Dedication

This is thy temple; here thy presence chamber.
Here may thy servants, at the mystic banquet,
Humbly adoring, take thy Body broken,
Drink of thy chalice.

Hallowed this dwelling where the Lord abideth,
This is none other than the gate of heaven;
Strangers and pilgrims, seeking homes eternal,
Pass through its portals.
[Rouen]

The Feast of the Dedication dawned with surreal lightning flashes and a chorus of rolling thunder that seemed to rumble on for minutes at a time. We were in the eye of the blizzard of ’06 I later found out, a massive storm that started down in Texas and gathered a lot of warm air on its way here, so the collision of warm and cold air caused quite a display as the blizzard blew into Manhattan. After a restless night of disquieting dreams after watching Hide and Seek (with a truly scary DeNiro), I stumbled wearily to the window, resigning the day to an earlier start than I had planned, and looked out upon an iridescent orange sky snowing heavy wet snow at a very fast clip. Technically it wasn’t quite a blizzard here in the city, but it sure felt like it as I made my way over to the church. Bless their hearts, the Building & Grounds crew were there shoveling away and soon we had the cleanest walk in the hood. It was the biggest snowfall recorded since they started keeping records in 1869, an impressive 26.9 inches by the time it stopped around 4 pm. [I read somewhere that the Central Park “official precipitation” gauge is actually a stick in the snow outside the sea lion’s den, which is read by a security guard, so who knows how accurate it is, but it was definitely a lot of snow.]

Only about 44 people made it to church (at least half of them in the sanctuary and choir) but it was a divine liturgy all the same. I was MC and somehow we managed to have a full complement of servers as well as an attending priest, our new associate Stephen Harding, who skied down from the Cathedral. After a rousing prelude of Messiaen’s Apparition de l’Eglise eternelle superbly done by Mr. Keilitz, we processed around the church to the station at the Rood singing Rouen (2d tune), one of my all-time favorites. Then we sang Aurelia, another favorite, back at the sedelia and it was Solemn Mass with humeral veil as usual thereafter, with no misbehaving candles for once. The choir did a splendid job with the wonderful Missa Nisi Dominus of Pierre de Manchicourt and Bairstow’s glorious Blessed city, heavenly Salem which, though rather long for an offertory anthem, was magnificent. The Proper Preface of the Dedication, sung most heartily by the Rector, went on for awhile also, but as I marked the book I felt like I was really hearing the words for the first time.

… And verily thy Church is the true House of Prayer, of which these visible buildings are but the figures. It is the Temple of the habitation of thy glory, the Throne of unchanging truth, the Holy Place wherein everlasting love abideth. It is the Ark which bringeth us, who are delivered from the deluge of the world, into the haven of salvation. …

This was the 81st anniversary of the dedication of St. Ignatius as a house of worship. It was opened in 1902 but in those days a church could not be consecrated until the mortgage was paid off, so it was not until February 8, 1925 that the church was canonically consecrated to the glory of God, in honor of St. Ignatius, Bishop and Martyr, and in memory of Arthur Ritchie, Priest and Rector. Bishop William T. Manning did the honors.

In 1925 St. Ignatius was grateful to finally have a bishop that was supportive of Catholic practice after decades of pontifical disapproval over Fr. Ritchie’s introduction of full Catholic ritual upon his arrival in 1884. Dr. Ewer, our founding rector, had problems enough of his own over his Catholic leanings, but Fr. Ritchie was considerably more “advanced” than Dr. Ewer in his use of vestments, candles, incense, holy water, confessionals, reservation of the Sacrament, Benediction (it was believed to be the first instance of Benediction ever practiced in the American church, called “Adoration”) and the so-called non-communicating High Mass, where only the celebrant receives, the faithful having come to one of the four Low Masses earlier for their fasting communion.

Fr. Ritchie’s ill heath forced him to resign after a 30 year tenure, and Fr. William Pitt McCune took things even higher over the next 30 years, introducing the full Kalendar of Saints Days, Stations of the Cross, Tenebrae, Holy Week ceremonies, the Angelus, three beautiful statues and a gorgeous font by Cram and Ferguson, and use of the American Missal with Introit, Sequence and Offertory included in the Mass.

So we have come a long way from Dr. Ewer’s plain linen chasuble (except on high feasts when he wore brocaded silk), “no biretta” days. As it says at the end of Louis Gray’s History of St. Ignatius:

It is, in great part, a stormy tale, but storm and strife are the lot of all who strive steadfastly for the right and the true. From the days of Dr. Ewer at Christ Church to this moment St. Ignatius’ has had but one goal and one aim, and from this it has never swerved: devotion to our Blessed Lord and love of Him, especially in the Holy Sacrament of the Altar; increase of that devotion and that love in the hearts of all who profess and call themselves Christians; constant progress in the richness of the rites of the Holy Catholic Church; absolute adherence to her historic Creeds and historic traditions; veneration of the Blessed Saints and super-veneration of our Lady; unceasing remembrance of the faithful departed – the Catholic Faith undiminished, unimpaired, enriched. …”