When You Sing, You Pray Twice

by Michael Sean Winters

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St. Augustine is credited with the saying that he who sings prays twice. So, I suspect we will have a quadruplet of orations when the Sistine Chapel Choir joins with the choir of Westminster Abbey at vespers and Masses this summertime in Rome. How fitting that the Abbey Church dedicated to St. Peter will be sending its choir to the See of Peter.

You could see this coming. After he returned from his State visit to the UK, Pope Benedict XVI was reported to have been exceedingly moved by the prayer service at Westminster Abbey, and especially by the extraordinary music. And what was not to love? Here, as a refresher, the Westminster choir and congregation sing Purcell's "Christ is Made the Sure Foundation" as the Holy Father processed up the nave. (Note that the Anglican clergy know all the words!)

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