{"id":1150,"date":"2019-02-25T08:57:25","date_gmt":"2019-02-25T13:57:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mci.archpitt.org\/blog\/blog\/?p=1150"},"modified":"2019-02-25T08:58:46","modified_gmt":"2019-02-25T13:58:46","slug":"songs-of-the-passion-of-christ","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mci.archpitt.org\/blog\/songs-of-the-passion-of-christ\/","title":{"rendered":"Songs of the Passion of Christ"},"content":{"rendered":"

We now come to one of the thornier problems in the hymnal project<\/a>: those “Lenten hymns” which are really songs of the suffering of Christ on the Cross. These were often sung in connection with Stations of the Cross and other Lenten services which were imported from the Christian West, and replaced our own services such as the Liturgy of the Presanctified Gifts, Lenten Vespers, and the Royal Hours on Great and Holy Friday.<\/p>\n

In addition to those printed in our 1978 Divine Liturgy book, our “core” collection of these hymns is Father Levkulic’s Hymns for Great Lent<\/em>. About half the context of this work is strictly liturgical: music for the Liturgy of Saint Basil, the Typical Psalms and Beatitudes, the troparion of Thursday, and the hymn, Beneath your compassion<\/em>, which is sung at Vespers on fast days.\u00a0 This music we already have in official versions, and need not concern us here.<\/p>\n

There are also Lenten hymns in this\u00a0 collection which are properly hymns of repentance, that could be sung at services throughout the Great Fast as well as our minor fasts.\u00a0 We discussed those in a previous thread,<\/a>\u00a0 as well as a pair of songs for Palm Sunday<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The remaining hymns in this collection are very specifically about the suffering and death of Christ on the Cross. In our tradition, these would be most suitably sung during Great and Holy Week, especially on Holy Thursday and Holy Friday.<\/p>\n

These should definitely be considered for the hymnal:<\/p>\n