Lovely. Except that half of the world now lives in the southern hemisphere, so the dates in that are totally out of whack for 1/2 of all Catholics.

good luck with your perspective. If dates decide theology…

Oh… and I forgot to include… hemispheres

@PaxMelodious

I should have explained this further. The theology is separate from the physical seasons as they occur in different hemispheres.

HOW THE CHURCH CELEBRATES THE CHANGE OF SEASONS

Rogation Days, Ember Days, and Customs Around the World

The Church traditionally sanctifies the natural year through two related observances:

• Rogation Days ask God’s protection over the land, crops, animals, weather, and human labor—principally during the spring planting season.

• Ember Days give thanks and do penance at the beginning of each of the four seasons.

Thus, it is really the Ember Days that mark all four seasonal changes, while Rogation Days are the great springtime supplication.

ROGATION DAYS

The word “rogation” comes from the Latin rogare, meaning “to ask.” Traditionally there are four:

• Major Rogation: April 25

• Minor Rogations: Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday before Ascension Thursday

The characteristic celebration is a public procession from the church through the parish territory. The priest and people chant the Litany of the Saints, carry the processional cross, stop at fields, gardens, orchards, wells, or boundary markers, and ask God to:

• bless the growing crops and provide favorable weather;

• protect against drought, flood, disease, and disaster;

• bless farmers, animals, tools, and human labor;

• deliver the community from sin and every form of evil.

This was never merely a quaint agricultural festival. Its deeper meaning is that creation is God’s gift, human beings remain dependent upon Providence, and the material world should be returned to God in prayer and thanksgiving.

EMBER DAYS: THE FOUR SEASONS

Ember Days occur on a Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday four times each year. An old English mnemonic is:

“Lenty, Penty, Crucy, Lucy”

Spring

Traditional time: After the First Sunday in Lent

Spiritual emphasis: Renewal, planting, and conversion

Summer

Traditional time: After Pentecost

Spiritual emphasis: First harvests and the gifts of the Holy Ghost

Autumn

Traditional time: After the Exaltation of the Holy Cross, September SeptemberSeptemberSeptember 14

Spiritual emphasis: Harvest and thanksgiving

Winter

Traditional time: After St. Lucy’s Day, DecemberChristmas preparation

Traditionally, these were days of fasting, partial abstinence, prayer, almsgiving, and thanksgiving for the fruits of the earth.

Ember Saturdays also became important days for priestly ordinations—linking the raising up of ministers for the Church with the gathering of a spiritual harvest.

CUSTOMS AROUND THE WORLD

England

Rogation processions became associated with “beating the bounds.” Parishioners walked the boundaries of the parish, prayed at particular landmarks, and blessed fields and farms.

France and Continental Europe

Village processions passed through vineyards, grain fields, and orchards. Crosses or shrines along the roads served as stations for prayers and blessings.

Italy and the Mediterranean

Prayers traditionally reflected wheat, grapes, olives, and the dangers of drought, storms, and crop disease.

Central Europe

Communities commonly blessed seed, fields, farm animals, wells, and sources of water. Local hymns were often sung in addition to the Litany.

Fishing and Coastal Communities

The same principle was applied to the sea—blessing boats, nets, fishermen, and the waters on which the community depended.

Modern Urban Parishes

A procession might pass through gardens, parks, workshops, businesses, factories, or residential streets.

Prayers can include those who produce, transport, and prepare food, as well as those who care for the environment.

Southern Hemisphere

The inherited Roman dates fall during the opposite natural seasons. The Church therefore allows bishops’ conferences and diocesan bishops to adapt the timing and intentions to local climate, planting, and harvest cycles.

The Eastern Catholic and Orthodox Churches have comparable blessings of fields, first fruits, grapes, water, animals, and harvests, although they generally do not call them “Rogation Days.”

THE OBSERVANCE TODAY

Rogation and Ember Days were not abolished.

In the present Roman Missal, their scheduling and manner of celebration are entrusted largely to bishops’ conferences and local bishops so that they can correspond to the actual needs, seasons, and culture of each country.

In the United States, they generally appear under the broader category of “Days of Prayer” for the fruits of the earth, human needs, justice, peace, or penitence.

Communities celebrating according to the older Roman calendar often retain the traditional dates, violet vestments, penitential character, Litany of the Saints, Rogation procession, and Mass.

At their best, these observances express something remarkably complete:

The Church does not simply notice the changing seasons—she receives them from God, blesses human work within them, repents for the misuse of creation, gives thanks for its fruitfulness, and asks that the earth sustain every human life.

The scandal surrounding the choice of music at my school Liturgies has resulted in the Principal explicitly accusing me of "alienating the students" because the music "isn't joyful, simple or repetitive".

She has obviously taken this way too personally, and our poor pastor is losing his mind.

@Dr_Haze

At what point does contemporary Catholic music cease to be an organic development of sacred music and instead become essentially secular musical language with Catholic texts placed within it?

Take the texts out of the music. If the music sounds like "the times", or "a particular time" it's of "the times", or "a particular time".

Am I being too rigid in wanting to maintain a distinctive sacred musical language, particularly for children?

No.

Or is there something pedagogically and liturgically backwards about continually lowering the musical/aesthetic threshold because we assume children will not participate unless the Mass sounds like the music they already hear outside the Church?

Yes. Lowering the musical/aesthetic threshold paradoxically raises the level of technical difficulty. And the assumption is backwards; children have no preconceived notions unless the adults form children in the preconceived notions they themselves have inherited as children.

Is the proper response to children's presumed musical preferences to change the music—or to form their musical preferences through exposure to something more genuinely sacred?

Formation is the easier task...provided the will and backing exists. I wouldn't even call it "forming their musical preferences" as much as "forming their grasp of musical reality".

Sacred at its core means "set apart". Tango music is sacred...for tango. Liturgical music is sacred...for liturgy.

@a_f_hawkins

Is there some generic thing called 'chant'?

At its essence, chant is unaccompanied sung speech. Everything else called "chant" derives from that essence. Because of its simplicity, starting with chant is pedagogically and liturgically forwards.

@Palestrina

I would have thought the ICEL Mass was a good place to start (or otherwise the Missa Jubilate Deo where it would not be howled down), obviously learning the Gloria in the upper years.

I share this thought. Ever since the current English edition of the Missal came out I've held that the ICEL Mass in conjunction with all of the priestly orations in the Missal, provides the foundation for everyone, from priest to preschooler, to discover what singing the Order of Mass requires, and how it can positively impact a parish's liturgical life.

@AnimaVocis

School Masses should be every day, and be regular daily (read "low") masses. No extra music except for special occasions.

This is trading one kind of secular sound (music on secular themes) for another (everyday speech). But most don't hear the latter as such, because most aren't exposed to sacred texts being delivered in a sacred manner, which is fundamentally...chant.

Honestly, this could all end if the priest would simply say to the principal:
"I'm fine with the direction @Dr_Haze is taking with the music at Mass. The buck stops with me and I have delegated authority to @Dr_Haze in this area. Neither @Dr_Haze nor I require any further input from you regarding liturgical music."

irishtenor, the Principal has just made this an easier decision for our Priest to make. Given her utterly subjective criteria for what is or is not "Age appropriate", "joyful", or "simple", she’s essentially trying to appoint herself the Liturgist and Music Director for the school masses, which should be an obvious red flag for any pastor. I'm now in a position to present two paths forward: delegate full authority to the music director, as it always has been, or go the whole school year with masses in silence. I can't willingly set this precedent while doing such a great disservice on so many levels.