Saint Thomas Aquinas spent some time in the early 1260’s in the beautiful Italian city of Orvieto, perched way high up on a promontory, about an hour outside Rome. When I visited there years ago, we had to take a cable car to the top. It was here, in the glorious cathedral, that Thomas commissioned by Pope Urban IV to compose the text for the Office of the recently instituted feast of Corpus Christi.
The good Dominican complied, and then some, writing the most poignant Eucharistic hymns in the Church’s treasury: Sacris Solemnis (the last two lines providing the text of the beloved Panis Angelicus); Adoro Te Devote; Verbum Supernum Prodiens (the last two lines are the O Salutaris Hostia); and Pange Lingua (the last two verses of which are the Tantum Ergo).
Here is a chant version of the last one, in honour of his feast:
And a recent polyphonic version, composed in 1994 by Paul Gibson, signifying that transcendent music never goes out of style:
