EWTN.com - The Priest and Pastoral Ministry in a Digital World

From EWTN.com:
"...Priests can rightly be expected to be present in the world of digital communications as faithful witnesses to the Gospel, exercising their proper role as leaders of communities which increasingly express themselves with the different 'voices' provided by the digital marketplace. Priests are thus challenged to proclaim the Gospel by employing the latest generation of audiovisual resources. Using new communication technologies, priests ... must learn, from the time of their formation, how to use these technologies in a competent and appropriate way, shaped by sound theological insights and reflecting a strong priestly spirituality grounded in constant dialogue with the Lord. Yet priests present in the world of digital communications should be less notable for their media savvy than for their priestly heart, their closeness to Christ. This will not only enliven their pastoral outreach, but also will give a 'soul' to the fabric of communications that makes up the 'Web'"....
Read the Rest: EWTN.com: - The Priest and Pastoral Ministry in a Digital World

Comparing English Psalms

From NLM: "Last November, the USCCB approved the Revised Grail Psalter - which is bound up in an amazing copyright mess, held ultimately by the Grail in the UK but administered by a major secular publisher in the UK and with changes held ultimately by Conception Abbey in the US but with rights administered by a major for-profit publisher in the US, that is, the GIA, which has already threatened anyone who would violate its terms of use.
This raises the question: just how different is this Psalm translation that would justify copyright enforcement, royalty payments, and the whole police-state apparatus of enforcement over texts in the digital age? ..." Read the rest of Comparing English Psalms

Memories of Abbot Parker

At the funeral of our beloved founding prelate, a book was distributed containing personal recollections of Abbot Ladislas Parker by all of the living members of the St. Michael's Abbey community. I thought you might be interested in this portrait of our founder.  It's also something of a portrait of our community.  The text is available here. 
"They are offered in great gratitude and joy for all the world of good he did us , in the hope that they will encourage and inspire all the clergy and faithful who read these truly heartfelt lines. All together, these reminiscences compose a comprehensive picture of his character, achievements, influence, personality, and grace-filled old age, and peaceful death in the abbey he founded."

A Tale of Two Cities

We shall soon begin our unit on Charles Dickens.  Each of my Brit. Lit. students should have and bring to class the paperback (which I think you all have).  For your convenience, here are also links to the etext and the audio book.

The St. Michael Messenger - Oct 2009 edition

Here is our latest issue of The St. Michael Messenger.  We hope you and your dear ones are well, and we keep you all in our daily prayers.

Please visit our website and take a look at the photo galleries for pictures of some recent events at the Abbey, e.g. articles and pictures of +Abbot Parker, Liturgies at the Abbey, the Prep School's sports, graduation, and activities, the Expansion Project, and  summer camp pictures. We have just started a fan page on Facebook and Twitter as well to keep you updated with upcoming events and abbey related photos.

The St. Michael Messenger is in the mail.  If you would like future issues via US Mail, please click here to sign up.

Sancte Hilari, ora pro nobis!

Happy feast of Saint Hilarius! 

Praying, in our own words

A good reflection on how the liturgy teaches us to pray.  Is not this canonical spirituality?  From PT: "There’s been a lot of discussion lately on the words we use in prayer. But what about the words we use in our own daily prayers? I’m not talking about the office, here. I’m talking about those moments in the privacy of a corner couch, a daily commute, or a kitchen stove when one has no written text, no hymnal, no breviary to rely on to speak one’s thoughts in private, ritual prayer to God. Just how do everyday people without theological degrees or a liturgical library learn to pray in their every day experience?"
Read the Rest: Praying, in our own words

Mary with Lamb............January 13

Mary with Lamb............January 13: "The Blessed Virgin directs to us all the acts that every mother lavishes on her children. She loves us, watches over us, protects us, and intercedes for us. --Pope John XXIII"

12-Jan-10 - True Environmentalists Are Pro-Life, Says Pope

12-Jan-10 - True Environmentalists Are Pro-Life, Says Pope: "VATICAN CITY, JAN. 11, 2010 (Zenit.org)

New Semester

Welcome back to all my students!  You'll notice a number of new links.  One which will be particularly useful to the seniors is the Matura, which can also be found on the sidebar under Class Handouts, and contains the papers from the Senior Matura CD. 

There's no debating taste when it comes to music at Mass

From NLM:
There's no debating taste when it comes to music at Mass: "Rev. Christopher Smith, STL, Parochial Vicar at Saint Francis-by-the-Sea Catholic Church on Hilton Head Island dispels eight commonly held myths about music at Mass. Would that all contemporary liturgists took a few minutes to read this concise and breezily argued Tour de force...
Myth #4: We are supposed to sing four hymns at Mass
Read the entire article. "

Rev. Ladislaus Parker (1915-2010) Photo Gallery

The Abbey Website now has a nice photo Gallery of Abbot Parker.  Requiescat in pace.

Must the Sisters Pay To Sing?

From NML:

"My inbox often receives notes from parishes and other Catholic institutions asking questions about ICEL's permissions policies. For review, this is the International Commission on English in the Liturgy that doesn't actually publish the liturgical texts but still claims to own them and therefore imagines that it has the right to charge you and me for the right to pray the words that they authorize and mandate for the whole English-speaking Catholic world.

...

In either case, it strikes me as a tragedy that anyone should create all this bureaucracy when a clean and clear, once-and-for permission for everyone, would suffice. It works for the Latin chant. It works for the Book of Common Prayer. It could work for Catholic English too. What keeps this obvious solution at bay?

All this pay-to-pray finagling is very embarrassing, especially for Catholics, especially with our folk history in this regard."

Full story:
Must the Sisters Pay To Sing?

Colligens de tribulis ficus: De instrumento orthographiae Latinae corrigendae

For those of you who, like me, need to use Latin on the computer: 
Colligens de tribulis ficus: De instrumento orthographiae Latinae corrigendae

I myself usually find Open Office  Latin Spell Checker to be sufficient.
Thanks to this blog also for suggestions of several good links, which I've added to the sidebar.

Dominus Spectabilis

Dominus Spectabilis! A remarkable gentleman. This title was often applied by Abbot Parker to postulants before these received their religious names, but especially to those of us who, being the youngest in our class, were charged with taking out the trash. "Domine Spectabilis... O-ka-pal. I have never heard of the name 'Okapal'. You say it is Slovak? I shall write to the Abbot of Jasow...." Sure enough, a few weeks later, he handed me an envelope emblazoned with the St. Michael's return address and motto, Ad omne bonum opus parati. The envelope was empty; on its front, Abbot Parker had typed (with his typewriter!): "Message from the Abbot of Jasow in Slovakia: Okapal is a verb in the 3rd person past perfect and means: 'He has cultivated it with a hoe.'" This envelope is on the desk in front of me. Abbot Parker delighted in the meaning and etymology of names, and he understood the necessity of cultivation for growth. Succisa Virescit!

--Frater Maximilian Okapal, O.Praem.

RIP, Abbot Ladislas Parker, O.Praem.

Our heavenly Father, the Lord of the living and the dead, has called to Himself Reverendissimus Dom. Ladislas Francis Keresztesy-Parker Abbas - Fundator Canoniae Sancti  Michaelis in Orange Sunday, 3 January, A.D. 2010, at 12:05 A.M. (premontre.org)

Francis Pürker was born in German-speaking Vaskeresztes, Hungary on December 19, 1915. He attended school in Szombathely at the Norbertine gymnasium directed by  confreres of St. Michael's Abbey in Csorna. Upon graduation Francis entered the Abbey's novitiate and received the name of Ladislas. After novitiate and profession, he  completed philosophical studies in the studium of the Abbey and was then sent to Rome where he pursued theological studies at the Gregorian University. Fr. Ladislas was  ordained a priest on August 20, 1940 and completed his doctoral studies in 1942 with a dissertation on "The Doctrine of St. Augustine on Hope." Upon return from his studies Fr.  Ladislas was named master of novices and professor of moral theology at the Abbey, posts he filled until escaping Communist Hungary along with his confreres in July,  1950.
Received warmly by Abbot Sylvester Killeen and the confreres of St. Norbert's Abbey in DePere, Wisconsin, Fr. Ladislas and his companions served in a variety of ministerial  settings doing both parish and academic work in the Abbey's widely-spread apostolates. Fr. Ladislas, though, was the driving force enabling his fellow refugees to reunite in  1957, reestablishing both the common life in Santa Ana, California and a common apostolate at Mater Dei High School, at the invitation of Cardinal James McIntyre, Archbishop  of Los Angeles. He served on the faculty of Mater Dei until 1961 when in August a new foundation was opened as a junior seminary and novitiate of the Abbey of St. Michael's in Csorna. 
From 1959 -1975, Fr. Ladislas was administrator of the community with its growing number of seminarians. In June 1975 the community became an independent priory and Fr.  Ladislas was elected the first prelate. In August, 1984, following the decision of the Order's definitory, the canonry was elevated to abbey status and Fr. Ladislas was named its  first abbot. Upon reaching 75 years of age in 1990, he was re-elected prelate. Abbot Parker became abbot emeritus upon his resignation in June, 1995. By that time and under his wise and loving governance the community had grown to 41 priests and nearly 60 confreres in all. 

"But the souls of the righteous are in the hand of God, and no torment will ever touch them. In the eyes of the foolish, they seemed to have died, and their departure was   thought to be an affliction, and their going from us to be their destruction; but they are at peace... They who trust in him will understand truth, and the faithful will abide with him  in love; because grace and mercy are upon his elect." (Wisdom 3:1-3, 9)

No More Earthen Vessels

From NLM:
No More Earthen Vessels: "
The new issue of Today's Liturgy came in the mail yesterday and I was stunned to see its cover. It is a gold chalice. Gold!

So much for the embarrassing fashion of the past, the earthen vessel, which was somehow supposed to remind us of something profound in a hippie kind of way. This change, this repudiation, is part of an overall trend at the Oregon Catholic Press that embraces the look of tradition.

The change in look has yet to affect their musical offerings however. And there are some traditions that can't be broken: my issue is missing 10 pages, just like their 'choral praise' book was missing the last verse of the hymn that was printed in their missalette, which we discovered only during liturgy last week. Nonetheless, praise where it is due!

"

Second Day of the Year of Grace 2010

So far, so good...