“The Great Litany Of Peace”.
“Sacred Treasures: Masterpieces
Of Ukrainian Choral Music
Of The XV - XIX Centuries”.
By: Kviv Chamber Choir.
Conductor: Mykola Hobdytch.
Available On YouTube
11 March, 2026
“Kyrie Eleison”. Fifteenth-Century Ukrainian Orthodox Chant By The Kyiv Chamber Choir.
“Kyrie Eleison”.
Fifteenth-Century Ukrainian Orthodox Chant.
The Kyiv Chamber Choir.
Available on YouTube
Regina Trench Cemetery, Grandcourt, The Somme, France.
Text and Illustrations:
Regina Trench Cemetery, France.
On 1 July 1916, the first day of the Battle of the Somme, Grandcourt Village was reached by part of the 36th (Ulster) Division, but it was not until the German withdrawal to the Hindenburg Line, early in February 1917, that it was occupied by patrols of the Howe Battalion, Royal Naval Division.
To the South-East of it is Courcelette, taken
by the 2nd Canadian Division on 15 September 1916.
Regina Trench was a German earthwork, captured
for a time by the 5th Canadian Brigade on 1 October 1916, attacked again by the 1st and 3rd Canadian Divisions on
8 October 1916, taken in part by the 18th and 4th Canadian Divisions on 21 October 1916, and finally cleared by the
4th Canadian Division on 11 November 1916.
The original part of the Cemetery (now Plot II,
Rows A to D) was made in the Winter of 1916-1917.
The Cemetery was completed after the Armistice,
in November 1918, when graves were brought in from
the battlefields of Courcelette, Grandcourt, and Miraumont; most date from October 1916 to February 1917.
Two considerable groups of scattered graves,
classed as Cemeteries, were concentrated in to Regina Trench Cemetery:- Courcelette Road Cemetery, Miraumont, was
on the West side of West Miraumont Road, between Courcelette and Miraumont, and in it were buried
soldiers from Canada and from the United Kingdom,
who fell in September-November 1916.
Miraumont British Cemetery, on the East side of the same road, contained the graves of soldiers from Canada and from the United Kingdom, who fell in September-December 1916.
Regina Trench Cemetery now contains 2,279
burials and Commemorations of the First World War.
1,077 of the burials are unidentified, but there
are special memorials to fourteen casualties
believed to be buried among them.
One American Airman is also buried in the Cemetery.
The Cemetery was designed by Sir Herbert Baker.
During this time of Lent 2026, let us remember The Fallen (R.I.P.) in Regina Trench Cemetery and all their Comrades.
May They Rest In Peace.
The Commonwealth War Graves Commission
Web-Site can be accessed
“Don’t It Make My Brown Eyes Blue”. By: Crystal Gayle.
“Don’t It Make My Brown Eyes Blue”.
By: Crystal Gayle.
Available On YouTube
“Parce Mihi, Domine”. Composer: Cristóbal de Morales. Sublime.
“Parce Mihi, Domine”.
Composer: Cristóbal de Morales.
His Majesty’s Men perform “Parce Mihi, Domine” by the 16th-Century Spanish Composer, Cristóbal de Morales (1500-1553).
Toward the end of his life, Morales was Maestro de Capilla
at Toledo Cathedral, Spain, with many of his works
contained in the Cathedral Library’s collection of
huge, bound, Choir-Books.
“St Peter”, by El Greco,
hangs in the Sacristy of the Cathedral.
His Majesty’s Men:
Richard Childress, Counter-Tenor;
Matthew Dean, Tenor;
Joe Labozetta, Baritone;
Jay Tuttle, Baritone;
Michael Hawes, Bass.
Audio recorded in Concert at
Saint John Cantius Church, Chicago, by Hudson Fair.
Video by oxy63n www.hismajestysmen.com
The Text, Job 7:16b-21, is from
The Office of The Dead
(Officium Defunctorum).
English translation from the Latin:
Let me alone; for my days are vanity.
What is man, that Thou shouldest magnify him,
and that Thou shouldest set Thine heart upon him ?
And that Thou shouldest visit him every morning,
and try him every moment ?
How long wilt Thou not depart from me,
nor let me alone till I swallow down my spittle ?
I have sinned; what shall I do unto Thee,
O Thou preserver of men ?
Why hast Thou set me as a mark against Thee,
so that I am a burden to myself ?
And why dost Thou not pardon my transgression,
and take away my iniquity ?
For now shall I sleep in the dust;
and Thou shalt seek me in the morning,
but I shall not be.
Available on YouTube
A tribute to Jan Garbarek and The Hilliard Ensemble by Gavino Murgia, Cantar Lontano and Marco Mencoboni.
“Parce Mihi, Domine”, composed by Cristòbal de Morales,
was recorded in Cagliari on 18 December 2015.
The Concert was performed in Sant’Anna Church.
Available on YouTube
Such Devotion !!!
Such Devotion !!!
Corpus Christi Procession 2022.
Saint Agnes Church, Minnesota.
Illustration: CHURCH OF SAINT AGNES
Wednesday Of The Third Week In Lent. The Lenten Station Is At The Basilica Of Saint Sixtus. Violet Vestments.
Peterborough Cathedral.
© Chel@SweetbriarDreams
www.sweetbriardreams.blogspot.co.uk
Text from The Saint Andrew Daily Missal,
unless otherwise stated.
Wednesday of The Third Week in Lent.
Station at Saint Sixtus.
Indulgence of 10 Years and 10 Quarantines.
Violet Vestments.
English: Basilica of Saint Sixtus, Rome.
Italiano: San Sisto (Santi Nereo e Achilleo)
(Terme di Caracalla).
Photo: June 2006.
Source: nereo-achilleo2
Uploaded by Kurpfalzbilder.de
Author: Hengist Decius
(Wikimedia Commons)
After the Collect, and before the Lessons, they proceeded to the Rites of Exsufflation, of the Sign of The Cross, of the Imposition of Hands, and of that of the Salt, which are still to be found in the first part of the Ceremonies of Baptism.
The Station is at Saint Sixtus’s, on the Appian Way, a Parish Church of Rome in the 5th-Century A.D. It was of this Holy Pontiff, and, according to several authors, in this very place, that Saint Laurence begged to be permitted to accompany him as his Minister in the sacrifice of himself which he was about to make. Saint Sixtus is buried in this Church.
God, on Sinai, had commanded men, the Epistle and Gospel tell us, to honour their parents and to love their neighbours. The Pharisees added to these Commandments human traditions, which consisted of formalities wholly external, to which they attached more importance than they did to the Law of Moses.
Basilica of Saint Sixtus, Rome.
Photo: November 2009.
Source: Own work.
Author: LPLT
(Wikimedia Commons)
For, in order to obtain the approval of Heaven, our Penance must come from a heart overflowing with Love of God and our neighbour, for it is from the heart that the holiness and malice of man proceeds.
To bodily mortifications, let us take great care to add the practice of Virtues: Sincerity; Justice; Patience; Charity; or, as the Collect expresses it, let us impose upon ourselves Fasting of Soul and body.
Mass: Ego autem.
Preface: Of Lent.
The following Text is from Wikipedia - the free encyclopædia.
Insufflation and Exsufflation.
In Religious and magical practice, Insufflation and Exsufflation are ritual acts of blowing, breathing, hissing, or puffing, that signify, variously, expulsion or renunciation of evil or of the Devil (the Evil One), or infilling or Blessing with good (especially, in Religious use, with the Spirit or Grace of God).
In historical Christian practice, such blowing appears most prominently in the Liturgy, and is connected almost exclusively with Baptism and other Ceremonies of Christian Initiation, achieving its greatest popularity during periods in which such Ceremonies were given a prophylactic or Exorcistic significance, and were viewed as essential to the defeat of the Devil or to the removal of the taint of Original Sin.
Ritual blowing occurs in the Liturgies of Catechumenate and Baptism from a very Early Period and survives into the modern Roman Catholic, Greek Orthodox, Maronite, and Coptic Rites.
Catholic Liturgy, post-Vatican II (the so-called Novus Ordo 1969), has largely done away with Insufflation, except in a Special Rite for the Consecration of Chrism on Maundy Thursday.
To bodily mortifications, let us take great care to add the practice of Virtues: Sincerity; Justice; Patience; Charity; or, as the Collect expresses it, let us impose upon ourselves Fasting of Soul and body.
Mass: Ego autem.
Preface: Of Lent.
The following Text is from Wikipedia - the free encyclopædia.
Insufflation and Exsufflation.
In Religious and magical practice, Insufflation and Exsufflation are ritual acts of blowing, breathing, hissing, or puffing, that signify, variously, expulsion or renunciation of evil or of the Devil (the Evil One), or infilling or Blessing with good (especially, in Religious use, with the Spirit or Grace of God).
Pope Leo III (795 A.D. - 816 A.D.)
rebuilt the old “Titulus” in 814 A.D.
Mosaics in the Hall (Triclinium) of Pope Leo III
of the Lateran Palace (798 A.D. - 799 A.D.).
(Wikimedia Commons)
In historical Christian practice, such blowing appears most prominently in the Liturgy, and is connected almost exclusively with Baptism and other Ceremonies of Christian Initiation, achieving its greatest popularity during periods in which such Ceremonies were given a prophylactic or Exorcistic significance, and were viewed as essential to the defeat of the Devil or to the removal of the taint of Original Sin.
Ritual blowing occurs in the Liturgies of Catechumenate and Baptism from a very Early Period and survives into the modern Roman Catholic, Greek Orthodox, Maronite, and Coptic Rites.
Catholic Liturgy, post-Vatican II (the so-called Novus Ordo 1969), has largely done away with Insufflation, except in a Special Rite for the Consecration of Chrism on Maundy Thursday.
Protestant liturgies typically abandoned it very early on. Muslims include the practice to a certain degree, following the Biblical Rites to a lesser extent.
The Tridentine Catholic Liturgy retained both an Insufflation of the Baptismal Water and (like the present-day Orthodox and Maronite Rites) an Exsufflation of the Candidate for Baptism, right up to the 1960s.
THE INSUFFLATION. The Priest breathes thrice upon the waters in the form of a Cross, saying: “Do you with your mouth Bless these pure waters: That besides their natural virtue of cleansing the body, they may also be effectual for purifying the Soul”.
THE EXSUFFLATION. The Priest breathes three times on the Child in the form of a Cross, saying: “Go out of him . . . you unclean spirit and give place to The Holy Spirit, the Paraclete”.
Santi Nereo e Achilleo is a 4th-Century A.D. Basilica Church in Rome, located in Via delle Termi di Caracalla, in the rione Celio, facing the main entrance to the Baths of Caracalla. The current Cardinal Priest of the Titulus Ss. Nerei et Achillei is Cardinal Celestino Aós Braco [Editor: As of 2020].
A 337 A.D., epitaph inscription in the Basilica di San Paolo fuori le Mura celebrates the Late Cinnamius Opas, Lector of a Church known as Titulus Fasciolæ; the name has traditionally been explained as the place where Saint Peter lost the foot bandage (fasciola) that wrapped the wounds caused by his chains, on his way to escape the Mamertine Prison.
In the Acts of the Synod of Pope Symmachus, 499 A.D., the Titulus Fasciolæ is recorded as Served by five Priests. This same building is recorded as Titulus Sanctorum Nerei et Achillei in 595 A.D; therefore, the dedications to Saints Nereus and Achilleus, two Soldiers and Martyrs of the 4th-Century A.D., must date to the 6th-Century A.D.
In 814 A.D., Pope Leo III rebuilt the old Titulus. In the 13th-Century, the Relics of the two Martyrs (Santi Nereo e Achilleo) were Transferred from the Catacomb of Domitilla to the Sant’Adriano, whence they were Transferred to this Church by Cardinal Baronius.
The Church degraded with time, and, in 1320, according to the Catalogue of Turin, it was a Presbyterial Title with no Priest serving. So, Pope Sixtus IV restored the Church on occasion of the Jubilee of 1475, while the Jubilee of 1600 was the occasion for the last major Restoration, funded by the scholarly antiquarian, Cardinal Cesare Baronio, who commissioned the frescoes.
Behind its unassuming facade, the Church is built according to the typical Basilica Plan, with a single Nave and two Side Aisles.
THE INSUFFLATION. The Priest breathes thrice upon the waters in the form of a Cross, saying: “Do you with your mouth Bless these pure waters: That besides their natural virtue of cleansing the body, they may also be effectual for purifying the Soul”.
THE EXSUFFLATION. The Priest breathes three times on the Child in the form of a Cross, saying: “Go out of him . . . you unclean spirit and give place to The Holy Spirit, the Paraclete”.
Pope Sixtus IV (1414-1484).
Artist: Justus van Gent and Pedro Berruguete
Date: Circa 1473.
Current location: Louvre Museum, Paris.
Source/Photographer: cartelen.louvre.fr
[Pope Sixtus IV restored the Basilica in 1475].
(Wikimedia Commons)
A 337 A.D., epitaph inscription in the Basilica di San Paolo fuori le Mura celebrates the Late Cinnamius Opas, Lector of a Church known as Titulus Fasciolæ; the name has traditionally been explained as the place where Saint Peter lost the foot bandage (fasciola) that wrapped the wounds caused by his chains, on his way to escape the Mamertine Prison.
In the Acts of the Synod of Pope Symmachus, 499 A.D., the Titulus Fasciolæ is recorded as Served by five Priests. This same building is recorded as Titulus Sanctorum Nerei et Achillei in 595 A.D; therefore, the dedications to Saints Nereus and Achilleus, two Soldiers and Martyrs of the 4th-Century A.D., must date to the 6th-Century A.D.
Basilica of Saint Sixtus (San Sisto)
(Santi Nereo e Achilleo), Rome.
Photo: June 2006.
Source: DSCN0317
Uploaded by Kurpfalzbilder.de
Author: Hengist Decius
(Wikimedia Commons)
The Church degraded with time, and, in 1320, according to the Catalogue of Turin, it was a Presbyterial Title with no Priest serving. So, Pope Sixtus IV restored the Church on occasion of the Jubilee of 1475, while the Jubilee of 1600 was the occasion for the last major Restoration, funded by the scholarly antiquarian, Cardinal Cesare Baronio, who commissioned the frescoes.
Saint Domitilla, with Saints Nereus and Achilleus.
Artist: Cristoforo Roncalli
Date: 1598 -1599.
Current location:
Chiesa dei Santi Nereo e Achilleo, Rome.
Source/Photographer:
(Wikimedia Commons)
The original Columns were replaced in the 15th-Century by Octagonal Pillars, and the Nave is characterised by the large fresco decorations commissioned by Cardinal Baronio.
The Cardinal, in his iconographic scheme timed for the 1600 Jubilee, emphasised the role of the Roman Martyrs during the early Centuries of Christianity. The execution of the frescoes was entrusted to a minor painter, generally thought to be Niccolò Circignani, called “Pomarancio”. There are a lot of gruesome details and blood all over the walls, but the pastel colours soften somewhat a fearsome effect of the pictures.
The Mediæval Ambo is set on a large porphyry Urn taken from the nearby Baths of Caracalla. The low Screen, separating the Choir, is faced with 13th-Century Cosmatesque-Style inlays. A White Marble Candelabra was brought here from San Paolo fuori-le-Mura. The Ciborium, dating from the 16th-Century, is raised on African Marble Columns.
The Spandrels of the Arch, at the end of the Nave, retain some of the former mosaics of the time of Pope Leo III, with a central Transfiguration in a Mandorla.
In the Apse, behind the High Altar, is the Episcopal Throne, assembled under the direction of the Antiquary, Cardinal Baronius, re-using Lions in the Cosmatesque Style, that is associated with the Vassalletto School, which support the arm-rests; on the back-rest, is inscribed the opening and closing words of the twenty-eighth Homily of Saint Gregory The Great, inscribed under the mistaken Tradition that he preached them here, in front of the Relics of Saints Nereus and Achilleus on their Feast Day.
When Cardinal Baronio ordered the inscription, he did not know that the Relics were originally buried in the underground Basilica of the Catacomb of Domitilla, so thought that this was the place where Saint Gregory Preached.
The Arch of the Apse has mosaics of the 9th-Century A.D., with the Annunciation, the Transfiguration, and the Theotokos (Mother of God).
The Cardinal, in his iconographic scheme timed for the 1600 Jubilee, emphasised the role of the Roman Martyrs during the early Centuries of Christianity. The execution of the frescoes was entrusted to a minor painter, generally thought to be Niccolò Circignani, called “Pomarancio”. There are a lot of gruesome details and blood all over the walls, but the pastel colours soften somewhat a fearsome effect of the pictures.
The Ciborium and High Altar,
Basilica of Saint Sixtus (San Sisto)
(Santi Nereo e Achilleo), Rome.
Photo: June 2006.
Source: DSCN0316
Uploaded by Kurpfalzbilder.de
Artist: Hengist Decius
(Wikimedia Commons)
The Spandrels of the Arch, at the end of the Nave, retain some of the former mosaics of the time of Pope Leo III, with a central Transfiguration in a Mandorla.
The High Altar, made of three Cosmatesque panels, houses the Relics of Nereus, Achilleus, and Saint Flavia Domitilla, all three of whom were brought here from the Catacomb of Domitilla.
Next to the Altar, there are two pagan stones, depicting two winged spirits, taken from a nearby temple.
When Cardinal Baronio ordered the inscription, he did not know that the Relics were originally buried in the underground Basilica of the Catacomb of Domitilla, so thought that this was the place where Saint Gregory Preached.
The Arch of the Apse has mosaics of the 9th-Century A.D., with the Annunciation, the Transfiguration, and the Theotokos (Mother of God).
Our Lady Of The Atonement Cathedral,
Baguio, Philippines.
Photo: 29 March 2024.
Source: Own work.
This file is made available under the
Author: Galaxiaria
(Wikimedia Commons)
Wells Cathedral.
Photo: August 2006.
Source: Own work.
This File is licensed under the
Share Alike 3.0 Unported licence.
Author: Steinsky
(Wikimedia Commons)
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