Praying the Angelus with Art: This Week's Image

From a 16th century French breviary in the collection of The Morgan Library and Museum comes this compact image, inset into the reading for the first nocturn (Vigil Service) for Matins on the Feast of the Annunciation.

Praying the Angelus with Art: This Week's Image

This 20th Century Chinese Annunciation includes some text, so I asked our Sister Paulamarie (who spent years as a missionary in Taiwan) what it said. Her answer:

It reads backwards from your right on the picture:
     Year is 1948, springtime

Move your eyes to the left and about all I can make out is: The Angel's announcement.

Then on the far left it reads: Done in Beijing.

To your far left it says
      Done in Beijing

Just one year after this painting was completed, Mao Zedong proclaimed the establishment of the People's Republic of China.

Praying the Angelus with Art: This Week's Image

This week's Annunciation is a detail of an image in an initial letter, the D for Dominus (the first word of the Collect for the feast of the Annunciation) from an Austrian Missal or Gradual dating to about 1260-1264, in the collection of The Morgan Library and Museum.

Praying the Regina Coeli with Art: This Week's Image

This image of the Coronation is attributed to Lorenzo Monaco (Piero di Giovanni). It is part of the San Benedetto Altarpiece (1407-1409), and can be explored in all its glorious detail at
http://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/paintings/lorenzo-monaco-the-coronation-of-the-virgin.

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From Easter to Pentecost, we traditionally pray the Regina Coeli in place of the Angelus, three times a day (morning, midday and evening). Since Pentecost falls this Sunday, next week's image will be an Annunciation as we resume praying the Angelus during Ordinary Time.

Queen of Heaven, rejoice, Alleluia!
R. For he whom you deserved to bear, Alleluia!
Has risen as he said, Alleluia!
R. Pray for us to God, Alleluia!

Rejoice and be glad, O Virgin Mary, Alleluia!
For the Lord has truly risen, Alleluia!

Let us pray:
O God, who gave joy to the world through the resurrection of your Son, our Lord Jesus Christ,
grant, we beseech thee, that through the intercession of his Mother, the Virgin Mary,
we may obtain the joys of everlasting life.
Through the same Christ our Lord. Amen.

Pray it in Latin!

Regina cæli, lætare, alleluia:

R. Quia quem meruisti portare, alleluia,

Resurrexit, sicut dixit, alleluia,

R. Ora pro nobis Deum, alleluia.

Gaude et lætare, Virgo Maria, alleluia.

R. Quia surrexit Dominus vere, alleluia.

Oremus. Deus, qui per resurrectionem Filii tui, Domini nostri Iesu Christi,
mundum lætificare dignatus es:
præsta, quæsumus, ut per eius Genitricem Virginem Mariam,
perpetuæ capiamus gaudia vitæ.
Per eundem Christum Dominum nostrum. R. Amen.