FROM THE RECTOR: AT LAST 

The New York City Department of Buildings issued a work permit for the conservation of the West 46th Street façade of the church on Wednesday, February 5, 2020. Weekly meetings with our contractor, Milan Restorations; our architects, Jan Hird Pokorny Associates, Inc. (JHP); and the members of the parish team—trustees MaryJane Boland and Clark Mitchell, office manager Chris Howatt, and myself—resumed last Thursday, February 6. These meetings will take place weekly, with few exceptions, until the project is completed in the spring of 2021.

The main doors of the church on 46th Street consist of two sets of doors—swinging doors with glass inserts and sliding, pocket doors that are closed at night to secure the entrance to the church. The westernmost set of doors, that is, the doors on the left, if one is standing on the sidewalk facing the church, were removed this week for conservation, and another set of temporary doors has taken their place. (The entryway of the church is alarmed when the church is closed!) Just as the team from Fifty Three Restorations, Inc., was excited by uncovering the quality and ingenuity of the design of the four sets of tambour doors between the nave of the church and Saint Joseph’s Hall, our contractor and architects had the same kind of excitement about the quality and ingenuity of the design of our main doors.

One project that should begin soon is the construction of the interior scaffolding at the rear of the church so that the rose window can be removed. The first set of drawings of the scaffolding are currently being revised. The scaffolding to be erected will not block the view of the high altar from the street. The organ and choir gallery will be unaffected. Our organ curator, Larry Trupiano, has been lending his expertise as this job evolves. Next week, weather permitting, the small stones at the top of the easternmost spire on the façade of the church will begin to be taken down. Paint and mortar samples are being analyzed.

Two days before Thanksgiving 2019, I received the only e-mail I think I’ve ever received from Lewis Gleason, JHP architectural conservator, that was marked “High Importance.” Lewis was part of the JHP team that did the survey that produced a “Report of the Existing Conditions” in the spring of 2011. (He was here, too, for the installation of the new rectory roof in 2015.) While looking at pictures taken during that survey, one in particular caught his attention. He wrote, “What you see behind the benches, and something we did not know at the time, are the original terra-cotta copings from either the Clergy or Mission House or both! I pray these are still there somewhere, as we may find some worthy of restoration, or at a minimum enough examples in good condition that can be used for molds which would streamline the production process.” I knew exactly where the photo had been taken. The old stones are still in the same place.

As I write on Thursday afternoon, I can tell you that there was real excitement in Saint Benedict’s Study this morning about the work ahead. At last it really is underway. Sometimes it’s hard to wait for the Lord’s gracious blessings, but in God’s time they come. —Stephen Gerth

YOUR PRAYERS ARE ASKED FOR Pat, Eloise, Martha, Nancy, Leila, Chantal, Sharon, Marilouise, Jonathan, MaryHope, Stephanie, John, Luis, Donald, Margaret, Murray, Mel, Richard, Carlos, Ken, May, Willard, Alexandra, Karen, Takeem, Michael, Pearl, and Dennis; for Nicholas, religious; and for Jake, Horace, Gene, Gaylord, Louis, and Edgar, priests; for the members of our Armed Forces on active duty, especially Edward; and for all the benefactors and friends of this parish . . . GRANT THEM PEACE: February 16: 1896 John Jay Elmendorf; 1923 Dorothy Ellen Glanville Webb; 1925 Clara Lund Oldenbort; 1938 Alan Ramsey Hawley; 1939 Bertha M. Albrecht; 1940 Patrick Miller Boggs; 1943 Morton L. Fouquet; 1947 Delores Diana Opallo; 1950 Emma Johanna Piehl; 1969 Frederick Rouland.

THE ORDINARY FRIDAYS OF THE YEAR are observed by special acts of discipline and self-denial in commemoration of the Lord’s crucifixion.

ASH WEDNESDAY IN TIMES SQUARE . . . More people enter Saint Mary’s on Ash Wednesday than on any other day of the year. When the doors open at 7:00 AM, some will be waiting to come in for the 7:00 AM Eucharist with the imposition of ashes, others just for ashes. A few people will still be coming in as the doors close at 8:00 PM. It’s a day when volunteers are needed to help people find their way to the place in the church where ashes are being distributed. Please let Mary Robison or Father Jay Smith know if you can be here and when.

The Right Reverend Allen K. Shin, bishop suffragan of the Episcopal Diocese of New York, will be celebrant and preacher for the 12:10 Sung Mass. Father Jay Smith will be celebrant and preacher for the 6:00 PM Solemn Mass. At both Eucharists the parish choir will sing. The music will be Mass XVIII (plainsong), Miserere mei, Deus by Gregorio Allegri (c. 1582–1652), and To you, O Lord, I lift up my soul by David Hurd (b.1950).

AN ANNIVERSARY . . . Our office manager, Christopher Howatt, marks an anniversary this week. Four years ago, on February 16, 2016, Chris began to work here at Saint Mary’s. Chris not only keeps things organized around here, he is also an accomplished tenor and a mainstay of the parish choir. Thank you, Chris, for all that you do for us here at Saint Mary’s. —S.G.

AROUND THE PARISH . . . Flowers are needed for March 22 (Laetare Sunday) and for the Sundays after Easter. We also welcome donations to help with the decoration of the church during Holy Week and at Easter. Please be in touch with Chris Howatt in the parish office if you would like to make a donation . . . Attendance at all Offices and Masses: Last Sunday: 156.

THIS WEEK AT SAINT MARY’S . . . Sunday, February 16, 2020, The Sixth Sunday after Epiphany, Sung Matins 8:30 AM; Mass 9:00 & 10:00 AM; Adult Education 10:00 AM; Solemn Mass 11:00 AM, Solemn Evensong and Benediction 5:00 PM. . . . Monday, February 17, Washington’s Birthday (Presidents’ Day)—Federal Holiday Schedule. The church opens at 10:00 AM and closes at 2:00 PM. Only the noonday services are offered. The parish offices are closed . . . Wednesday, February 19, Sung Mass 12:10 PM; Drop-in Day, 2:00 to 4:00 PM in the Mission House Basement and the Church narthex; The Wednesday Night Bible Study Class will meet on Wednesday, February 19, at 6:30 PM in Saint Benedict’s Study (the east door on the Forty-sixth Street side of the church, the door nearest the sextons’ lodge, remains open until 6:45 PM for latecomers) . . . Thursday, February 20, Mass with Healing Service 12:10 PM . . . Friday, February 21, Centering Prayer Group at 6:30 PM in the Morning Room (the east door on the Forty-sixth Street side of the church, the door nearest the sextons’ lodge, remains open until 6:45 PM for latecomers).

OUTREACH AT SAINT MARY’S . . . Our monthly Drop-in Day will take place this week, on Wednesday, February 19, from 2:00 to 4:00 PM in the Mission House basement and in the narthex of the church. On other Wednesdays, we hold our Grab-and-Go Days, during which basic, emergency items—for example, socks, underwear, and toiletries—are available in the church lobby at the Forty-sixth Street entrance to the church. Cold-weather clothing such as coats, jackets, scarves, hats, and gloves remain much-needed, and much-appreciated, items during these winter months. We also continue to receive requests for shoes and sneakers in various sizes and styles. Shoes are an infrequent donation and are in constant demand. All such donations will be put to good use at both our Drop-In and our Grab-and-Go Days. Please contact me if you would like to donate cash, clothing, or toiletry articles for this ministry . . . Would you like to volunteer for Drop-in, but can’t get away for two hours mid-day? Consider being with us for an hour or half hour between 2:00 and 3:00 PM. The beginning of the event is especially busy, and we can always use extra hands to help, even if you can’t stay until 4:00 PM . . . We continue to receive donations of canned goods and other nonperishable food items for the Saint Clement’s Food Pantry. Donations may be placed in the basket next to the Ushers’ Table at the Forty-sixth Street entrance to the church. —Br. Damien Joseph SSF

ABOUT THE CHORAL AND ORGAN MUSIC ON SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 16 . . . Sunday morning’s setting of the ordinary is the Chichester Mass of William Albright (1944–1998). This setting was commissioned for the ninth centenary of Chichester Cathedral and was first performed there on June 14, 1975. Walter Hussey (1909–1985), who was dean of Chichester Cathedral from 1955–1977, was a noted patron of the arts and was the impetus behind the commissioning of an impressive list of choral works, beginning in 1943 with Benjamin Britten’s Rejoice in the Lamb which was commissioned while Hussey was vicar of Saint Matthew’s, Northampton. William Albright was born in Gary, Indiana, attended The Juilliard School, the Eastman School of Music, and the University of Michigan, where he later served on the faculty. He received a Fulbright scholarship in 1968 to study in Paris with Olivier Messiaen, whose influence combined with many others in fueling Albright’s “poly-stylistic” musical range. The Chichester Mass uses traditional Book of Common Prayer texts. It includes chant-like choral writing reminiscent of Stravinsky as in the Gloria, random as well as highly structured polyphonic elements as in the Sanctus and Benedictus, and cluster harmonies as in the Agnus Dei.

Richard Proulx (1937–2010) was one of the most gifted and prolific twentieth-century American composers, conductors, editors, and arrangers of church music. Proulx, a Roman Catholic for most of his life, produced an influential body of work which was broadly ecumenical. He was an active member of the Commission that produced The Hymnal 1982, and he modeled the highest standards as director of music for many years at Chicago’s Holy Name Cathedral (Roman Catholic). His Prayer of the Venerable Bede was composed in 1982 for Trinity Church, Princeton, New Jersey, and is dedicated to James Litton who was music director at that time. The text is as it appears inscribed upon a wall of Galilee Chapel at Durham Cathedral. Proulx’s setting has a haunting quality. The choir introduces an antiphon in Latin against which a soloist (Sharon Harms) alternates singing the text in Latin and English. 

The composer of Sunday morning’s prelude, Nicolaus Bruhns (1665–1697), was a significant North German composer in the generation before Johann Sebastian Bach, having been a student of Dieterich Buxtehude from 1681 in Lübeck. During his short life, Bruhns established for himself the reputations of a virtuoso of both keyboard and stringed instruments. He is said to have been skilled in playing trios with two voices on the violin and the third on the pedals of the organ. The Praeludium in G is one of Bruhns’ only five surviving organ works. It is a model of the improvisatory, multi-sectional North German baroque organ toccata style, and includes a notable fugue in six voices, two of which are played by the feet on the pedals. 

Sunday’s postlude, Bach’s chorale prelude on Allein Gott, BWV 715, is in the same bright key of G Major. The fact that Bach composed nearly a dozen organ settings of Allein Gott reveals the importance and popularity of this paraphrase of Gloria in excelsis (“All glory be to God on High”) in the liturgical culture of his time. Long before Bach, many leading German composers had set this melody repeatedly and, in our day, one finds this tune with its translated text in most major hymnals across denominational lines. (See 421 in The Hymnal 1982.) Today’s postlude is one of Bach’s miscellaneous settings. Here Bach separates phrases of the chorale melody, vividly harmonized, with free fantasia passages sounding very much like they might have been improvised. —David Hurd

CHRISTIAN EDUCATION . . . On Sunday, February 16, at 10:00 AM, in Saint Benedict’s Study, Father Jay Smith will lead the third of four classes in the Adult Forum on the various meanings of Jesus’ death on the cross. Using images of the Crucifixion, the class will study how Jesus’ death was understood, from very early on, as having been “for us,” and how that understanding both evolved and changed over time . . . The Wednesday Night Bible Study Class meets next on February 19 at 6:30 PM in Saint Benedict’s Study. This term the class is reading Saint Paul’s Letter to the Galatians. The class is led by Father Jay Smith. Newcomers are always welcome. The class will not meet on February 26, Ash Wednesday . . . Coming Up . . . Beginning on March 1, Father Peter Powell will resume his series on the prophets in the Adult Forum. Father Powell writes, “Every Sunday in Lent we will be reading from several of the last 12 books of the Old Testament. All you need to participate is curiosity about the Bible. Why should this interest you?  The issues each prophet addressed are relevant today as we work out how to be faithful in a divided society. These books, known both as The Twelve and as the Minor Prophets, include Amos, Hosea, Jonah, and Habakkuk. We will examine them in their original setting and then move into how they speak to us today. We will spend the first three weeks on Amos and then will go on to Jonah and Habakkuk and will conclude by looking at how the Minor Prophets are used in the Gospels. Amos and Hosea tell us about how to be faithful in a time in which conservative religion appears to me to be in control of our culture. The twelve prophets lived in a time when religion dominated but faith was absent. Our time is much like that. In the Fall we worked through Hosea, and it was a rewarding look at how faithful people live in a faithless time. Join me on March 1, the First Sunday in Lent, as we begin this important study into how God works in our world.”

COMING UP . . . Monday, February 24, Saint Matthias the Apostle . . . February 26, Ash Wednesday . . . Fridays in Lent, Evening Prayer 6:00 PM, Stations of the Cross 6:30 PM . . . Thursday, March 19, Saint Joseph . . . Wednesday, March 25, The Annunciation of Our Lord Jesus Christ.

AT THE GALLERIES . . . At the Morgan Museum and Library, 225 Madison Avenue at Thirty-sixth Street, a short walk from Grand Central Terminal and Penn Station, Speak, Act, Vote, Resist: Citizen Voices from The Gilder Lehrman Collection. From the museum website, “This special installation in the Rotunda features documents from the collection of the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History. Artifacts on view illustrate some of the many ways American citizens have raised their voices, banded together, expressed rage and hope, and taken steps to build on the promise of the nation’s founding principles. From Black activists resisting the Fugitive Slave Law of 1850 to LGBTQ+ activists demanding change after the Stonewall uprising over a century later, the people represented in these documents have engaged in patriotic pursuit of a more just America.”

The Calendar of the Week

The Complete Service Schedule for 2020