FROM THE RECTOR: A SPECIAL AUGUST

Beginning Sunday, August 15, The Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, we will return to our traditional principal Sunday service: Solemn Mass at 11:00 AM. On Assumption Sunday, a quartet from the choir will sing the Mass ordinary and the Latin minor proper for the day. Though I wrote in The Angelus for Sunday, July 11, 2021, that congregational singing would return on August 1. I now think the right Sunday for us to start will be Assumption Sunday. I continue to be in touch with colleagues in the city and Westchester. Singing has resumed in many parishes already.

The Burial of the Dead for Edgar Fisher Wells, Jr., priest, (March 26, 1930–June 7, 2020; rector, January 1, 1979–December 31, 1998), will be celebrated here on Saturday, August 21, 2021, at 10:00 AM. The Right Reverend Andrew M.L. Dietsche, the bishop of New York, will be the celebrant. The Right Reverend Allen Shin, bishop suffragan, will pray the commendation. I will be the preacher. Immediately following this service, we will have cars for the family and the altar party to take us to the cathedral. Bishop Dietsche will officiate at the interment of Father Wells’s ashes in the cathedral columbarium. I think there will be time and room for those who wish to be at the interment to come.

I have been in touch with the Reverend Canon Steven Lee, canon pastor and vicar of the cathedral congregation, and his assistant, Ms. Hope Chang, about the interment. Canon Lee returns from vacation on Monday, August 16. I’ve asked Hope to get me on his calendar on Monday or Tuesday. I have never been at an interment at the cathedral. However, she did let me know that recently there were 45 people present for an interment. As soon as I can visit the space, I’ll be in touch with the parish community on our web page and announce to those on The Angelus list about attending the committal.

On Sunday, August 29, 2021, we will celebrate Holy Baptism for Shayleigh and Rich Page’s son, Osias, at the Solemn Mass. They were married here at Saint Mary’s on June 1, 2019. They lived for a time in the Somerset, 150 West Forty-seventh Street. They now live downtown. Osias was born during the pandemic. There will be a quartet to sing for the service. Some readers may not know that the setting of Psalm 23 that we use at parish funerals is the same setting sung when we celebrate Holy Baptism. The choir sings the chant. The congregation joins in singing the antiphon: You anoint my head with oil and my cup is running over. Our faith is about our life now and the life of the world to come. —Stephen Gerth

TWO SATURDAYS . . . On Saturday, July 31, and on Saturday, August 7, the church will only be open from 11:00 AM until 1:00 PM. The 12:10 PM Eucharist will be celebrated. Sexton Jorge Trujillo is on vacation until Sunday, August 8. The Executive Committee of the Board of Trustees has approved the hiring of a part-time sexton. There is more use of our church complex now, and we need another person to cover vacation periods for our sextons. —S.G.

YOUR PRAYERS ARE ASKED FOR Pat, Eloise, Carla, Hortense, Eric, Larry, José, Terry, Mario, Liduvina, Jonathan, Emerson, Rita, Marilouise, Quincy, Florette, John, Shalim, Peter, George, Abraham, Dennis, Ethelyn, Emil, Gypsy, Hardy, Margaret, and Robert; for Randall and Louis, priests; for all who suffer from COVID-19; for all who work for the common good; and for all the friends and members of this parish. . . GRANT THEM PEACE . . . August 1: 1874 Charles Augustus Dubois; 1880 Henry Francis Clark; 1891 Leicester Kent Ely; 1917 Axel Frederick Nelson; 1919 Edna Lillian Mayer; 1928 Elizabeth Kelsey; Eva Marion Whelpley; 1936 Louis Henry Morris; 1961 Whitney J. Blake; 1969 Mabel Upson; 2006 Marion Elizabeth Freise.

WE NEED YOUR HELP . . . If you have made a pledge for 2021, please continue to make payments on your pledge, if possible. If you have not yet made a pledge for 2021, we urge you to do so. If you can make an additional donation to support the parish at this time, we would happily receive it. Donations may be made online via the Giving section of the parish website. You may also make arrangements for other forms of payment by contacting our parish administrator, Christopher Howatt, who would be happy to assist you. We are grateful to all those who continue to support Saint Mary’s so generously. —The Stewardship Committee

AROUND THE PARISH . . . A Note to Our Faithful Ushers: If you are at Mass and notice that the ushers’ table is understaffed, we invite you to jump in and lend a hand. It’s vacation season, and on some Sundays, we do not have a full complement of ushers . . . Brandon Coreale, and his husband, Ivan, have been worshiping with us for some time now. Brandon recently transferred his membership here from his former parish in Louisiana. Brandon has expressed interest in serving at the altar—an important and much-needed ministry just now. We look forward to getting to know both Brandon and Ivan and we are very happy that they have joined us . . . Parishioner Larry Hamil is being treated at home for some persistent pain following medical treatment . . . Parish volunteer Gypsy da Silva is now living at a care facility in New Jersey. We hear that she is doing well and welcomes communications from her friends at Saint Mary’s. Hortense Rose is a friend of Father Matt Jacobson’s. She is undergoing treatment for a rare illness, which is proving difficult to treat. Please keep Larry, Gypsy, and Hortense in your prayers . . . Would you like to donate altar flowers? We are looking those willing to donate altar flowers for all the Sundays in August and September, except for August 15. (During the month of September, we celebrate the following feast days: the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Holy Cross Day, Saint Matthew, and Michaelmas.) The suggested donation for flowers is $250. Donors often give flowers in memory of, thanksgiving for, or celebration of certain people or life events. Please contact Chris Howatt in the parish office, if you would like to donate or you may also speak to Brendon Hunter for more information . . . Please speak to the rector if you’d like to volunteer to take photographs on Sunday morning, during Mass or the adult-education classes. The photographs are used to illustrate the weekly newsletter.

THIS WEEK AT SAINT MARY’S . . . Sunday, August 1, The Tenth Sunday after Pentecost, Mass 11:00 AM, Father Matthew Jacobson, celebrant and preacher; Evening Prayer 5:00 PM. The church opens at 10:00 AM and closes at 5:30 PM . . . Monday–Saturday, August 2–7, Mass 12:10 PM and Evening Prayer 5:00 PM. The church is open from 11:00 AM until 5:30 PM . . . Tuesday, August 3, Racism Discussion Group Meeting, 7:00 PM via Zoom. For more information about this ongoing weekly meeting, please call the parish office . . . Friday, August 6, The Transfiguration of Our Lord Jesus Christ, Mass 12:10 PM, Evening Prayer 5:00 PM . . . Next Sunday, August 8, The Eleventh Sunday after Pentecost: Mass 11:00 AM, Father Jay Smith, celebrant and preacher; Evening Prayer 5:00 PM. The readings at Mass on Sunday, August 8, are Deuteronomy 8:1–10, Psalm 34:1–8, Ephesians 4:25–5:2, and John 6:37–51.

ABOUT THE MUSIC . . . Sunday’s organ voluntaries are two of the Eight Little Preludes and Fugues, a set of concise organ pieces traditionally attributed to Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750). More recent scholarship suggests that they might actually have been composed by a Bach pupil, very likely Johann Tobias Krebs (1690–1762), or his son, Johann Ludwig Krebs (1713–1780). The uncertainty of the origin of these works notwithstanding, these well-known eight Preludes and Fugues have figured largely in the instruction of generations of organists and are very suitable as voluntaries in liturgical settings. BWV 555 in E minor, played for the Prelude, is the third of the set of eight. It begins in a rather introspective mood. The fugue subject skillfully employs chromaticism. BWV 557 in the relative major key of G, played for the Postlude, is a more extroverted work and is the fifth of the set of eight. It begins grandly and then takes on the free spirit of the keyboard toccatas of its time. The fugue is stately and is a study in melodic suspensions. The remaining six of the Eight Little Preludes and Fugues will be offered as voluntaries for the next three Sundays in relative major and minor key pairings.

The settings for the Mass today are from Music for the Lord’s Supper by NcNeil Robinson (1943–2015). Robinson was an internationally celebrated organist, composer, improvisateur and teacher. He headed the organ department at the Manhattan School of Music for many years in addition to serving religious institutions. In 1965 while still a student at the Juilliard School he began long and well-remembered associations with the Church of Saint Mary the Virgin and with Park Avenue Synagogue. While he remained organist at Park Avenue Synagogue until retiring in 2012, he left Saint Mary’s in 1982 and subsequently served at Park Avenue Christian Church and at Holy Trinity Roman Catholic Church before failing health necessitated his retirement. Robinson’s reputation as a virtuoso organist, improviser, and composer became established during his years at St. Mary’s. Music for the Lord’s Supper, a setting for Rite II Eucharist for unison voices and organ, was published in 1979. Its Kyrie and widely sung Lord’s Prayer are found in The Hymnal 1982. At Mass today the cantor will sing the Gloria, Sanctus, Benedictus, and Agnus Dei from this setting. These movements are composed in a conventional style with a fine economy of melodic grace and harmonic interest.

Today’s cantor is tenor, Daniel Castellanos. His musical offering during the Communion will be Lord, thou art my refuge (Opus 99/2) by Antonín Dvořák (1841–1901). In March 1894, while Dvořák was living in New York City, he composed a cycle of ten Biblical Songs, Opus 99, of which Lord, thou art my refuge is the last. The text is drawn from Psalm 119:114-120. Dvořák’s Biblical Songs were first published in Czech with English and German translations in 1895. Scored originally quite simply for piano and voice, Dvořák orchestrated only the first five of the songs in a manuscript which was published posthumously in 1914 by the Simrock, the publisher of the original 1895 edition. The conductor Vilem Zemanek was the first, in 1914, to orchestrate the last five of the Dvořák songs. Despite a profusion of arrangements which have been created subsequently, Dvořák’s Biblical Songs, in their original form, are notable for their simplicity of means and effectiveness of expression. They are often performed as a cycle or in select groupings. —David Hurd

NEIGHBORS IN NEED . . . At our monthly Drop-by Days, we distribute clothing and toiletry and hygiene items to those in need in the Times Square neighborhood. Our next Drop-by Day is scheduled for Friday, August 20. Volunteers work from 1:30 PM until 3:30 PM. Our guests are invited into the church at 2:00 PM and we close our doors at 3:00 PM. We need six (6) volunteers for each Drop-by. If you would like to volunteer, please contact Marie Rosseels, MaryJane Boland, or Father Jay Smith. You may reach them by calling the Parish Office at 212-869-5830.

At the moment, we would welcome donations of packages of new underwear for both men and women. We are also very happy to receive donations of single-trip MTA Transit cards. These are useful for our guests who need to travel to soup kitchens, appointments at health clinics, or meetings with social workers. We are so grateful to all those who continue to support this ministry so generously.

CHRISTIAN EDUCATION . . . We are happy to announce that Father Peter Powell will be teaching in our adult-education program this fall on Sundays from November 7 until December 19. Father Powell has proven to be a popular Bible teacher both here at Saint Mary’s and at parishes in Connecticut. We are pleased that he will be able to teach in the autumn and again during Lent 2022.

This year, Father Powell will be teaching a class about the Holiness Code, Leviticus 17–27. He writes, “I have long been attracted to the Holiness Code as the source of much of what has become Christian Ethics. The foundation of the call to be ethical is that we are called to be Holy because the Lord Our God, who brought his people up from the land of Egypt, is Holy. To be Holy is to be a people apart. This fall and then again in Lent we will look at these chapters and related chapters in the Torah that ground us in what we undertake when we say we are children of God. Our faith has expectations. These are not the easiest chapters to read so we will do so carefully as we learn about ourselves and our faith. In these chapters you will find the texts used to argue against same-sex marriage as well as the texts used to mandate the forgiveness of debts. How do we read these texts today in a way that takes each seriously while understanding them in their context? We live in a church that encourages marriage for all who desire it. Are we in conflict with the bible or might there be, as I think there is, another way of treating these difficult verses? We live in world in which some are calling for the forgiveness of all student debt (and some for the cancelling of all debt for the poor), what does the call for Jubilee have to say about how we are Christians today? These are only two of the many ethical issues raised in these chapters. I look forward to studying with you in the fall.”

MARK YOUR CALENDAR . . . Sunday, August 15, The Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary . . . Tuesday, August 24, Saint Bartholomew the Apostle . . . Monday, September 6, Labor Day . . . Wednesday, September 8, The Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary . . . Saturday, September 11, Requiem Mass for Victims of Attacks on 9/11/2001 . . . Tuesday, September 14, Holy Cross Day . . . Tuesday, September 21, Saint Matthew, Apostle and Evangelist . . . Wednesday, September 29, Saint Michael and All Angels.

This edition of the Angelus was written and edited by Father Stephen Gerth and Father Jay Smith. Father Gerth is responsible for posting the newsletter on the parish website and for distributing it via mail and e-mail, with the assistance of Christopher Howatt and parish volunteer Clint Best.