from ourselves and bring us back to the fullness of our human nature: eternal life in him.

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Music for Advent & Christmas

19 Thursday Dec 2013

Posted by Fr James Bradley in Music

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advent, christmas, music

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Certain that I am not alone in having certain pieces of music that I listen to each Advent and Christmas – and which really mark this time of year – I thought I’d share with you some of my favourites, in the hope that these beautiful examples of sacred music draw you deeper into the mystery of the Lord’s coming, as they have for me.

As far as Advent is concerned, I can’t recommend anything better than Veni Emmanuel sung by the King’s Singers on their Christmas album. The arrangement is by Philip Lawson, who sang with them until recently and at whose final concert in Salisbury Cathedral I was privileged to be. I’d also edge you toward the very beautiful Magnificat Quinti Toni by Praetorius, interspersed with verses from Joseph lieber, Joseph mein, on a wonderful recording of his settings of the Magnificat and various motets, by the Cardinall’s Musick directed by Andrew Carwood.

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Pregnant with expectant joy

18 Wednesday Dec 2013

Posted by Fr James Bradley in Liturgy

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advent, ember days, fasting, liturgy, ordinariate, penance

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As we reach the final days of this season of Advent, the sacred liturgy draws our attention to the Lord’s imminent coming in a number of ways. First, the beautiful antiphons which adorn the daily singing of the Magnificat from 17th December – the “O Antiphons” – intensify our prayer, and add a certain urgency. In these texts the Church petitions her Lord under a different title each day, and for a different need. These prophetic titles – like many of the lections at Mass in the past few weeks – remind us that the coming of Christ is the fulfillment of the old dispensation. By calling on the Lord as Radix Iesse, Emmanuel, and so forth, we proclaim our belief that in Christ all prophecy and preparation is ended; he is the alpha and the omega, and in him all things find perfection.

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Dominican Hymnarium

11 Wednesday Dec 2013

Posted by Fr James Bradley in Music

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dominican, liturgy, music, plainchant, religious

OPHymnarium

The other morning I was presented with a copy of the new Hymanarium published by the Saint Joseph Province of the Order of Preachers. I was fortunate to get to know some of the Dominicans in Oxford during my time there, and I have to say that same infectious zeal, good sense, good humour, and love for the sacred liturgy is present in their brethren at the exceptional Dominican house of studies here in Washington. For the feast of All Saints, for example, a chapel packed with young adults sat through an hour of readings, chant and motets, a fine sermon, and then processed around the cloister singing the litany of the saints. The DC house is full, and they have only just completed another extension. Do the math, as they say.

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Mercy is the Lord’s motive

10 Tuesday Dec 2013

Posted by Fr James Bradley in Media

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advent, catholic herald, meditation, mercy, william byrd

This meditation was my contribution to the 2013 Advent magazine of the Catholic Herald (29 November 2013). It is reproduced here with the permission of the editor.

The Offertory antiphon on the Third Sunday of Advent, Benedixisti Domine, is taken from Psalm 84 (85): “Lord, thou art become gracious unto thy land, thou hast turned away the captivity of Jacob. Thou hast forgiven the offence of thy people, and covered all their sins.” The psalm is a profound hymn of the hope of the people of Israel at the end of the Babylonian exile, as they journey to Jerusalem. It also appears in the introit for the beautiful Rorate Mass, a Votive Mass of the Blessed Virgin Mary sung before first light on the Saturdays of Advent. The “land” which is the womb of the Blessed Mother, has become the place where man’s captivity – our bondage to sin – is first undone. As St Irenaeus reminds us, by Mary’s obedience, Eve’s disobedience is reversed: Ave is made from Eva!

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Homily for the Immaculate Conception

09 Monday Dec 2013

Posted by Fr James Bradley in Homily

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advent, homily, immaculate conception, marian, our lady

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This homily was given on the feast of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary at Old Saint John’s, Silver Spring, Maryland:

There is a profound beauty in our celebration of this feast of the Immaculate Conception of Our Lady in the midst of the season of advent. Nine months before her birth, which the Church celebrates on 8th September, there is a deeper and richer spiritual truth being communicated to us by the Church’s calendar than simply the physical growth of Our Lady in the womb of her mother, Saint Anne. What might this be? 

One of the principle themes of the season of advent is prophecy. We hear the prophet Isaiah, for example, quoted extensively in the readings and propers at Mass, and we see his language and analogies drawn on, to show Christ as the fulfillment of all that is foretold by the old testament. Just as during Holy Week we see Christ in the suffering servant of Isaiah, so in this season we see the babe in the manger in the anticipated king of the prophets. It is for this reason, perhaps, that Isaiah’s prophecy is referred to by the fathers as ‘the fifth gospel’. Indeed, Saint Jerome attributed the title ‘evangelist’ to Isaiah because, he said, “he describes all the mysteries of Christ and the Church so clearly that you would think he is composing a history of what has already happened rather than prophesying about what is to come” (Nn. 1.2: CCL 73, 1-3). 

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Homily for Advent I

01 Sunday Dec 2013

Posted by Fr James Bradley in Homily

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advent, conversion, homily, liturgy

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As the Church sets out on a new liturgical year with the celebration of this season of Advent, it is easy for us to allow our gaze to fall only a short distance before ourselves. Surrounded as we are already by the lights and music of the Christmas festivities, and yet some way from the feast itself, we can all-too-easily be caught thinking that the sole purpose of this holy season is our preparation to celebrate the birth of the Lord in a few weeks’ time. Instead, the readings and prayers at this Mass and throughout Advent, point us not simply toward the coming of Christ as the babe in a manger – though of course they do – but also to his second coming when, as we profess in the Creed, he shall come to judge the quick and the dead.

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