Stefano Maderno, St. Cecilia, and St. Therese

On November 22nd, the feast day of St. Cecilia, I bring you the combination of two of the Catholic Church's beautiful saints: St. Therese of Lisieux, the Little Flower, and St. Cecilia, the patroness of musicians, artists, and poets.

Detail of Stefano Maderno's sculpture of St. Cecilia

"Cecilia, lend to me thy melody most sweet: How many souls would I convert to Jesus now. I fain would die, like thee, to win them to His feet; For him give all my tears, my blood. Oh, help me thou! Pray for me that I gain, on this our pilgrim way perfect abandonment that sweetest fruit of love. Saint of my heart! Oh, soon, bring me to endless day; obtain that I may fly, with thee, to heaven above!”

 -- St. Therese of Lisieux

St. Therese of Lisieux, the Little Flower

The young Therese Martin was inspired by Stefano Maderno's sculpture of St. Cecilia to write this prayer when she visited St. Cecilia's basilica with her father while on pilgrimage to Rome in 1887. 

Pope Clement VIII had St. Cecilia's body disinterred in 1599. When she was found to be incorrupt, Maderno was enlisted to carve a sculpture of the saint as she was discovered in her tomb. Maderno inscribed on the statue's base, "Behold the body of the most holy virgin Cecilia whom I myself saw lying incorrupt in her tomb. I have in this marble expressed for thee the same saint in the very same posture of body." 

Happy Feast day to my fellow artists, poets, and musicians! 

Dominican Garrigou-Lagrange on Chant

Some quotes on chant from Dominican writer up for beatification, Garrigou-Lagrange.


"The chant, which prepares so admirably for Mass and which follows it, is one of the greatest means by which the theologian, as well as others, may rise far above reasoning to contemplation, to the simple gaze on God and to divine union."


"The chant thus understood is the holy repose which souls need after all the fatigues, agitations, and complications of the world. It is rest in God, rest that is full of life, rest which from afar resembles that of God, who possesses His interminable life tota simul, in the single instant which never passes, and which at the same time measures supreme action and supreme rest, quies in bono amato."


"Mental prayer finds in liturgical prayer an abundant source of contemplation and an objective rule against individual illusions. The Divine Office cures sentimentality by continually recalling the great truths in the very language of Scripture; it reminds presumptuous souls of the greatness and severity of divine justice, and it also reminds fearful souls of infinite mercy and the value of the passion of Christ. It makes sentimental souls live on the heights of true faith and charity, far above sensibility."


"The chant, which prepares so admirably for Mass and which follows it, is one of the greatest means by which the theologian, as well as others, may rise far above reasoning to contemplation, to the simple gaze on God and to divine union."