The Feast of St. Ignatius

Today, October 17, is the feast day of our patron saint, St. Ignatius of Antioch, 2d bishop of Antioch, martyred in 115. More about him here: http://saintignatiusnyc.org/patron.htm. We celebrated the solemnity yesterday in fine High Church style. I was thurifer and I think I managed to smoke up the place pretty good. We only processed halfway around the church since the south wall is covered with scaffolding right now, undergoing a bit of a facelift. We sang "Blessed feasts of blessed martyrs", one of my favorite. The mass setting was Guerrero's Missa "Simile est regnum", heavenly! The first reading was from the Epistle of Blessed Ignatius to the Romans, wherein he embraces his martyrdom with open arms. The motet was Victoria's marvelous Cum Beatus Ignatius, with the rather graphic text: "When Blessed Ignatius was condemned to the beasts and heard the lions roaring, his eagerness to suffer made him exclaim: I am the wheat of Christ: let me be ground by the teeth of beasts..." The offertory hymn was a new edition of a hymn written by our second rector, Fr. Arthur Ritchie. It was a lovely Vaughn-Williams-like tune arranged by our organist, Douglas Keilitz, with words edited by James Bush. The last verse says it all: "O dear Ignatius, pray in heav'n, for us on earth below; so to us here may grace be giv'n, that we Christ-like may grow." Amen!