SANCTUS, SANCTUS, SANCTUS ! HOLY, HOLY, HOLY !
During Holy Mass, we say or sing the ‘Sanctus’, and we place ourselves in a line of worshipping disciples wending back to the very earliest years of the Church’s history. Indeed, the ‘Sanctus’ was, and is, part of the Synagogue service, and would have been familiar to Our Lord and Our Lady. The fourth Successor of Peter as Bishop of Rome, Pope Clement I, wrote (in 96 AD) a letter to the Corinthians, and mentions the singing of the ‘Sanctus’…:
“Let our glorying and our confidence be in Him; let us submit
ourselves to His will; let us consider the whole multitude of
His angels, how they stand by and serve His will. For the
Scripture saith ‘Ten thousand times ten thousand stood before
Him, and thousands of thousands served Him and they cried:
‘Holy, holy, holy Lord of Sabaoth ! All creation is full of His
glory” And let us, being gathered together in harmony and a
good conscience, cry earnestly, as it were with one mouth,
unto Him, that we may become partakers of His great and
glorious promises” (34:5-7)
The first section of the ‘Sanctus’ is inspired by the prophet Isaiah 6:3, which describes the Prophet’s vision of the Throne of God. It is worth seeing an extended passage of Chapter 6, to get a sense of what our own attitude should be at this moment of Holy Mass:
“In the year that King Uzziah died (+759 BC) I saw the Lord
sitting upon a Throne, high and lifted up; and His train filled
the Temple. Above Him stood the Seraphim; each had six
wings….and one called to another and said ‘Holy, holy, holy
is the Lord God of Hosts; the whole earth is full of His glory’
And the foundations of the thresholds shook at the voice of
Him who called, and the house was filled with smoke. And I
said “Woe is me ! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean
lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for
my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of Hosts !” Then flew
one of the Seraphim to me, having in his hand a burning
coal which he had taken with tongs from the Altar. And he
touched my mouth and said “Behold, this has touched your
lips; your guilt is taken away, and your sin forgiven” (6:1-7)
This why at every Mass for a thousand years (in the Traditional Rite) before reading the Gospel the Priest says the prayer Munda cor meum: “Cleanse my heart and my lips O Almighty God, who cleansed the lips of the Prophet Isaiah with a burning coal. In your gracious mercy deign so to purify me that I may worthily proclaim Your Holy Gospel.
Through Christ Our Lord. Amen.
Lord, grant me your blessing. The Lord be in my heart and on my lips that I may worthily and fittingly proclaim His Holy Gospel”
This prayer invoked the presence of the greatest of created beings, the Holy Angels, and acknowledges their presence. They bow before God. They bow before and with the Priest, alter Christus (another Christ),as they minister at the Altars in our Churches. Later, during the Roman Canon (Eucharistic Prayer 1) the Priest requests that the Angels take our sacrifice to the Altar in Heaven.
So, when you say or sing the ‘Sanctus’ do so with the Holy Angels, and adore the Real Presence of God Himself upon the Holy Altar.
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