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FULLY SUNG SOLEMN MASS

“ And day and night they never ceased singing: Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord God, the Almighty; who was, and is and is to come.”

( Revelation 4: 8 )

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.....This is the principal celebration of our parish community. At 11:00am on Sundays St. Stephen's offers a fully-sung celebration of the Roman Rite, unique in the city of Washington . If one enters the church early, one is immediately drawn into prayer by the echoes of chanted psalms during the Office of Lauds (Morning Prayer) which precedes the Mass. At the Solemn Mass, almost all of the prayers, texts and dialogues for the liturgy are chanted by the congregation, choir and priest. It is a truly robust, joy-filled sound, and serves as a fuller sign that the Mass is, in fact, one, great, unified hymn of praise. This forms an arc of divine praise which transcends time and space – a rhythm of prayer which allows us to participate with all the angels and saints in the heavenly ceaseless worship of the Lamb. The Schola Cantorum sings the proper texts in English (Introit, Communio, etc.) as well as a rich offering of special sacred choral literatures, hymns and service music.