Latin Chant Mass

Church of the Advent
of Christ the King

An inclusive parish of The Episcopal Church in the Anglo-Catholic tradition

Special Note: Father Rod Thompson, who is usually the celebrant and homilist at our Latin Mass services, has , as noted below, translated the 1979 Book of Common Prayer of the Episcopal Church to a two-volume Latin version. Until it becomes available on Amazon.com the publication can be purchased now through http://stores.lulu.com/anglorod

Latin Chant Mass

The Latin Mass at Church of the Advent

At 5:00 p.m. on the first and third Saturday of each month, amid the sweet smell of incense, the ancient and serene tones of Gregorian chant can be heard at Church of the Advent in their original context: a Latin liturgy.

The Latin Eucharist at Church of the Advent provides a contemplative alternative to the more active styles of worship which have been emphasized in the Episcopal Church in recent decades, and also continues a little-known strand in Anglican tradition. In addition to the vernacular Prayer Book adopted by the Anglican Church at the Reformation, the use of Latin continued in various places, especially Oxford University. The Elizabethan Book of Common Prayer appeared in a Latin edition in 1560, and Latin versions of the prayer book continued to be produced up until the nineteenth century.

The service at Church of the Advent provides a truly Anglican via media, with the readings, sermon, and intercessions in English, while all the other prayers and the traditional psalm and scripture verses (the “minor propers”) are sung in Latin by the celebrant and schola cantorum.

Those looking for further adventures in the Anglican Latin tradition can find several Latin versions of the Prayer Book online at Chad Wohler’s extensive Book of Common Prayer website, with a translation of the 1979 book by one of Church of the Advent’s associate clergy.

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At the Latin Mass on Epiphany, January 6, 2007, the day after he returned from his sabbatical, The Reverend Paul Burrows, Advent's Rector gave the following sermo.

On entering the house, they saw the child
with Mary his mother; and they knelt down and paid him homage.

Matthew 12:11

On my travels I have witnessed many liturgies of varying values many sublime but others frankly banal. When asked why we have this liturgy twice a month in Latin I am often at a loss to answer – until now that is.

One of the places I visited was the White Benedictine Community at Pluscarden near Elgin in the very North of Scotland. I am told the Pluscarden is the most northerly of Benedictine Houses in the world – it is certainly one of very few that is in a restored medieval ruin. And here the full eightfold office ordered in the Rule of St. Benedict is recited each day in Latin. The monks, 25 of them, sing through all 150 psalms each week in the glorious Latin of St. Jerome with hymns by St. Ambrose and responds by a variety of writers. Attending Vigils each morning at 4:45 a.m. I realized that it was not important to keep up with translation or even understanding, the sense of the psalms washed over me and I was transported.

Here at Advent we offer this Mass not as an intellectual exercise nor as some sort of antiquarian feast but as a manifestation, as an Epiphany. So now it is important that we take that into our lives and become ourselves an epiphany of the mysteries that we reveal here each time we offer this Mass.

Church of the Advent of Christ the King
261 Fell Street, San Francisco, CA 94102-5908
Parish office: (415) 431-0454
Fax: (415) 431-3767
E-mail: office@advent-sf.org