Advent Antiphons, Lessons and Motets at the Church of St. Bartholomew

I arrived at the candle-lit Church of St. Bartholomew on the evening of December 7 to experience the richness of Advent, the liturgical season sometimes forgotten or unceremoniously truncated in the hurry to celebrate Christmas. This Anglican community in New Edinburgh — founded in 1867 and with the church dating back to 1868 — has a history of close connections with a prominent neighbour, notably the Governor Generals of Canada. The liturgy opened with words of greeting from Reverend Canon Catherine Ascah, who also officiated. “Tonight we hear the timeless words of scripture as we hearken back to the promises of God. We wait this night, for the gift of the Incarnation — God with us — while acknowledging God has been, is, and will be with us again…We enter into this season of waiting, watching, hoping and preparing through song, scripture, prayer and poetry,” she said, encapsulating the meaning and spirit of Advent. Some two-dozen choristers led the faithful, numbering over 50, in song.

The prayers, sonnets, hymns, Antiphons and Motets all served as examples of the lyricism and aesthetic beauty that is part of the Anglican tradition. The prayers also urged the congregation to look both inward and outward, aware of Christ in us and around us. The Bidding Prayer included:

We meet in the evening darkness, at this time and place, to become mindful of the present unfolding of God’s purpose; to take in the vibrant sights and sounds of this Christian Liturgy and to rejoice as the Church, the body of Christ. As we pray together this night, joining with all who serve Christ yesterday, today and tomorrow. We pray for anyone who cannot see or feel the love of Christ. We pray for anyone in need, for those who are helpless and oppressed, for those who live in fear. Christ be with all who live with small hope; Christ be with those who live with anxiety and pain; Christ be with those who mourn. May God who will give us tomorrow have mercy upon us today.

The Scripture passages were read by both St. Bartholomew parishioners, as well as representatives of organizations and community groups with which the church collaborates. Among these were poverty relief non-profits like Belong Ottawa, Cornerstone Housing for Women and Alongside Hope, as well as local grassroots organizations like the Rideau Rockcliffe Community Resource Centre, the Garry J. Armstrong Pastoral Care Team and the Ottawa private school, Ashbury College.

The evening included poetry readings from the works of English poet, priest and songwriter Malcolm Guite. The sonnets were read by Chris Burns and among the ones that stood out the most for the beauty of their imagery and language was entitled O Oriens:

First light and then first lines along the east
To touch and brush a sheen of light on water
As though behind the sky itself they traced
The shift and shimmer of another river
Flowing unbidden from its hidden source;
The Day-Spring, the eternal Prima Vera.
Blake saw it too. Dante and Beatrice
Are bathing in it now, away upstream…
So every trace of light begins a grace
In me, a beckoning. The smallest gleam
Is somehow a beginning and a calling;
“Sleeper awake, the darkness was a dream
For you will see the Dayspring at your waking
Beyond your long last line the dawn is breaking.”

St. Bartholomew’s Music Director and Organist, Timothy Piper, conducted the evening’s robust choir.  Seated as I was near the organ, the full force of hymns like “Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silence” were made wonderfully clear to me. The lyrics matched the force of sound that filled the church, especially when we sang “let all mortal flesh keep silence, and with fear and trembling stand; ponder nothing earthly-minded, for with blessing in His hand, Christ our God to us approacheth, our full homage to demand.”

When the lights remained dimmed, we knew to stay seated in our pews and to take in the voices of the choristers. Our cue to stand and join the choir in song was whenever the lights turned on. While Advent is a season of darkness and waiting, we know that this darkness will inevitably give way to light. The dramatic words of the closing hymn “Lo, He Comes with Clouds Descending” (“Lo, he comes with clouds descending, once for favoured sinners slain; Thousand, thousand saints attending swell the triumph of his train”) reflect the hope that fills Advent and the triumph that is to come with Christmas.

Christopher Adam