Rebroadcast of Choral Vespers Worship Service

While the Chapel is currently closed to visitors, our ministers and musicians have selected the Choral Vespers worship service below to rebroadcast/re-post at the time when we would normally hold the service (Thursday at 7:00 p.m.). This service from March 21, 2019, was selected for its music and prayers that can speak to us afresh today.

The musical texts for this service take their theme from a quotation from the third-century North African bishop and theologian Cyprian:

For since Christ is the true sun and the true day, as the worldly sun and worldly day depart,
when we pray and ask that light may return to us again, we pray for the advent of Christ,
which shall give us the grace of everlasting light.

This theme of light emerging from dark is present in the opening choral piece, which begins:

Christ, who art the light and day,
You drive away the darkness of night

The theme appears again in the anthem sung near the end of the service, as well as in the closing benediction in Latin:

Another layer to the music is its reach across time. Much of the service music is from two sixteenth-century British composers Robert White and William Byrd. Their compositions in turn draw upon Plainsong— the ancient musical language of the church—as the source of melodies that are sung, sometimes in alternation with the polyphony, or woven into the intricate fabric of the music. At the end of the service, the music moves forward in time to a modern setting of the Latin text O nata lux de lumine by the contemporary American organist and composer Thomas Pavlechko. Comprising this variety of music in a single service can symbolize a unity in Christ across place and time.

This order of service can help you follow along and identify the music:

• Organ Voluntary
• Choral Introit — “Christ, who art the light and day,” music by Robert White (c. 1538–1574)
• Hymn — “Lord, Who Throughout These Forty Days”
• Psalm — Psalm 74, chanted in Plainsong
• First Lesson — Jeremiah 4:9–10, 19–28
• Canticle — “Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart” (Nunc Dimittis), music by William Byrd (c. 1539–1623)
• Second Lesson — Romans 2:12–24
• Anthem — “Christe qui lux es et dies,” music by Robert White
• Hymn — “Holy Spirit, Truth Divine”
• Choral Benediction — “O nata lux de lumine,” music by Thomas Pavlechko (b. 1962)