A MIDNIGHT MASS
On Easter Eve, it is the practice of the Orthodox Greek Church to hold
a Special Vigil, which terminates at midnight on Holy Saturday. In the
year 1917 this vigil had unusual significance for the Rumanian people,
who were passing through a time of tribulation, the words “Kyrie
Eleison”[38] were in every heart, and even the irreligious sought the
solace of Mother Church.
I had been with the Armies, and had returned to Jassy late on Easter
Saturday. My way had lain through almost deserted country, with here
and there a sparsely populated village, whose tolling church bells
called the peasants to their prayers.
The Moldavian capital was densely crowded. Since early in the evening,
a great concourse had been assembling in the Cathedral Square. At the
time of my arrival, thousands of patient waiting people stood there,
a sea of faces blanched in the moonlight, pinched by want and cold.
Many Russian soldiers were sharing in this outer vigil. Just before
midnight, after the King and Queen had entered the Cathedral, some of
them broke through the cordon of Rumanian troops and tried to force an
entrance. They also wished to worship in accordance with the ritual of
their church, but were held back and roughly handled. There was not
room for all who wished to enter in, and these were soldiers of the
Revolution wearing the red cockade. One of them, quite a boy in years,
fell prostrate and inarticulate on the steps, and was permitted to
remain.
The vigil ended shortly after midnight, and at its close the Archbishop
led a procession to the precincts, where massed bands played, rockets
soared high in Heaven, and true believers kissed each other, saying:
“Christ is risen.”
Once more we entered the Cathedral, and what I have called a Midnight
Mass or Liturgy was celebrated. The term may well be a misnomer. There
may not have been a mystical destruction, but there were prayers of
penitence and praise, of supplication and thanksgiving, and these we
are taught are the four ends of the sacrifice of the Mass.
Jassy Cathedral is not one of those vast Gothic structures, whose
symmetry and gorgeous decoration serve as memorials of the inspired
human efforts which graced a more religious age. It is a plain
unostentatious building of no great size. This night, however, it
appeared transformed; height, length and breadth assumed immense,
mysterious proportions--the chancel blazed with light, all other parts
of the interior of the building were wrapped in obscurity, side chapels
loomed like cavernous recesses, the nave was filled with flickering
shadows, its vault resembled a dark firmament above a tense expectant
multitude, a seemingly innumerable host, stretching far back in serried
lines and ever deepening gloom.
Rumanian soldiers predominated in the congregation, the radiance from
the altar was reflected on swart, fierce faces, and shone in countless
eyes. Queen Mary, surrounded by her ladies, stood near the centre of
the transept, a group of white-clad figures gleaming softly against the
grey background. The King and his second son occupied two thrones on
the south side of the chancel, facing them were the representatives of
seven Allied States.
At the commencement of the service the music was subdued, treble and
alto voices recited canticles and chanted antiphons. Sometimes a clear
soprano rang out alone. I could not understand the words, but one of
the melodies recalled an air by Handel, a touching declaration of faith
triumphant, a woman’s voice proclaiming that her Redeemer lives. Later,
the character of the music changed. From a gallery at the Cathedral’s
western end, a choir of men thundered out pæans of rejoicing, which
rose in shattering crescendos, and surged up to the altar in waves of
sonorous sound.
The climax of the ceremony was reached when the Archbishop left the
altar steps and knelt before the King. The old Primate’s work was done.
This learned monk and priest of God was a Rumanian citizen. As such, he
surrendered to his temporal sovereign the symbol of all Christendom,
and his own most sacred charge. King Ferdinand received it reverently,
and a Catholic Hohenzollern Prince stood as the Head of Church and
State holding a jewelled cross.
An unexpected movement followed. Most of the foreign diplomats and
soldiers pressed round the Royal throne, and paid homage to both
spiritual and temporal power by kissing first the crucifix and then the
Monarch’s hand.
This gesture was neither premeditated nor prompted by a spirit of
Erastianism. It was the act of men under the influence of deep
emotion. Something had touched their hearts; something, perhaps, which
brought back memories of boyhood, when belief was ready, and young
imaginations glowed, and youth was vowed to noble needs; something
which stirred feelings numbed by contact with worldliness and cruelty
on life’s rough way; something still fragrant and redolent of
innocence, which they had lost long since and found awhile.
To the peasant soldiers, the music, the incense and the vestments
combined to make a beatific vision, a light to those who walked in
darkness, and whose simple faith was strong and real. They believed
implicitly in the second advent of a man who had been, and would be
again--Wonderful, a Counsellor, a Good Shepherd, and a Prince of Peace.
They had known sorrow and defeat, the enemy was in their land, famine
and pestilence were ravaging their homes, but they were soldiers of the
Cross and undismayed. More battles would be fought, battles without the
pomp and circumstance of those in theatres less remote. The last heroic
stand at Marasesti[39] would be made by humble men, who, this night
throughout Moldavia, were met together for a festival of their Church,
not to sing songs of lamentation, but to cry Hallelujah and Hosanna, to
tell the joyful tidings--“Christ is risen.”