Agnus Dei (liturgy) The Agnus Dei is part of nearly all settings by composers of sung masses. The priest again uses the phrase "Lamb of God", in a more complete quotation from , when displaying the consecrated Host (or the Host and Chalice) to the people before giving them Holy Communion. He says: "Ecce Agnus Dei, ecce qui tollit peccata mundi. Beati qui ad cenam Agni vocati sunt" (Behold the Lamb of God, behold him who takes away the sins of the world. Blessed are those called to the supper of the Lamb). Agnus Dei (liturgy) In the Mass of the Roman Rite
Mass for Four Voices the B flat strikingly changes to a B natural, producing an unexpected major chord at a key point in the music. A special feature of the mass (as also of the Five-Part Mass) is the final clause of the Agnus Dei. Although text-expression is not generally a feature of sixteenth-century Mass cycles, Byrd clearly regarded the ending of the Agnus Dei text ‘Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccata mundi, dona nobis pacem’ as an opportunity for an expressive treatment of the words. He almost certainly identified ‘nobis’ as the persecuted Tudor Catholic community, as he had done with many of the