UVM News and Readings: September 2027
2026 Pilgrimage for Restoration: Fri, Sep. 25 - Sun, Sep. 27
The Pilgrimage for Restoration is a journey of Catholic faithful from the statue of St. Isaac Jogues in Lake George, NY to Our Lady of Martyrs Shrine in Auriesville, NY, through the beautiful Adirondacks of upstate New York. Here, Jesuit Father Isaac Jogues and Companions were martyred.
The pilgrimage, modeled on the ancient French Chartres pilgrimage, is 61 miles over 3 days. Each day begins with a Sung Solemn High Latin Mass outside. The purpose of the pilgrimage is to honor Christ Our King publicly, to pray for the restoration of His Reign in the family and civil society, and to make reparation for sins committed against the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
For more information and to join the St. Athanasius Brigade (the Maine Brigade) email: stathanasiusbrigade@gmail.com.
For more overall information go to: pilgrimage-for-restoration.org
The Portland Catholic Center for Faith Announces Fall Conference
The Aesthetic of Ascent Ventures of Faith & Form, October 2 & 3, 2026
For those interested in exploring the relationship of art and faith, the Portland Catholic Center for Faith will be holding its annual fall conference this year on the theme of beauty. “The Aesthetic of Ascent: Ventures in Faith and Form,” will be held on October 2 and 3 at the Portland Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception. The conference will explore the profound role of art as a pathway to the Divine, feature talks from highly esteemed artists reflecting on the importance of beauty and drawing from the richness of art and the Catholic Church. They will also provide hands-on demonstrations and interactive exhibits to engage participants in various mediums of art.
Readings on The Traditional Latin Mass
“The Holy Mass is both the means and sign through which the Lord bequeaths us his love. His whole life was a Eucharist to the Father, and it is in this, his Eucharist, that he wants to include all his people. Christian thanksgiving is fulfilled in and cannot be separated from the wholeness of the Holy Mass, itself a commemoration of the wholeness of the love of the Lord. Each celebration of Holy Mass is a unique introduction to the love of the Lord. No single Holy Mass is to be considered in itself, but rather it stands in relation to all other Holy Masses, which together form the indivisible sign of the whole and indivisible love of the Lord for his Church. In the Holy Mass this love is present both in its active and in its contemplative form. The prayers are contemplative, while the transubstantiation is action, both the action of the Lord and that of the priest, who represents the Church. Holy Communion is both action and contemplation, but it leads to a contemplation that is taken into daily life as both active and contemplative. Both forms of love come to fruition through receiving Holy Communion.”
The Holy Mass, by Adrienne von Speyr
“The instruments of the liturgy—bells, oil, sacred vestments, prayers, and chants—play on a particular register, where memory and poetry, particularly scriptural and catechetical poetry, are based on the world of sense, but only in order constantly to go beyond it. Liturgy therefore requires active enquiry, and at the same time a very receptive state, what in the language of mysticism one might call a ‘passive’ state. Just like Scripture, the Christian liturgy speaks almost immediately to the soul of all believers, but it penetrates deeply only into those who listen to it attentively. We must therefore go through the church door, sign ourselves with holy water, and allow ourselves to be submerged in the luminous shadow of the sacred place, as Moses and Elijah were before us. A sacred preparation takes place, like that of the priest who prepares to celebrate the holy mysteries and who performs a series of actions, accompanied by prayer, as he clothes his body, and even more his soul, in the sacred vestments. That is what the minister is really doing (as are the faithful): he is clothing himself in the New Man of whom St Paul speaks, he is putting on Christ, in the place of the Old Man of sin. Or again, he is arming himself with spiritual armor, ready for the combat in which the Christian and spiritual life consists (Eph 5: 10–18).”
A Forest of Symbols: The Traditional Mass and Its Meaning, by Fr. Claude Barthe
The Liturgical Year
Autumn Ember Days: September 23, 25, 26
From The Liturgical Year, Very Rev. Dom Prosper Guéranger Abbot of Solesmes, 1833-1875
Today the Church begins the Fast of Quatuor Tempora, or as we call it, of Ember days: it includes also the Friday and Saturday of this same week. We may consider it as one of those practices which the Church took from the Synagogue; for the Prophet Zacharias speaks of the fourth, fifth, seven, and tenth months. (Zacharias 8:17) Its introduction into the Christian Church would seem to have been made in the apostolic times; such, at least, is the opinion of St. Leo, of St. Isidore of Seville, of Rabanus Maurus, and of several other ancient Christian writers. It is remarkable, on the other hand, that the Orientals do not observe this fast. . . From the first ages, the Quatuor Tempora were kept, in the Roman Church, at the same time of the year as at present. As to the expression, which is not unfrequently used in the early writers of The Three Times and not The Four, we must remember that in the spring, these Days always come in the first week of Lent, a period already consecrated to the most rigorous fasting and abstinence, and that consequently they could add nothing to the penitential exercises of that portion of the year.
The intentions which the Church has in the fast of the Ember Days are the same as those of the Synagogue; namely, to consecrate to God by penance the four Seasons of the year.
From OnePeterFive:
Ember Days are observed on Wednesdays, Fridays, and Saturdays in keeping with the ancient weekly devotional fast that originated with the Apostles. On the rationale for fasting on these days, St. Peter of Alexandria, Patriarch of Alexandria until his death in 311 AD, explains: “On Wednesday because on this day the council of the Jews was gathered to betray our Lord; on Friday because on this day He suffered death for our salvation.” Likewise, the 1875 Catechism of Father Michael Müller adds: “This practice began with Christianity itself, as we learn from St. Epiphanius, who says: ‘It is ordained, by the law of the Apostles, to fast two days of the week.’” Some places added Saturday fasting as well, as noted by St. Francis de Sales who writes, “The early Christians selected Wednesday, Friday and Saturday as days of abstinence.”
From The Fish Eaters:
Four times a year, the Church sets aside three days to focus on God through His marvelous creation. These quarterly periods take place around the beginnings of the four natural seasons 1 that "like some virgins dancing in a circle, succeed one another with the happiest harmony," as St. John Chrysostom wrote (see Readings below).
These four times are each kept on a successive Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday and are known as "Ember Days," or Quatuor Tempora, in Latin. The first of these four times comes in Winter, after the the Feast of St. Lucy; the second comes in Spring, the week after Ash Wednesday; the third comes in Summer, after Pentecost Sunday; and the last comes in Autumn, after Holy Cross Day. Their dates can be remembered by this old mnemonic:
Sant Crux, Lucia, Cineres, Charismata Dia
Ut sit in angaria quarta sequens feria.
Which means:
Holy Cross, Lucy, Ash Wednesday, Pentecost,
are when the quarter holidays follow.
For non-Latinists, it might be easier to just remember "Lucy, Ashes, Dove, and Cross" -- or "Lenty, Penty, Crucy, Lucy."
Embertides are spent fasting and partially abstaining (voluntary since the new Code of Canon Law) in penance and with the intentions of thanking God for the gifts He gives us in nature and beseeching Him for the discipline to use them in moderation. The fasts, known as "Jejunia quatuor temporum," or "the fast of the four seasons," are rooted in Old Testament practices of fasting four times a year:
Zacharias 8:19:
Thus saith the Lord of hosts: The fast of the fourth month, and the fast of the fifth, and the fast of the seventh, and the fast of the tenth shall be to the house of Juda, joy, and gladness, and great solemnities: only love ye truth and peace.
Our Israelite ancestors once fasted weekly on Tuesdays and Thursdays, but Christians changed the fast days to Wednesdays (the day on which Christ was betrayed) and Fridays (the day on which He was crucified). The weekly two day fasts were later amended in the Roman Church to keeping only Fridays as penitential days, but during Embertides, the older, two-day fasts are restored. Saturdays (the day He was entombed) were added to these Ember times of fasting and are seen as a sort of culmination of the Ember Days: for example, on Ember Wednesdays, there is one lesson given during the Mass; on Fridays, there are none; and on Saturdays, there are four or five.