Ascension of the Lord

5 June 2011

Entrance	At the name of Jesus
Gloria	Glory to God (Berthier)
Psalm 46	Our God goes up (mtgf)
Gospel Acclamation	Celtic (O'Carroll/Walker)
Preparation of Gifts	One is the Body (John Bell)
Eucharistic Acclamations	Gathering (Paul Inwood)
Lamb of God	(Berthier)
Communion	Alleluia hymn (Orthodox arr. mtgf)
Final	Lord, you give the great commission

This morning we had five baptisms so opening and closing hymns we chose ones which would be well known. The final hymn was chosen because of the specific reference to baptism and we sang it to Ode to Joy on the assumption that more people would know that tune rather than Abbot's Leigh.

One is the Body is a well-crafted song based on the Ephesians text. The Alleluia hymn is based on well known Orthodox chant which I have added words in praise of Christ and made it more rhythmic than chanted.

We also had a conference in the college this weekend and were asked to sing at Mass on Friday evening and at a second Mass on Sunday morning. In preparing the music choices the key questions are how many people and are they English speaking alongside the purpose of conference and the liturgical texts. As I understood it the group was English speaking/comprehending - so the task was to identify hymns that would be widely known and appropriate. For Mass parts we sang de Angelis on Friday - which worked fine they were a group who sang well. I was interested that few seemed to know the chant of the memorial acclamation Mortem tuam. For Sunday we sang much the same as our normal Mass above but used the Mass of Creation instead of the Gathering Mass — I think was the last time we will sing as an acclamation Christ has died. We used the Penitential Rite I wrote based on the Easter chant Lux et origo and I added a Lamb of God based on the chant as well.