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Lenten Lamentations (Gorzkie Zale)
Lenten Lamentations (Gorzkie Zale)
LAMENTATIONS
“Gorzkie Zale”
(English text)
GORZKIE
ŻALE
ENGLISH TRANSLATION
by
S.M. Consuela, CSSF
S.M. Lucentia, CSSF
melody revised by
S.M. Evangeline, CSSF
Fr. Bartholomew Tarlo CM, pastor of Holy Cross Parish and first Visitor of Province of Poland acknowledged importance of this devotional
melodies on Passion of Christ. He ordered to rearrange the songs into structured liturgical order. The confreres used the structure of baroque Liturgy
of Hours as pattern. They based the devotion on morning hour of Breviary prayers, then called Matutinum (nowadays it might be similar to Office of
Readings) and Laudes prayer (present Lauds). Fr. Benik looked at old gregorian chorales to arrange music, but he kept original folklore character of
melodies. Specialists can find similarities to gregorian hymnals and chorales.
Author, Fr. Lawrence Benik CM described how the devotion should be celebrated. Since the beginning it took place on Sundays of the Lent after
either High Mass or Vespers. In late 18th century some liturgical elements were added making the structure very much like the present one:
presentation of the Holy Sacrament at the beginning; next, three parts of the hymnals and songs were sang; following was occasional sermon called
Passion Sermon. Next, there was procession with candles around the church. Finally the celebrant blessed worshippers with the Holy Sacrament.
The devotion of Gorzkie Zale spread around territory of Kingdom of Poland and Lithuania very fast. Wherever Vincentian missioners went and
preached recollections and popular missions they brought Gorzkie Zale with them and planted the devotion in all these places. Soon, Gorzkie Zale
became the central and most traditional Lenten celebration in Polish churches.
During three centuries of its history some changes in the melody line were introduced. There were also some attempts to translate the text into
other languages, e.g. English. But after 300 years Gorzkie Zale remained typical, traditional Polish Lenten devotion piously celebrated in Poland and
in most Polish communities abroad. In 2007 there were numerous events in Vincentian locations in Poland, especially in Holy Cross Church in
Warsaw, commemorating 300 years of this Lenten devotion.
Modern Gorzkie Zale is not as rich in structure as the original version. It starts with Presentation of the Holy Sacrament. Wake-up (Pobudka) song
follows. Next, one part (three melodies like psalms in the Lauds) is performed (the same part in every third Sunday of Lent). Passion sermon is
preached next. The celebration is concludes with the blessing with Holy Sacrament. In some parishes, all three parts of Gorzkie Zale are sang as one
celebration on Good Friday.
Text scanned from LENTEN LAMENTATIONS by © Polish-American Liturgical Center, Orchard Lake, Michigan, 1986
Additional text, graphic design and layout Thomas Zielinski
© 2011 for this presentation: Congregation of the Mission, Province of New England; http://cmnewengland.org