Venite Prandete

  ST HILDEGEARD OF BINGEN - HER STORY FEAST DAY 17th SEPTEMBER St Hildegard, who lived from 1098-1179 AD, was one of those amazing women who populate Catholic history – along with St Catherine of Alexandria, St Catherine of Siena, St Theresa of Avila, St Clare of Assisi, St Therese of the Child Jesus, St Joan of Arc etc., etc., – the list goes on and on…. Women who, as the saying goes, were not afraid to ‘speak truth to power’ when their duty to God required it. She was noble born and placed by her parents into the care of an older woman, Jutta, who was the Abbess of the Benedictine monastery in Disibondenberg, in the Palatine Forest in Germany and, “as a result, one of the most brilliant minds of the era entered a world of culture and learning.”; Judyth McCleod, ‘In a Unicorn’s Garden, Recreating the Mystery and Magic of Medieval Gardens’, (Murdoch Books), at p. 66. When her mentor, Jutta, died, Hildegard was unanimously elected as Magistra of the community by her fellow nuns. Abb...

 

  THE FEAST OF THE MOST HOLY NAME OF MARY SATURDAY 12 SEPTEMBER The Valaam Bretheren sing to the Theotokis - the Mother of God. Monks who survived (somehow) the Communist persecutions, perhaps due to the isolation of the Valaam Monastery, on an island, sing to Our Lady as the Theotokis: Agni Parthene: O Virgin pure, immaculate, O Lady Theotokos, O rejoice, Bride unwedded! O fleece bedewed with every grace, O Virgin Queen and Mother, O rejoice, Bride unwedded! More radiant than the rays of sun, and higher than the heavens, O rejoice, Bride unwedded! O joy of virgins, superior to angels, O rejoice, Bride unwedded! O brighter than the firmament, and purer than the sun's light, O rejoice, Bride unwedded! More holy than the multitude of all the heavenly armies, O rejoice, Bride unwedded! O Ever-Virgin Mary, of all the world the Lady, O rejoice, Bride unwedded! O Bride all-pure, immaculate, O Lady Panagia, O rejoice, Bride unwedded! O Mary Bride and Queen of all, the cause of our rejoic...

Saturday memorial of the Blessed Virgin Mary: This music, incredibly beautiful and joyous, dates from the Medieval pilgrimages in Spain in the 14th century, where the lay people sang hymns to the Blessed Virgin Mary on their pilgrimage to Montserrat - the whole population, grouped in guilds or professions, were allowed entrance into the Church as their part of the hymn came up, singing praise to Our Lady.