Spring flowers for the Feast of the Annunciation

                                                                   

March 20, 2023, Equinox and Feast of St. Joseph  

 Annunciation March 25, in the midst of Lent is a lovely reminder that there is joy and hope within Lenten preparation. This year it comes after the Feast of St. Joseph, today, March 20 and the Equinox.   Usually we sing about Mary and Joseph during Advent, but Annunciation comes in the Spring, with the Equinox. Voices Found offers many songs of Mary but this one great for a Spring celebration of the Holy Family.  "Mary, when the Angel's voice,"is sung to the tune Tempus adest floridum.

Mary, when the angel’s voice called you highly favored,

Dread and joy in your heart mixed, pondered there and savored.

May we learn to welcome all that our life is bringing,

Even when in pain we feel birth within us springing.

Joseph in your darkest night, angel message hearing,

You cast not your live aside, scorn and anger fearing.

When a loved one brings us grief, rips our world asunder,

Dreamer, may we have your heart, open to God’s wonder.

Old and sage Elizabeth, birth anticipating,

Nurturing your cousin’s will you taught hopeful waiting.

So, as women long have done, may we never falter

To extend a gentle touch, fears to courage alter.

God, whose name we magnify, all your children matter,

From oppression raise the poor; proud and mighty scatter.

Seeds beneath the winter snow live, though all seems barren.

Lift a carl sing of hope for the Rose of Sharon.

Tempus adest floridum,  has a fascinating history.  It is from an ancient songbook, Piae Cantiones,  collected  in 1582 by Theodoricus Petri, a Finnish student. The volume was then edited  by a Catholic student and  again by a Swedish Lutheran.  Tempus adest floridum celebrated Springtime  new life and flowers. The tune  also set texts praising the Virgin Mary.  In 1853 , John Mason Neale received a copy of  Piae Cantiones, then unknown in England.  He used this tune  for "Good King Wenceslas

   Carol Goodwin King wrote this text as a teaching piece for her Sunday school class. While the text is simple, appropriate for students, there is much wisdom for all.     We learn of virtues exemplified by the Holy Family.  Mary, always a model of purity and obedience, calls for justice: “from oppression raise the poor, proud and mighty scatter.” Joseph shows  love and courage in the face of “scorn and anger.”  Elizabeth, a wise nurturing spirit, demonstrates compassion, extending a gentle touch to calm  Mary’s fears.    Important in Advent, as well as Lent, the text reminds us of the promise of Resurrection: “seeds beneath the winter snow live though all seems barren.” With a reminder of life and rebirth to come, we hear echoes of the original Medieval song.

Voices Found  returns Mary and the the promise of new life to the now familiar carol.  Many groups will enjoy singing it along with the angels voices. Two harmonizations are provided in the Leader’s Guide to Voices Found.  One includes a descant for choirs or more adventurous congregations. 

Here is the original Latin text with translation:

Tempus adest floridum, surgent namque flores
Vernales in omnibus, imitantur mores
Hoc quod frigus laeserat, reparant calores
Cernimus hoc fieri, per multos labores.

Spring has now unwrapped the flowers,
Day is fast reviving,

Life in all her growing powers
Towards the light is striving:

Gone the iron touch of cold,
Winter time and frost time,
Seedlings, working through the mould,
Now make up for lost time.

(Author and translator unknow

"Mary when the Angel's Voice" is #64 in Voices Found.  It is recorded on Echoes of St. Hildegard.  Both are available from Church Publishing, Inc. in New York