|
This Week at Ascension + February 14, 2024
"Worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness." - Psalm 96
| |
|
Stations of the Cross
& Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament
on the Fridays of Lent at 6 p.m.
February 16 & 23 and March 1, 8, 15 & 22
Following Stations & Benediction a vegetarian soup and bread supper will be offered in Wheeler Hall
| |
|
New Weekday Mass Schedule
Be present, be present, O Jesus, our great High Priest,
as you were present with your disciples,
and be known to us in the breaking of bread.
On Monday, February 19, we will institute a new weekday Mass schedule. We hope you will make our new weekday Mass schedule part of your Lenten journey.
12 p.m. on Monday & Friday
8 a.m. on Tuesday & Thursday
6:30 p.m. on Wednesday
| |
|
From the Rector
Every Ash Wednesday, following my first mass of the day, I sit down with a cup of coffee and read through a transcript of Archbishop Rowan Williams 2009 reflections on Lent. As a priest, between all the planning and preparation for the season, it's easy to become so consumed by the details and entrenched in the disciplines that you forget the reason for the season - what it's for and what it's not for. As we embark on this most holy season, I wish to share with you an excerpt from Archbishop Williams' reflection. I hope it too will ground you and prepare you for your Lenten journey:
"In the earliest centuries of the Church, newcomers to the Christian community were baptised at Easter. It seemed to be the obvious time to do it – Easter, the conquest of death, the beginning of new life – and so it was that it came to be the common practice for bishops, particularly, to baptise and anoint new believers at that great feast. But of course, believers had to be prepared for this event, prepared by instruction, and prayer, and self-denial. It was believed that self-denial; fasting and extra prayer was something that, as it were, limbered you up, rather like doing exercises for some great race. It made you more spiritually mobile and agile. And so that period of preparation for baptism came to be associated with fasting, with prayer and with self-denial. That's how Lent began.
But it's important to remember that the word 'Lent' itself comes from the old English word for 'spring'. It's not about feeling gloomy for forty days; it's not about making yourself miserable for forty days; it's not even about giving things up for forty days. Lent is springtime. It's preparing for that great climax of springtime which is Easter – new life bursting through death. And as we prepare ourselves for Easter during these days, by prayer and by self-denial, what motivates us and what fills the horizon is not self-denial as an end in itself but trying to sweep and clean the room of our own minds and hearts so that the new life really may have room to come in and take over and transform us at Easter."
To read the full manuscript, click here.
—Fr. de la Torre
| |
|
Ritual Notes
Worship at Ascension
As we embark on the season of Lent, I want to share with you two liturgical implementations that will go into effect beginning Ash Wednesday (February 14):
1. On a trial basis, we will be removing formal announcements from our liturgy. The practice of bidding announcements after the peace and before the offertory, while functional, especially to greet people and highlight upcoming events, disrupts the natural structure and movement of our liturgy. In consultation with our clergy and staff, I have decided, as Gary Alexander remarked in a meeting, “to give up announcements for Lent.”
As far as our ritual practice is concerned, this means that after the peace is bid and shared, the congregation will be invited to remain standing through the offertory sentence. During which the oblations are brought forward before sitting down for the offertory anthem at the 11AM Mass or continuing to stand for the hymn at the 9AM mass. New and direct rubrics will appear in your mass bulletins. Some will note that this is not a change, but a return to a previous practice.
2. A Lenten custom across the Church is to remove flowers from the sanctuary (with the exception of Laetare Sunday) and, eventually, veil holy images. Just as it is customary to remove flowers from the Altar during Lent, we will also be removing flowers from our incense – dry lavender is one of the ingredients in our incense blend. During Lent, we will use pure frankincense from the famed Mucknell Abbey in Worcestershire, England, which contains no added fragrant oils.
Along with our other distinct Lenten practices, like the elimination of organ voluntaries and the use of the Great Litany on the first and fifth Sunday in Lent, the goal of these implementations is to ground us more deeply in our worship of God as we meditate on our Lord's passion and death, and prepare ourselves to celebrated his glorious resurrection on Easter Day.
| |
|
Images of Pilgrimage
2024 Lenten Program led by Fr. Robert Petite
Our Lenten program will explore Images of Pilgrimage as they inform the practice of Christian love throughout the Christian’s life journey. A pilgrimage is a journey to visit holy places: historical churches, religious shrines, or other sacred sites in a particular country. We can also speak metaphorically of the whole of life as “a pilgrimage”, a metaphor for the spiritual journey we all take, with all the challenges, demands and hardship that accompany it. Please join us for this rich formation program led by Fr. Petite, following the 11:00 a.m. Solemn High Mass. A hearty lunch will be provided.
Sunday, February 18 – Images of Pilgrimage in Holy Scripture (The Creation Story, The Exodus, the Prodigal Son, and Christ’s Journey into the Wilderness.)
Sunday, February 25 – Images of Pilgrimage in the theology of St. Augustine of Hippo (The Restless Journey toward Divine Love)
Sunday, March 3 – Images of Pilgrimage in the poetry of Dante Alighieri (The movement of Romantic love to love of neighbor and God).
| |
About our Written Resource: Images of Pilgrimage; Paradise and Wilderness in Christian Spirituality by Rev. Dr. Robert Crouse, one time professor of Classics at Dalhousie University and the University of King’s College, Halifax, Nova Scotia. Fr. Crouse was a respected spiritual director, an authority on St. Augustine (354-430) and on Dante (1261-1321). He died in 2011. His book can be found on Amazon in hardcover and Kindle: https://a.co/d/0DVRdcs
| |
|
Lenten Quiet Morning Saturday, March 9
What’s so good about a crucified God?
Mtr. KJ Oh, priest associate at St Paul and the Redeemer, Hyde Park and Emerita Professor in Practical Theology at Bexley Seabury Seminary, Chicago, will lead us as we reflect on what it means to follow a savior who was so easily exterminated and how Jesus’ sacrificial act results in our salvation. Our conversations, while framed by theology, are offered as a time for personal, spiritual exploration rather than as a theological exercise.
| |
|
Consider being a Coffee Hour host
There are spots available for hosting Coffee Hour after either Sunday Mass! Look for the NEW MARCH & APRIL sign-up sheets in Wheeler Hall.
If you are leary of what hosting a Coffee Hour might entail, speak to Hospitality Committee members Josh or Ellie Simpson, David Reeves, LaVerne Saunders or Carol Noren. They will be glad to help.
| |
|
The Prayers of the People
As part of our Sunday offering of the Mass, we bring to God our petitions and thanksgivings. As a community, we do this by bidding the parish’s intentions in the Prayers of the People. If you wish to have someone added to the Prayers of the People, please email Father de la Torre or Mother Murphy-Gill. You can also fill out the prayer request form in the link below. Names will remain on the prayer list for three weeks, unless otherwise requested.
Lord, hear the prayers of thy people; and what we have asked faithfully, grant that we may obtain effectually, to the glory of thy Name; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
| |
|
For our prayers
Lynn Wilber, Ellen, Kenneth Phillips, Amy & Amanda Boemer, Elizabeth McLaughlin,
Greg Nigosian, Ellen Penrod, Andrew Carlin, Marilyn Labkon, Robert Baily, Lee Gould,
Robert Pischke, Derrick Petite, Florence Jones Clanton, David Schrader,
Leslie Smebak Gormley, Rachel Smolinski, Sarah Reece Glanman, Suzanne Dines, MB Hwang, Juanita Malone, David S. Jones, Richard Francis Tracz, Victor Fernandez, Claire Green,
Beth Hall, Sue Lenz, Brenda Martins
Birthday
Tom Opferman, 2/11
Anniversary
Jim & Susanne Lenz, Marriage, 2/17/1968
Requiescat in pace: Alison Henderson;
Roy G. Batson, 2/11/2009; Norman Peter Joseph, 2/11/2011; Roy Frederic Kehl, 2/12/2011; Richard Young, Priest, 2/15/1996; Ruth Schram, 2/16/2023
Rest eternal grant unto them, O Lord, and let light perpetual shine upon them;
May their souls and the souls of all the departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace.
| |
|
Organ and Choral Repertoire for
February 18, 2024
| |
|
ORGAN
Voluntaries are omitted on this day.
At the Entrance Procession
THE GREAT LITANY
At the Offertory
147 BOURBON
At the Communion
143 ERHALT UNS, HERR
At the Retiring Procession
150 AUS DER TIEFE RUFE ICH
| |  |
|
Mass Setting
Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina
(c. 1525-1594)
Missa Ave regina coelorum
Offertory Motet
Richard Farrant (c. 1525-1580)
Call to remembrance
Communion Motet
Kathryn Rose (b. 1980)
Angelis suis (2018)
Chanted Mass Propers
from the Graduale Romanum
| | |
|
Between Masses, please don’t forget that The Choir of the Ascension has recorded upwards of 60 tracks that you can listen to anywhere you have an internet connection. They can be found here: https://soundcloud.com/choir-of-the-ascension
| |
|
Ascension Connections
(with your click and God's help)
|
Meeting ID:
792 031 7452
Password: 1133
Join-by-Phone Option: (312) 626-6799
| |
|
Weekly Ascension Schedule
For connections:
via Zoom (click here)
SUNDAYS
7:30 a.m. Morning Prayer via Zoom
9:00 a.m. In-person Sung Mass
11:00 a.m. In-person and Live-Streamed Solemn High Mass
VIA YOUTUBE or FACEBOOK LIVE
MONDAY-FRIDAY
7:30 a.m. Morning Prayer via Zoom
6:00 p.m. Evening Prayer via Zoom
Beginning February 19
Weekday Mass Schedule
12 p.m. on Monday & Friday
8 a.m. on Tuesday & Thursday
6:30 p.m. on Wednesday
View the Wednesday Mass here
VIA YOUTUBE or FACEBOOK LIVE
| |
|
Wardens
David Reeves, Sr. Warden
David Reeves, Sr. Warden
David A. Robertson, Jr. Warden
David A. Robertson Jr. Warden
Vestry
Ian Barillas-McEntee, Jay Peterson, Joshua Simpson
Ken Cozette, Elizabeth Simpson, Samuel Sommers (Clerk)
Vicki Dvonch, Nancy Pardee, DiAnne Walsh
Susan Schlough, Treasurer
Finance@ascensionchicago.org
Br. Nathanael Deward Rahm BSG, Parish Office
Office@ascensionchicago.org
Approved minutes of Vestry meetings are always available online to parishioners who request the link. If you would like Internet access to these Vestry Minutes, please email the Parish Office and request the link. Once you access the web page, you can read all recent Vestry meeting minutes.
The link remains live indefinitely. Any parishioner who has the link will not need to request a new link from month to month.
| | | | |
