Reflections with Fr. Michael Kelly - Monday 22 Nov, 2021

Today’s feast is an instructive moment for the way the Church celebrates features of Church life. It is the feast of Saint Cecilia and there is no reliable evidence that she ever existed. But she is patron of music in Rome and devotion to her has produced some rich musical outcomes for the Church and indeed the city of Rome. But often what happened in the past was the attribution of achievements and outcomes collectively to a single person when in fact the artistic works or “opus” are those of several people. Each puts in their own best efforts which are at times only part 9f all that is claimed by the person celebrated at the feast, if anything can be claimed by that person, if they existed. The same is true of St. Christopher. Earlier generations did things differently.