The Journey to the First Ordinariate Mass in NYC and Beyond

October 14, 2021

by James Thomas More Griffin

Last week, former ACS president Joseph Blake provided an excellent reflection about the celebration of an Anglican Use Mass at St. Vincent Ferrer, NYC in 2004 according to the Book of Divine Worship. I must frankly admit that I knew very little of that story; then again, the same can be said for most of us in the younger generation of Catholics affiliated with the Ordinariates. While there's still yet so much to be done to further the growth of the Ordinariates, we build upon the foundation laid by those who labored under the "old dispensation" of the Pastoral Provision. I am, myself, an heir of this legacy as someone who entered the Catholic Church through Our Lady of the Atonement in San Antonio, Texas a few years prior to Anglicanorum Coetibus. I spent many formative years there learning both the Anglican patrimony and the Roman tradition of Gregorian chant; all which helped me eventually establish the Durandus Institute for Sacred Liturgy & Music.

The first attempt to celebrate an Ordinariate Mass according to Divine Worship: The Missal in New York City was actually not long after its publication in 2015. This initial Mass was set to be offered at St Vincent Ferrer during the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity in January 2016 by a priest of the Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham. However, a snow-out that day prevented anyone from reaching the church, and for various reasons, it could never be rescheduled. The possibility of organizing a Divine Worship Mass at St Vincent Ferrer finally resurfaced when, on the 15th of February 2020, I visited St Vincent's to attend a pontifical Latin Mass celebrated by a prelate I've long admired: Joseph Cardinal Zen. A number of the clergy and musicians gathered for that Mass had seen the video or even attended the Durandus Institute's inaugural Sarum Vespers event of Candlemas Eve just two weeks prior at another Dominican parish: St Patrick's in Philadelphia. There was then some talk of the possibilities of hosting the Durandus Institute for an event at St Vincent's, such as the canceled Divine Worship Mass.

About a month after Cardinal Zen's Mass, the world went into lockdown, courtesy of the novel coronavirus. Any possibility of organizing a special Mass in America's largest city had to be mothballed for the foreseeable future. It was over a full year before I could resume discussions with the Dominicans and James Wetzel, director of music at St Vincent Ferrer, on the logistics of coordinating a Divine Worship Mass in a city with no yet established Ordinariate community.

Thankfully, Mr Wetzel was extremely well-versed in the music of the Anglican patrimony, and the Dominicans were happy to serve in the roles of Deacon and Subdeacon so long as Durandus could help supply an Ordinariate priest to celebrate. For this Sept. 24 Divine Worship Solemn Mass, the feast of Our Lady of Walsingham, we arranged for Fr Bonaventure Chapman, O.P., a former Anglican seminarian and occasional supply priest for St Luke's Ordinariate parish in Washington DC, to come up to New York City to serve in the role of Deacon and preach the sermon. The pastor of St Vincent's himself, Fr Peter Martyr Yungwirth, O.P., graciously served in the role of Subdeacon. Durandus Institute's chaplain, Fr Armando Alejandro, Jr., a priest of the Ordinariate of the Chair of St Peter, made the journey from his community in Sykesville, Maryland to act as the Celebrant of Holy Mass. I came up from Philadelphia with some of my associates to join forces with St Vincent's own altar servers.

With such a disparate team of people who had never seen each other before, and many whom had never so much as even attended a Divine Worship Mass, the odds of this liturgy being executed smoothly were slim. But by God's grace, we made it through to the end with very few mistakes. Without any pre-existing parish customs, we kept the ceremony simple by following closely to "Ritual Notes" and the English Missal tradition.

The Schola Cantorum of St Vincent Ferrer is, of course, comprised of some of the finest singers in New York City, so the music program was stellar. We all felt it was best to sing music that could not be used in any other form of Catholic Mass, so the Mass Ordinary was the Communion Service from Herbert Howells's Collegium Regale, and Propers were the full melismatic forms adapted from the Graduale Romanum into English by Palmer & Burgess. My personal favorite selection was the motet at the offertory: a setting of a middle English poem, "I sing of a maiden", arranged by Alec Redshaw. I'm grateful for the schola also indulging me by using a set of choral responses for Intercessions III in three men's voices, which I arranged for a different event earlier this year.

About 250 people attended in the congregation. Many Catholic parishes in Manhattan happily promoted this event. I'm especially grateful to Juventutem NYC for spreading the word among their members. The feedback I received after the Mass was overwhelmingly positive. Many attendees were shocked that Mass could still be so beautiful while offered in the English language. The Dominican Friars were especially pleased to host this event – so much that there will be another Ordinariate liturgy in the future.

I therefore ask you to stay tuned for the next liturgy in New York City. In the meantime, your prayers and support of the Durandus Institute are much-needed so that our work to worship God in the beauty of holiness – for which the Ordinariate plays an integral part – may continue!

James Thomas More Griffin is the founder and executive director of the Durandus Institute for Liturgy & Music, and an instituted acolyte for St John the Baptist Catholic Church in Bridgeport, Pa., the Ordinariate community for the Philadelphia region.