Improperia

A remarkable sermon by His Excellency Msgr. Vitus Huonder, bishop of Chur, Switzerland, http://www.bistum-chur.ch/am_dioezesanbischof_108.html translated by Gregor Kollmorgen on TNLM http://thenewliturgicalmovement.blogspot.com/2008/03/my-people-what-have-i-done-to-you.html

My people, what have I done to you? How have I offended you? Answer me! What have I done to you that you so unworthily treat this Sacrament? What have I done to you that you spread teachings about this Sacrament which are not in accord with my institution; that you say this were common bread and common wine, and it were unthinkable that the changing of the bread into my sacred Body and of the wine into my precious Blood were possible? I myself after all have said: "This is my Body, this is my Blood." Why do you not believe in my words?
My people, what have I done to you that you do not raise the children in awe and love before this most holy Sacrament anymore; that you do not impart to them the truth of this Sacrament anymore; that you do not tell them either that they are to receive this Sacrament with a pure heart free of sins? My people, what have I done to you? Answer me!
What have I done to you that you no longer want to acknowledge this Sacrament as the Sacrament of my Sacrifice on the Cross; that you say that holy Mass were not the making present of the Sacrifice of the Cross; that you want to avoid the word sacrifice, although I have said: „This is my Body which will be given up for you“? What have I done to you that you have made out of this holy celebration a meal of amusement and of your self-affirmation? My people, Answer me!
My people, what have I done to you that the Sacrifice of the Mass is worth to you so little; that you do everything else but participating in the Eucharistic Sacrifice, and stay away Sunday after Sunday? What have I done to you that you overlook and despise my Presence in the tabernacle? What more could I have done for you than giving you this Sacrament and thus let my Sacrifice of the Cross remain efficacious through all times and for all men? What more could I have done for you than commanding my Apostles: „Do this in memory of me?“ My people, what have I done to you? How have I offended you? Answer me! Amen.

This reminds me, we of course sang the Reproaches again this year, albeit in a simplified chant.
I think next year we will graduate to the Sacramentary chant, perhaps with the Trisagion ( is that the word?) in Greek.
When I mentioned in my first year on the job that I would be incorporating the Reproaches into our Good Friday service, a certain obstructionist reactionary began, to use a phrase I learned from my Mother the farm girl, sputtering like a wet hen, and shaking said reactionary's head.
(How the arrangements concerning a liturgy one does not attend can discomfit one so, I never knew...)
Our pastor, I should like to report, also quoted from the Reproaches in his Holy Week column, so whatever the objections of wet hens, it seems he does not share them.