May 03, 2025 - Dan Kuehler Audio Divina

Rooted in a spirit of reverence and introspection, this talk, Praying at the Foot of the Cross with Mary, invites listeners into a contemplative encounter with Christ through sacred music and the example of Our Lady. Opening with a heartfelt prayer for grace—grace to desire, discern, and fulfill God's will—the speaker shares a personal journey of discovery that began with a moment of stillness in a parked car and led to a deep spiritual transformation. Through a powerful setting of the Stabat Mater, an ancient hymn meditating on Mary's sorrow at the foot of the cross, the audience is encouraged to engage in Audio Divina—a musical form of prayer akin to Lectio Divina—to ponder the mysteries of suffering, redemption, and the nearness of God in affliction. The music becomes more than beauty; it becomes a teacher of compassion, repentance, and hope. With sincerity and vulnerability, the speaker reveals how hearing the Latin word gladius—"sword"—unveiled a new depth of sorrow and self-awareness, prompting a profound encounter with grace. Ultimately, this meditation beckons each of us to imagine our death not in fear, but in longing—to see it as a return to Christ, and to allow that vision to transform how we live today.

MC: Adam Hohn

Parochial Vicar: Tyler Arens

Presenter: Dan Kuehler

Deacon: Rick Freedberg

Brought to you By: The Knights of Columbus

participantOne:(200-29120): TO THE FIRST SEPTEMBER FOR THE MONTH OF MAY. DOES ANYBODY HAVE ANY AREA ANNOUNCEMENTS? YEAH, THE, I HAD MENTIONED THAT WE WERE GOING TO BUILD THAT RAMP, AND IT WAS GOING TO START TODAY, BUT THAT GOT DELAYED BECAUSE OF PERMIT AND OTHER THINGS.

participantOne:(30300-71260): I'm not sure the next date, but we're talking now the 22nd, which is Saturday. So I'm not real sure of that, but it's off for today. Thanks, Mayor. We also do want to apologize for not being able to meet at Cascades Manor House last week. There was a few communication issues. But we are going to meet this month and next month. And Mark,

participantOne:(71500-100340): It's going to be passing around the signer sheet. Do you want to say something? Just to that point, part of the communication problems was mine. I do apologize. Plus, they had a ton of improvements and things going on at Cascades, which would have made it somewhat problematic if we were there anyhow. But the good news is this month, the 4th, Saturday morning on the 24th, they are prepared and expecting us. So please sign up and also indicate if you can invite any additional friends. Thank you, gentlemen.

participantOne:(100500-137299): Thanks Mark. Is there anyone here for their first ever CORE meeting? I don't think so. Everyone's here, has been here at least once or twice. That's great. Just keep going ahead. Yeah, just remember to invite, if you are getting a lot out of CORE, make sure you invite someone. In the breakfast, as Mark said, it's a great way to kind of introduce the men to the larger group as a whole. So this morning,

participantOne:(137580-166780): Our speaker, he's a professor at Hillsdale College. I'm not really sure what you're speaking about. I didn't quite get that. That's okay. He doesn't know either, but I'd like to welcome Dan Keeler. Good morning. Wow. In true Joseph Gruber fashion, let's pray again. In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, amen.

participantOne:(167060-195560): Grant us grace, O merciful God, to desire ardently all that is pleasing to thee, to examine it prudently, to acknowledge it truthfully, and to accomplish it perfectly for the praise and glory of thy name. Amen. In the name of the Father, Son, Holy Spirit, amen. All right, so I was asked to do this two days ago, and it's a little bit unprepared, but I gave this talk to the Hillsdale Kids last Lent,

participantOne:(195920-225140): And the title of it is Praying at the Foot of the Cross with Mary. We're going to do something a little bit different today. I'm actually going to play you a piece of music. It is a setting of a Stabat Mater. This is a text. It's a sequence, actually. It's a hymn from the 1300s or the 13th century. So the 1200s. And I would like to get out of the way as soon as possible so we have time to listen to the piece.

participantOne:(225640-254900): The piece is 24 minutes long, so it's a little bit longer than what we usually listen to on the radio, but it is absolutely gorgeous and I think it can help us in a way in our prayer life. So I call this Audio Divina. I just made that up. It's kind of like Lectio Divina. You've probably done this before, but it's essentially using a musical setting of a sacred text, which this is,

participantOne:(255760-285540): in imaginative prayer and private devotion, so to ponder the sacred mysteries as Mary pondered them in her heart. So I'd like to start off by telling you a little bit of how I found this piece. I was in college and I was listening to the classical radio station. I was kind of late for my class, but there was this really amazing ubicaritas that was on the radio. And so I stayed in my car until...

participantOne:(285800-312480): the piece was finished just so I could hear what it was, and I found out the composer was Paul Maillor. And so I looked up that piece and I listened to the whole album, but the piece that you're going to listen to this morning was the one that I actually fell in love with on the CD. I'd listened to it over and over again, but one night the Holy Spirit actually prompted me to look up the text

participantOne:(313360-344700): and I looked up a literal translation of the text, which you have in front of you. You probably are familiar with the more poetic translation. At the cross, her station keeping, stood the mournful mother weeping, close to Jesus to the last. But I listened to the piece reading the literal translation, and that profoundly changed me, because I could literally hear in the music...

participantOne:(345180-373120): what was going on in each word, and I knew what each word meant. And the music was actually doing things on specific words, like gladius. I had no idea that gladius was sword, and the music does something special on sword. So it kind of rearranged my interiority, and it actually allowed me to feel sorrow for my sin that I had never actually felt before.

participantOne:(373340-405380): in such a deep way before. So the music actually was the cause for that. The true value of this piece is that it gives us a space to imagine our own death with the hope of meeting Christ face to face. And to contextualize all the suffering that we experience here on earth in light of his cross and resurrection. If we know how to die, then we know how to live. So let's just talk about the music for a moment.

participantOne:(406300-437380): The main role of the musical setting is to interpret the text. That's what it's there for. There's a lot of extremes in this piece. It's slow in some parts, it's fast in some parts, it's very quiet in some parts, and it's very loud in some parts. Just choir for some areas, and with a full orchestra for other areas. The music actually becomes like an exegesis and an interpretation of the text.

participantOne:(441740-463680): So I'm going to talk a little bit about the form, and I know that sounds very nerdy, but it actually helps point to specific verses in the text. So if you have your text in front of you, we've got extra copies that you can read up here. The first movement is...

participantOne:(465380-497860): is a triptych form. It's an ABA form. So there's three parts. There's an A section with some music, a B section which is different music, and then the A section returns. Within the A section, the composer, Paul Mary Lord, treats the first three stanzas. Now the second and third stanzas are literally the same music, but the third stanza is one octave higher. Why is this important?

participantOne:(499280-536060): Well, it actually draws us to the text. Who would not be able to feel compassion on beholding Christ's mother suffering with her son? The piece basically here is inviting us to suffer with, to suffer with Jesus and Mary. That is the meaning of compassion from the Latin, compatsior, to suffer with.

participantOne:(536939-570000): Now, why is the composer inviting us to suffer with them? Because God deigned to suffer with us, to come to the limits of our depravity, to divinize us so that we could participate and share in his very divine life. And then the music at this moment is actually written to order our emotions toward this compassion. But even more than that, it's inviting us to behold our mother.

participantOne:(571780-601980): Behold your mother, Christ says to St. John. Why must we behold her? First, because she teaches us how to suffer with love. Because she beheld the face of her son and pondered the mystery of Christ in her heart from the very beginning. Because, like she sings in her Magnificat, her soul magnifies the Lord. So much poetry is contained in that verb, to magnify.

participantOne:(602260-632760): It not only speaks of Mary's desire to glorify the Lord, it also implies that she is immaculate. She is lucid as a pane of glass is lucid. Mary magnifies Christ within our soul. And when we behold Mary, she helps us behold her son. And in this way, we can see the piece of music is acting as an icon. This piece is an image of Calvary.

participantOne:(633020-670640): And we're there at the foot of the cross with Mary. How does the music have this power? Because music is art and art at its essence is incarnational. Why is that? Jesus is the icon of the invisible God, as St. Paul tells us. He marries in his person both heaven and earth. And as the icon of the invisible God, Christ fully reveals man to himself. I stole that from John Paul II.

participantOne:(671199-702260): We are made in that imago Dei, in God's image and likeness, which means we too, in our very being, unite heaven and earth, soul with body. Because God made an icon of himself, we can now participate in this image-making process as sub-creators, as secondary causes. Music is both spiritual and corporeal. We make it and we hear it with our bodies, with our senses, physically.

participantOne:(703240-734060): but it has no physical shape, but it's also spiritual. It gets into our very core without taking up any material space, although, yes, the particles in the air are vibrating. But as Plato says in his Republic, music is a more potent instrument than any other because rhythm and harmony find their way into the inward places of the soul on which they mightily fasten. Music actually does vibrate.

participantOne:(734300-769220): form the soul in a way, it does matter what we listen to because music can dispose us to certain ways of being and it conditions our attachments. Okay, just one more thing about this movement and then we'll briefly go through the rest, I promise. In the B section, so the last two stanzas of this first movement here, there's a beautiful moment at the line,

participantOne:(772339-787720): She saw her son hang in torment. There is a rising scale that happens literally right then. And you can literally see an experience with Mary slowly gazing up towards Jesus hanging on the cross.

participantOne:(788240-817240): It is such a bitter moment. But the strangest thing is that in the music, the word tormentis is on a major chord. Now, if you know anything about music theory, usually we associate major chords with happy, major minor chords with sad. But this is a major chord on torment. And so we have to ask the question, why? Why did the composer choose to interpret the text in this way?

participantOne:(819060-852040): The ugliest thing in history also paradoxically happens to be the most beautiful. It happens to be the cause of our joy. That's the subtext that I read into that. The climax of the B section is that She saw her son, her sweet son. And the composer repeats She saw. It should come as no surprise that

participantOne:(852699-878620): that the, well, I didn't talk about the golden ratio. All of these structural important points that I've been talking about all happen at the golden ratio of their respective sections, which I think is pretty cool. The golden ratio, you might know, it's like a divine fingerprint that happens all across nature. You can find it in shells. You can find it in galaxies. You can find it in hurricanes. You can find it in the center of sunflowers. It's God's fingerprint. But...

participantOne:(878920-913080): Music can actually participate in all of those patterns, those little logoi in the world, in its structure. And this piece does that too. And it is one of the reasons why, objectively, it is beautiful. Okay, I'm going to skip over movement two. It's very beautiful, but we don't really need to talk about anything there. The third movement, the music, how it's interpreting the text, sounds like a hellish calvary. Okay?

participantOne:(914339-946440): It's chaos. There's rapid strings. The choral parts are overlapping, which muddles the text, actually. The sopranos are flickering, kind of in flames, above the basses. And it's just like clamor. Clamor of the Roman soldiers, shouts and jeers of the crowd. The diabolic element of scattering is apparent.

participantOne:(946660-978020): That is one of the devil's names, by the way, the scatterer. You can even hear the beating heartbeat of Jesus falter and then come to a halt, only to be cast back into the hellish whirlwind again at the return of the text Stabat Mater. Now, the actual sequence does not repeat Stabat Mater, Dolorosa. The mother stood weeping. The sorrowful mother stood weeping. But...

participantOne:(978600-1015020): The entire four movements, taking that into account as a whole, the very place where this Stabat Mater text returns is also, not surprisingly, the golden ratio of the whole entire piece. And the music, the composer, is interpreting the text in this way and manipulating it to bring to the forefront of our mind once again the idea that Mary stood. She stood weathering the storms.

participantOne:(1015280-1044580): of all of the iniquity of humanity for all ages bearing down on her son. And she also stood up for abandoning her son as all but one of the apostles did. So the music is actually calling to our attention Mary's standing. So the tension builds, the choir sings, the Stabat Mater in unison. It's actually the only time in the whole entire piece where they sing in unison.

participantOne:(1046000-1077000): The sopranos rise higher and higher, and there's like this wall of sound. It sounds utterly painful, and they're going higher and higher, and you think you're being driven to the limits of your experience. And suddenly, it's quiet again. Jesus' heartbeat returns and gets fainter and fainter until a sudden crash lands on a low, very low, low, low note, a low F.

participantOne:(1077780-1114460): Some movements return from other, some motives return from other movements. We go down one more step to a lower note. We go one more to a lower note. Three days in the tomb. The music is literally an icon painting those three days for us. The fourth note is confirming the new movement that's about to come in. The choir returns.

participantOne:(1115920-1148460): Fourth movement on the word Christe, Christ. It's long and drawn out. And as they proceed, you notice something peculiar. You've heard this music before. It's actually the music from the first movement. Literally, the music is exactly the same, except now the text is transformed. The orchestra comes in, builds to bring the choir back in for the last stanza of the piece.

participantOne:(1150060-1177420): The fact that the composer returns to this theme at the very end not only unifies the piece, gives it wholeness, and brings it to a satisfying conclusion, but on a deeper level, the composer is inviting us to see the connection between the text of those two places. In the first movement, the second stanza says, "...through her weeping soul, compassionate and grieving, a sword passed."

participantOne:(1178520-1209600): who would not be able to feel compassion on beholding Christ's mother suffering with her son? In the last movement, the text says, Christ, when it is time to pass away, grant that through your mother I may come to the palm of victory. When my body dies, grant that to my soul is given the glory of paradise. And when the choir sings, And when the choir sings,

participantOne:(1210960-1223220): The orchestra just like rips open. The sopranos ascend to the highest part they've ever ascended to in the whole piece. And the basses go all the way down to the absolute lowest point. And you have this just...

participantOne:(1223580-1255520): vista open up like in Dante's Divine Comedy, the Paradiso. It's utterly spectacular. It's jaw-dropping. It's the most glorious moment of the whole piece. You can literally feel like heaven open to you. The music somehow is able to capture this. But you can't have the Easter Sunday without the Good Friday and it's precisely because of the suffering, the sort of sorrow that makes the victory so sweet. It's the best.

participantOne:(1256020-1289300): We must pass through this life mourning and weeping through this valley of tears. And the sword which pierced Mary's heart and the lance which pieced Jesus' side and heart now has been transformed into the palm of victory. Victorious athletes in Greece and Rome would be given the palm of victory, right? St. Paul says, do you not know that in the race all runners compete, but only one receives the prize? Run in such a way that you may win it.

participantOne:(1289760-1322840): Athletes exercise self-control in all things. They do it to receive a perishable wreath, but we an imperishable one. As Jesus entered into Jerusalem with palm branches, may we strive to enter the heavenly Jerusalem and receive the palm of victory. Well done, good and faithful servant. So reflect on your own death. You may reflect on your own death as you listen and use this as an opportunity to contemplate

participantOne:(1323940-1381800): meeting Jesus in paradise. You may like to follow along with the text if you'd like, or you can just let the music wash over you. That's fine too. If you follow along, you can notice which words the composer decides to repeat and lengthen and asking ourselves, why is he doing this? How is he interpreting the text? Allow the music to be an icon for you, drawing you into the scene next to Mary at the foot of the cross.

participantOne:(1448360-1922640): and see I shall fall on the grave for his life and all that he will do is to die and die for his life and all that he will do and die

participantOne:(1933140-2296799): Thank you.

participantOne:(2297580-2600540): The Lord be with you.

participantOne:(2645220-2813319): Isn't that an amazing piece? There are discussion questions if you so choose. I know that's kind of late, but they exist at the back tables if you so choose.

participantOne:(2813660-2854229): Thank you, everybody, for your attention. I know it was a long piece, but hopefully it was spiritually fruitful in some way. Thanks for listening. Thank you.