Saint Cecelia, Virgin & Martyr

On this feast of an early woman martyr, Saint Cecelia, it is good to reflect on music and its impact on the heart. As she lay dying for three days, Cecelia sang of the Lord’s glory and extolled the singular devotion of one dedicated to the Lord as a virgin. Saint Cecelia is the patron saint of musicians. Benedict XVI writes about beauty and contemplative nature of music:

St Cecilia.jpgThe encounter with the beautiful can become the wound
of the arrow that strikes the heart and in this way opens our eyes, so that
later, from this experience, we take the criteria for judgment and can
correctly evaluate the arguments. For me an unforgettable experience was the
Bach concert that Leonard Bernstein conducted in Munich after the sudden death
of Karl Richter. I was sitting next to the Lutheran Bishop Hanselmann. When the
last note of one of the great Thomas-Kantor-Cantatas triumphantly faded away,
we looked at each other spontaneously and right then we said: “Anyone who
has heard this, knows that the faith is true.” The music had such an
extraordinary force of reality that we realized, no longer by deduction, but by
the impact on our hearts, that it could not have originated from nothingness,
but could only have come to be through the power of the Truth that became real in
the composer’s inspiration. (Message to Communion and Liberation, August 2002,
Rimini, Italy; text available May 2, 2005, Zenit.org)

3 thoughts on “Saint Cecelia, Virgin & Martyr”

  2. The iconography for Saint Cecilia varies. She can be pictured with viola da gamba, harp or an organ. From the image it looks like Cecilia is playing an organ, miniature, of course.

  3. Dear Paul,
    Thx for bringing us the words of deep meaning of our Pope Benedict.
    Who is the painter of st.Cecily ?
    Kind regards from st.Ciril&Metod church choir, Ljubljana, Slovenia
    Pija Jober

Comments are closed.