In a desert land where there is no water

"For thee my soul hath thirsted... In a desert land, and where there is no way, and no water: so in the sanctuary have I come before thee." - Psalm lxii 2-3

Makeshift altar for Our Lady of Guadalupe

Prior to the Divino Afflatu revisions of the Roman Breviary under St. Pius X in 1911, clergy bound to recite the Tridentine Canonical Hours recited the verses of this 62nd Psalm every day at Lauds, regardless of Feast or Feria. According to the superscript of this Psalm in Knox's translation of the Vulgate, it was written by King David while in the Judaean Desert, the same wilderness where Christ was tempted by Satan, and east of which is located the Dead Sea. 

In terra deserta, et invia, et inaquosa... (near El Centro)

Another vast and inhospitable desert exists in the vicinity of a great and salty sea of death, that being the Imperial Valley adjacent to southern California's Salton Sea. Modern irrigation has made this area fit for large-scale agriculture and human (even suburban-style) habitation, yet, as the Psalmist points more towards thirsts and deserts of a spiritual kind, rather than physical, so does this post point more towards the Imperial Valley as a spiritual desert. 

The descent into the Imperial Valley through In-Ko-Pah

Out of the seven deaneries of the Diocese of San Diego, the El Centro Deanery, which covers the Imperial Valley and likely all of Imperial County, CA, is probably the most isolated from a Traditional Latin Mass location. Residents of the deanery have to travel nearly two hours across the desert and mountains to get to the nearest Latin Mass, and the diocesan parishes in their vicinity are not of much help to those who long for reverence and tradition. A small movement started by local young adults in 2021 to find and secure a priest to offer even a single Holy Mass in the old rite for Imperial Valley Catholics was hampered both by certain liturgical situations and the eventual release of Traditionis Custodes. Despite this, local Catholics were still offered a chance at traditional rituals and prayers in a corporate setting through the celebration of Vespers in the Valley.

Improvised choir stalls and an electronic organ

On the afternoon of September 5th, 2021, San Diego Brothers and Chorus Breviarii members, along with a member of the nascent Chorus Breviarii Murrieta, drove out to El Centro with the necessary equipment to celebrate Sunday Vespers for the 15th Sunday after Pentecost. Fratellino and the cantors instructed the faithful in the movements during the celebration of Vespers and how to chant the music, both for the evening's success and to assist the faithful in the case they would like to pray the Office on their own.

Preparing the venue

As evening drew near, the group descended upon one of the largest parks in the Valley, Bucklin Park, located in the center of El Centro, CA. Near the eastern parking lot sat a couple of strange, partially-walled shelters with little windows and decent roofs to provide shade. The satisfactory design of the shelters and the presence of electrical outlets to plug in the electronic keyboard organ made this a good spot to set up the makeshift altar and the choir's stools and chairs. Additional chairs were used to seat both women and other attending faithful in a sort of nave. 

Even passers-by with their families enjoying a rather humid evening in the park seemed amused by the group's Vespers, with them standing far off for quite a while, observing with curiosity. The faithful in the nave, including the day's "women's schola," were engaged in song and prayer much different from what they were used to at their home parishes across the Imperial Valley. After the conclusion of Vespers, the Imperial Valley faithful thanked us for introducing them to the treasures of the Divine Office, and we concluded the night with a homemade Mexican dinner and other refreshments at the house of one of the families in attendance.

Many thanks to the Imperial Valley faithful for providing us with an opportunity to share the value of the Divine Office in a place rarely exposed to its authentic Catholic patrimony. Vespers in the Valley provided Chorus Breviarii and the students at John Paul the Great Catholic University in Escondido with a template for how to celebrate Vespers when local places of worship simply aren't available, especially in this time when tradition is looked on with suspicion and disdain. As was said in the announcement for First Vespers of the Assumption 2022 at Grape Day Park, Irish Catholics were forced to offer Mass on rocks in the outdoors during their persecution, so in our own time of restriction from public celebration in church buildings, we too have been forced to go outdoors to worship God. We will continue praying that we find more opportunities for local faithful to take us in to worship in their church buildings, but the opportunity to pray outdoors has, as said in previous posts, given us opportunities to present the Catholic faith to our secular world, which may also be likened to a desert. 

May God lead us out of this desert, where many wander searching for the water that will quench their thirst for the authentic Catholic faith, and may He bring us into His sanctuary where we may come and worship before Him.

The complete "sanctuary"

Photos from Fratellino & hoklochen

Live Recording of Sunday Vespers 9/5/2021

YouTube archived version:

Words from a fellow on this video: 

"Vespers of the XV Sunday after Pentecost, this afternoon in a public park in the Imperial Valley, assisting a group of local twenty year-olds to find themselves in traditional Roman Catholic liturgical prayer. Traditionalism is not mere 'nostalgia'; it is a conscious decision to identify with and manifest orthodox Roman Catholic identity that neither pope nor bishop can restrict or abolish."

Imperial Valley Latin Mass links:

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Logo from Martin Palihnich