Jeffrey Tucker thought he had heard it all in the world of music. Then he attended a chanted Mass.
Unlike the secular music he was used to, the simple chant he heard raised his mind and heart to God. This life-changing experience facilitated his conversion to the Catholic faith in 1985.
Unfortunately, he was disappointed with much of the music he heard in church. Tucker decided to do something about it. In 2002 he became a member of the Church Music Association of America, and has been the managing editor of the group’s journal Sacred Music since 2005.
Tucker is also editorial vice president of the Ludwig von Mises Institute, which bills itself as “the research and education center of classical liberalism, libertarian political theory and the Austrian School of economics.”
But as far as the Catholic heritage of music is concerned, the object of Tucker’s most recent enthusiasm has been the assemblage and distribution of a book of chants to correspond with the implementation of the new English translation of the Roman Missal later this year.
You’re a convert to Catholicism. How did your conversion occur?
Every time I tell the story, it is different. I recently realized why: Conversions are too big for full cognition. Too many influences hit us from too many directions to make sense of it all, and there is the element of the divine that surpasses consciousness. So I’m at the point of realizing that I do not and cannot know how or why it occurred.
However, I do know this: Music played a role. I had been a lifetime musician, playing in symphonies and jazz combos and everything in between. But there was something about hearing the Mass chanted with just a few small notes — by an older priest with a tired voice — that transformed me completely. I was about 22 years old and I had never heard anything so beautiful. The total absence of ego and the total absorption in a purpose beyond time enthralled me. I think that these notes unlocked my mind to understand and opened my heart to a kind of love I had never known. Looking back at it, those small notes had a more powerful effect than the shelves of books and the endless hours of studying the faith.
How did your newly-found interest in sacred music proceed from there?
That chant in Mass that I heard from the late Father Urban Schnaus at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception exposed me to something completely new, something words and argument alone could not express. The context mattered too: This wasn’t a music history class. It changed everything. My whole aesthetic outlook changed. Instead of looking for truth and beauty in the avant-garde, I found it in music that was unbound from the temporal world.
From the chant, I moved on to listen to Renaissance polyphony, in which I heard a level of sophistication that I did not hear in much modern music, which seemed strangely superficial and simple by comparison. It’s like comparing a medieval cathedral to a trailer home. Gradually, chant and polyphony took over my brain and hardly any other music mattered anymore.
Of course my fascination with it began as purely artistic, but when I realized that there was a reason for its structure and sound, my appreciation grew. I realized that it is all a form of prayer, and the musical structure amounts to an attempt by mortals to touch a realm of immortality. It was all an attempt to somehow capture and characterize what the ancients called the “music of the spheres,” which is something like a heavenly sound that might be worthy to be presented by angels at the throne of God. The composers and the tradition heard something true and beautiful and the liturgy absorbed it as its own.
It goes without saying that secular music doesn’t attempt this at all. It is designed to flatter the performers, indulge the composers, entertain the audience, or whatever. There is a place for this approach in the culture at large, but sacred music has a different purpose. To me, to begin to understand liturgical music is to realize this central point that appears in Christian writings from the earliest age: There is a difference between sacred and profane. Many people deny this today, which just amazes me. I consider it so axiomatic that it is not worth debating, only explaining.
Why do people deny it? It has something to do with an embedded agnosticism born of deconstructionist thinking. There is no intrinsic meaning in anything, this view says, so how can we really make such distinctions between what is sacred and what is not?
But you are more than a student or listener; you’re also a practitioner and a director.
I became interested in sacred music as a practitioner because the tragedy of its loss is so undeniably obvious to any practicing Catholic. Given our heritage, given what Catholicism has done artistically through the ages (we invented music notation, for example), given what Vatican II called the “treasury of sacred music,” it is shocking how absent it is from our parishes. But that’s only the beginning of the problem. The real core is the loss of the ideal, the near absence of an understanding that musicians have any serious responsibilities to the ritual. So far as I can tell, this is an unprecedented situation, and it cries out for change.
Many people have noted what a dramatic contrast the reality is from the hope of the Second Vatican Council, which called for the Gregorian tradition to assume first place at Mass. Many Council fathers hoped for a liturgical reform that would put an end to the pre-conciliar practice of vernacular hymnody dominating the Mass. They wanted to universalize the high Mass with music that is native to the ritual. It didn’t turn out that way, for a variety of reasons.
For many years, I sat by and wished someone would do something about the problem. Then one day I realized that I had a responsibility to step forward and do something myself. I realized that it is not just a matter of selecting the right stuff to sing, but there is training required and massive personal sacrifices are necessary. There were political, pastoral, and logistical obstacles to overcome, so the change would not be easy. It required an infrastructure and a long-term outlook.
Colleagues in the Church Music Association of America felt the same way. Under the leadership of Dr. William Mahrt, good things are happening. Really, a new renaissance is under way. Our annual colloquium trains hundreds of people each year and turns away as many as it accepts simply because there is not enough room.
What are the most common misconceptions about sacred music in the mind of the average Catholic?
I’m not entirely sure that the average Catholic is as confused as the nice people who attempt to provide music in our parishes from week to week. If you ask the average Catholic what kind of music is integral to our liturgy and ritual, most will mention Gregorian chant. They are right. The music of the Church was taking shape around the same time as the books of the Bible were being chosen; the faith and its music grew up and took shape together. Just as Scripture continues to speak to us today, the music of the faith speaks to us as well.
I find it striking that most non-Catholics imagine that our services are dominated by the kind of chant heard in movies and television. But the truth is that we do not hear it in our parishes. Why not? The musicians have not had their responsibilities explained to them. They do not know that the Church has assigned a specific and brilliant piece of music for every part of the Mass throughout the liturgical year. Not one in one hundred Catholic musicians know this. They’ve never heard of the Graduale Romanum, which is the music book of the Roman Rite. They’ve never been told that there are ideals that extend beyond a weekly game of English-hymn roulette.
People who do know about chant are often afraid of it because the notation is different and the language is different. The rhythm is different too. So it is with the rest of Catholicism. What we do is different from what the rest of the world does. We understand the need to train in doctrine and morals, but somehow we think that such training should not be necessary for liturgical music.
We have to realize that our music is of a special type, so it makes special demands on the musician. We should not permit any music to be used in Mass without some consciousness of what it is supposed to be about, any more than we should tolerate homilies that teach ideas contrary to the faith.
What are the goals of the Sacred Music journal?
Sacred Music is the oldest, continuously-published music journal in the English-speaking world. It is now on volume 137, if you can believe it. The goal is to publish scholarship, to provide news, to offer tutorials, to inspire and teach, and generally serve as a literary infrastructure for a burgeoning movement. It is going very well, but the digital presence of the sacred music movement has also been important. I’m very happy with how chantcafe.com is coming along. The forums at musicasacra.com are huge and essential, helping musicians every day. The ethos is starting to change.
Do you have any projects corresponding with the new missal translation which will begin to be in use in Advent 2011?
I’m so excited about this that I can hardly stand it. This is a chance for a new beginning with the ordinary form. The new translation is so much better, so much more beautiful. People will notice immediately, not just in the order of Mass but in all the celebrant parts, too. The chants are now embedded in the structure of the missal; this was not previously true.. We’ve already recorded all these chants on YouTube and made them available to every singer in the world for free.
But there is something even more important. It is called the Simple Propers Project. Some background: in 1969 the Consilium [the commission established to implement Vatican II’s Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy] stated definitively that it is not fitting that hymns should replace the propers of the Mass, that is, the antiphon text for the entrance, psalm or tract, offertory, and communion. Of course this statement is widely ignored today. The leap from silly songs to serious Gregorian chant is a bit large for most parishes, in part because we’ve lacked good resources to make the transition possible.
This is what the Simple Propers Project is all about. It is managed by Adam Bartlett of Phoenix, Ariz. He is writing melodies that anyone can sing for English-text versions of the propers, together with Psalms. The results are stunningly beautiful, and it will enable parishes to do what they should be doing. The full book is to be published as an open-source book, meaning it won’t be copyright-protected and will be given away for free. This replicates the way music was distributed in the first 1,800 years of Christianity. I fully expect this collection will have a major impact on Catholic liturgy all over the English-speaking world, and it fits perfectly with the new Missal translation.
What do you say to parish music directors who think that prescribed music for the Mass takes away from their artistic freedom?
In some ways, Catholicism in general takes away from our freedom to believe and do whatever we want, but there is another sense in which the framework itself frees us to do what is right, true, and beautiful. Many art historians have looked back to see that it is not untethered freedom that has given rise to great art but rather creativity within constraints. Think of the Mass settings of the Renaissance and Classical periods. Many of the great secular composers are best known for their settings of Requiem Masses or operas with a pre-set story. Artists craved a framework to work within; it is this framework that causes an exit from the ego, which is probably the beginning of truly lasting contributions to art.
There is also the need for music at Mass to unify the purposes of the gathered community. That cannot happen if the music is all about individual preferences. Notice how even four people in a moving car cannot agree on which radio station should be played. If we leave the choice solely to individual preferences, the result will be chaos. We need to use music that draws us out of ourselves and into a higher realm that unifies us. The chant tradition provides this. It is a third way, beyond liberal and conservative hymn choices.
What do you say to people who think that ”contemporary” or rock music is necessary to attract young people to Mass?
So far as I can tell, the only people who really argue this way are old people. It’s true that plenty of young people are not interested in true liturgical music, but those same people are not interested in Catholicism either. How do we draw people to the faith? By lying about it and substituting false teaching? I don’t think so. The faith draws people when it is not ashamed of itself and when it has the ring of truth.
It is the same with liturgical music. Church music uses free rhythm that always points upwards in the same way that incense is always rising. This assists our prayer. Secular styles of music, in contrast, use rhythms that elicit temporal thoughts and emotions. Rock music points to nothing outside of itself, so it does not belong anywhere near the liturgy.
We are living in times of transition, and young people seem to know this even more than older people. I don’t think there is any doubt where that transition is headed: People are discovering the sacred music tradition. If you look around at the Catholic music world, you quickly find that this is where the interest and energy is. This is the future.
Register correspondent Trent Beattie writes from Seattle, Washington.
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Thank you so much for doing the interview and running this. I should be clear that I’m managing editor of Sacred Music and the editor is Professor William Mahrt of Stanford University.
I am going to read this again later, and then probably again after that. There is a lot here to consider. I am a parish musician in several churches, and also have a contemporary group that plays at youth retreats and other non-parish events. Since getting involved in music “ministry” (I sometimes wonder if that is even the correct use of the word) I have been drawn more to traditional music, but am frustrated with the lack of support or knowledge out there. I disagree with the author that contemporary music has no place in the church. I have witnessed profound moments of grace take place in the presence of contemporary music, and I certainly don’t like the “high brow” attitude that often comes with adherence to traditional rites and practices. I am however concerned with the movement toward a protestant-style “worship experience” in the Catholic church. The term “worship leader”, long associated with Evangelical pastors with a two-year community college degree and a back-up band, is now being tossed around in the Catholic world way too much.
Bravo, Trent for giving this to the wider audience. Jeffrey is articulate and has a gift for not only music, but distilling what is essential for a deeper understanding, hence appreciation of this treasure that has lain hidden in the field for far too long.
Beautiful interview. I feel my return to the Catholic Church was similar in that every time I tell the story I am reminded of something new that impacted me and my story changes. It truly is too big and mysterious to detail how the Holy Spirit can affect you. May God bless you Jeff, and I wish you much success in your mission.
My parish is blessed with both the ordinary (in English) and extraordinary forms of the Mass, and I’ve attended both many times. My experience is that, in the EF, most of the music is too complicated to be sung by the average worshiper. The difficulty increases on feast days such as the Christmas season. It is opposite in the OF which offers ‘praise and worship’ style music. I am not musically gifted but I like to sing with all my heart, and I like it when everyone around me is singing also.
Very interesting article. Evidently Mr. Tucker was converted by attending and hearing a sung Mass, possibly a missa cantata in which the priest sings and the people respond and many of the peoples’ parts are sung in Gregorian chant. The new missal is a step in the right direction. Hopefully more and more people will experience the Mass in the extraordinary form and push for a wider and wider use of this extra mundane form.
Joe, perhaps I should have pointed out that the chanted Mass at the Shrine in Latin was the Ordinary Form. The same chants of the Graduale Romanum apply to both the OF and the EF.
Thank-you for your work, Mr. Tucker! I only wish my mother could have lived long enough to see the renewal of truly sacred music at Mass again. She was born in 1924, died in 2004, heartbroken that the church seemed to have lost an understanding and appreciation of our musical heritage. She was a church organist who was eventually replaced with more modern-thinking musicians. She would continue to play at all of the neighboring parishes as a substitute to the great appreciation of many older parishioners. God bless you!!
Mr. Tucker was too polite to put it this way but what he is really saying—and it is true—is that most Catholics are ignorant of their own musical tradition and of what role music plays in the liturgy. The state of the music as I find it most parishes is a source of despair for me. I discern very few signs of improvements. I pursue a ministry work that involves me with quite a few different parishes, and I consequently go to Mass in many different parishes, and many, many of them have horrible amplified guitars, keyboards and drums churning out the most unprayful music imaginable. When I walk into a church to attend Mass at a new parish and see the drum set, I become so full irritation that I find it difficult to even pray during Mass.
I do not know what the solution is. If somehow all directors of music at all parishes could be educated about what liturgical music is all about, that might help. I know things aren’t done this way, but I personally would welcome an outright ban on electric guitars and drums of any sort.
http://tindeck.com/users/sarejess1
You might find some music here that could be of use a self tought composer from South Africa
Alex—have your read Cardinal Ratzinger’s Spirit of the Liturgy ? I am finally getting to it and I think you will find it enlightening as to the place of music in the liturgy, the difference between sacred and religious music, what is liturgically appropriate or not.
When we were children the Mass was said in Latin and so were all the forms of worship.Then came many changes. Latin was thrown overboard.The singing in churches became rock”.Stike your hands and clap your feet stuff” Some times these days our choir sings along with the celebrant in the Gregorian chant and it is beautifully soothing to the senses.
Thanks for a brilliant presentation by Mr JeffreyTucker.We do hope the global church will follow in the steps enumerated by Mr Tucker and the richness of tradional music will throw out the rubbish that is used presently.
The appearance of words such as ‘liberalism’, ‘libertarian’, ‘symphonies’, ‘jazz’, ‘avant-garde’ create for me a picture of a Jeffrey Tucker moving from modern, classically-trained music to traditional and sacred but nevertheless still classical music. My experience of classical musicians is that many have a disdain for pop music, particularly its overwhelming use of a drum beat. Jeffrey Tucker appears to have carried this culturally subjective bias into the arena of Sacred Music, implying wrongly in the penultimate paragraph that sacred music has free rhythm and that music which is rhythmically not free is not essentially sacred.
According to this analysis, this would exclude at least the Coptic traditions for using cymbals and drums played to a beat (as per the current Youtube clip “Heavenly chant” on Gere3025’s channel). Then there is the fact of Byzantine choral chant which is sung to a beat. In short, it appears that Jeffrey Tucker’s thinking is limited by the biases of his own post-Romantic classical aesthetic. The overwhelming proof from history is that Gregorian chant was sung to a beat until the Solesmes initiative of the 19th century. The idea that it was rhythmically free in origin is entirely theoretical.
I personally find the forum at Musica Sacra unhelpful and their treatment of new members execrable as my own experience of it as a new member was that a certain moderator cannot be questioned on statements which that moderator presented as being factual without me being made the subject of insulting language by other posters and all my posts being excised without any retracton or apology for the insulting language, despite the fact that I had used nothing but respectable language for the course of all my postings. The forum apparently has no facility for dealing with complaints against moderators. My polite attempts to raise the issue of the unfairness of this treatment on that forum led to my apparent expulsion from it without explanation. I wrote to the developers, none of whom have replied to me.
It seems that the Musica Sacra forum tolerates fair and polite factual discussion as long as you are one of their own and not a new member pointing facts out in respectable language, as I did. Fortunately, the Daily News permits me to criticise statements and defend personal dignity in the face of the complicit laughter of the same Musica Sacra forum moderator. I have a record of the now censored exchange should the Daily News have any questions about the veracity of my comment here in this regard.
As a practitioner of a form of traditional music which uses both free and proportional rhythm in both solo and choral music, I perceive myself as having limited bias when approaching the question of singing Gregorian chant proportionally or not. The weighting of historical evidence towards proportionalism as bona fide traditional practice is undeniable. Since the free rhythm theory is based on such slender argument, it is perhaps worth considering the possibility that Gregorian chant has, in terms of practice, fallen out of a degree of favour with God until the rhythmically regular aspect of its historical nature is reaffirmed and promoted and enjoyed as the style and sound of Christian chant in western Europe and far beyond. Proportional rhythm, being much simpler in nature and practice than free rhythm, would facilitate the acquisition and performance of Gregorian chant by parish choirs of all skill-levels. The historical approach might not satisfy the post-Romantic aesthetic of the modern classical music world but perhaps such musicians should learn to value an aesthetic which, like Byzantine chant, is beyond their own modern one while yet regarded as being musically beautiful by the culture which produced it.
Well, I guess we were warned—someplace along the way!!! Is the Catholic Church returning to the days that led to the Protestant Reformation??? You are correct, the average, even above average, guy in the pew has NO idea what is going on—wonder why many are leaving the faith for another that they can understand. Please pray that I do not lose my faith!!
Some want only the Tridentine Mass and chant. Apparently nothing else is pleasing to God.
Dear Calum, It appears to be more about you than the music.
It is people like Jeffrey Tucker who likes to trash others that makes Catholic Church look bad. Obviously, he only speaks Latin form of languages and nothing else. If he has his way, he will probably prohibit any other form of singings to glorify God.
Fantastic interview! Mr. Tucker’s knowledge of and passion for liturgical music shines out of every sentence. I am very glad I read it; it renewed my appreciation for Gregorian chant and gave me new insights on it as well.
Dear THERESE60640, unlike you, I would not place “the music” above human beings nor do I send messages the length of an unhelpful ambiguous quip.
If moderators of the Musica Sacra forum feel free to abuse anyone who dares make valid criticism in a respectable way of purportedly factual statements, it is clearly more about the music than the human beings on that forum. You should see how David Haas was maligned on the Chant Cafe the other day for allegedly putting his personal financial benefit ahead of the liturgy. He managed to elicit an apology. Good for him, he well deserved it.
Khuong Trin raises a valid spectre, which I would formulate as the agenda of classical musicians to claim the liturgy for their own preferred musical style and content. They should be ashamed that they publically treat David Haas (and little old me) the way they do.
Ritual and religious song is a melodically and rhythmically rich and beautiful worldwide realm. The notion of elevating free rhythm above non-free rhythm is as ridiculous as claiming that no Catholic music prior to 1800 was composed in non-free rhythm. To quote Pope Benedict XVI, “Modern so-called ‘classical’ music has maneuvered itself, with some exceptions, into an elitist ghetto, which only specialists may enter—and even they do so with what may sometimes be mixed feelings.”
I run a Gregorian chant group myself but I do not share much of the doubts that classical musicians - and the Pope - have about the potential of pop music to lift the soul to God as much as classical or folk music. There is also classical music that you wouldn’t put in a mass. What I see is that pop music is heavily shot through with African rhythms and that those rhythms feel innately irreverent and unspiritual to aficionados of white classic music in particular. While I believe that Gregorian chant should have prime place in the liturgy, I don’t believe in excluding popular song styles per se from the liturgy.
Readers might like to view the Youtube clip “Thanksgiving Mass - Bishop Badejo - Part 7 of 8” on the channel of oyodiocese and ask themselves whether they want the Catholic liturgy in the US to be the sole cultural domain of white European classical music.
Isn’t it striking how many folks are upset that a man thinks the Latin part of the Catholic Church be, indeed, Latin. Wow! The guy thinks the Latin Church should hold onto its Latin traditions and folks get all crazy angry. He’s not saying get rid of the Ordinary Form, he’s saying enrich it with the Traditions from which it sprang forth. What is so crazy about that? I realize that beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but for me, saying a rock mass is as beautiful as a mass using the music the article encourages is like saying a tattoo from Joe’s Tattoo Parlor is as beautiful as the artwork in the Sistine Chapel. The Mass should be beautiful, and it should be about giving beauty and glory to God, not getting worked up or excited by a bass guitar or drum. Who in America, when hearing chant or sacred music, doesn’t instantly think about God, or church, or holiness? Everybody does, and that’s because that kind of music brings your mind there. Rock music simply does not have that power, and what power is does have in this area increases proportionately to how close it comes to sounding like traditional sacred music. When it sounds like rock it does not bring your mind there, but when it starts to mimic traditional sacred music it does.
The problem I have with a lot of the singing that goes on as part of the mass is that most priests cannot sing.
Bibbit, the problem here would appear to be that Jeffrey Tucker is promoting a third way, that is, a separate alternative offering a single choice of what music to use instead of having conservatives and liberals arguing for their own personal preferences. Like most attempting to raise musical standards from a classical viewpoint, he does not make it clear whether or not his agenda is that other musical approaches are more or less excluded at the end of the day. He puts down rock music as not being suitable for the liturgy as he goes along and that hardly dispels doubts about his agenda. Hence what you call “crazy angry” “upset”. He does not merely advocate holding onto Latin tradition but actively excluding other music, as you would exclude rock music.
Your insistence that only classical music and orchestral instruments are truly beautiful - and that pop music and guitars and drums are much less so - is at odds with common sense. If pop music was not attractive, why would millions buy it? Yes, chant is mainly associated with God/church/holiness and pop music is mainly associated with other things but that does not mean that a given song in a pop style is not potentially as beautiful as a chant and therefore not amenable to liturgical use. That too would defy common sense as beauty, as you say, is in the eye of the beholder. You may not get a spiritual experience from rock music but others statedly do, whether you respect that experience or not. Imitating polyphony or chant does not necessarily strengthen the composition of a pop song in the eyes of pop aficionados.
It is a mistake to equate musical beauty and superiority with the western European mainstream classical tradition and to imply that all other kinds of music are simply unworthy of God and liturgy. The Christian musical tradition is fairly monolithic but is not completely uniform and various times and locations have left their cultural inheritance. To restrict such innovation to the western European classical mainstream smacks of cultural imperialism. Why, for example, should Catholic music from elsewhere in the world be denied to Catholics in the US which has a population drawn from many nations, not merely from western Europe? Are all non-Latins to be excluded from composing liturgical music in a non-Latin style because of some misbegotten bellief that such composition would be unholy purely because, to take Jeffrey Tucker’s example, it doesn’t use “free rhythm”?
The Latin musical tradition is central but I see no historical justification for it being exclusive for a Catholic, especially in the US. The church is best served by putting forward the many meaningful objective arguments for Latin chant than by subjectively putting down other musical styles by vainly maintaining that they have less spiritual potential. My contention with a rock mass, assuming the music assisted raising the soul to God, would not be with the rock music but with cutting off English-speaking and Spanish-speaking Catholics etc from their musico-cultural inheritance from Rome which they should treasure, not abandon. But then, the chant group I run includes one heavy metal fan.
Hello Calum, I have several thoughts on your post, I hope I don’t come across as angry or snarky. I realize that reasonable people can disagree about these things. My first thought stems from this: “If pop music was not attractive, why would millions buy it?” In response to that I would point out that for years we’ve been told that porn is the number one reason folks use the internet. By your logic that makes porn a good, licitly attractive even. I would also point out that on Good Friday it’s likely a majority of folks called for Christ’s crucifixion. These are examples of why the Church is called to transform the world, to be in it, but not of it. I think the music that men like Pope Benedict call for is much more transformative. I myself actually left the Church for many years in the late 80’s / early 90’s. I attended a Pentecostal church, and from them I learned that pop music may help get somebody worked up, but it doesn’t seem to last, and it can get flat out ugly. People who get worked up spiritually by pop music need more and more of it to stay worked up. Right or wrong that was my experience. Mind you, I have no problem with music like that for prayer meetings, but the mass is different, much different. The mass should be something that immediately lets the attendants know they are experiencing something very different and special, something other, holy. I think it’s fair to say that rock music doesn’t do that in and of itself.
“Yes, chant is mainly associated with God/church/holiness and pop music is mainly associated with other things but that does not mean that a given song in a pop style is not potentially as beautiful as a chant and therefore not amenable to liturgical use. That too would defy common sense as beauty, as you say, is in the eye of the beholder. You may not get a spiritual experience from rock music but others statedly do, whether you respect that experience or not.” As I said above I don’t have much of a problem with rock for prayer meetings, but I think the mass is different. Part of my problem with rock is that it sprang from a movement of rebellion, not a movement towards beauty. When one thinks of rock music and its history one has to recognize that it came about as part of a rebellious attitude and movement. When Pope Gregory called for what came to be called Gregorian chant he wasn’t calling for rebellion, he wasn’t looking to trample that past, he was looking to elevate worship and help to standardize it. Rock simply isn’t about elevation. I suspect that when you espouse rock masses you maybe mean soft rock, or something else. But my brief experience with it is drums and bass guitar leading the way, driving a beat that was suitable for a club more than the source and summit of our faith. It was a show in and of itself.
“To restrict such innovation to the western European classical mainstream smacks of cultural imperialism.“ The Latin part of the Church is the WESTERN part of the Church. I wonder, would you tell Catholics that worship in eastern liturgical settings that they need to change their worship and add rock and other such newer innovations to be more inclusive? I can’t imagine asking Maronite Catholics to have a rock mass. If you did they would look at you like you had two heads or came from Mars. So why should the western tradition have to change? I don’t think the folks in the western tradition who rejected (for hundreds of years) the music more akin to the tastes of folks who like rock masses did so to be cultural imperialists. I think they did so because they concluded (properly so in my opinion) that the music was not worthy of the mass.
Bibbit, you don’t come across to me as angry or snarky at all. I think respectable, structured discussions of this kind are useful. The number one reason that folks go to a cup of tea is to drink it but that does not make the cup of tea bad or illicit but it does mean that drinking the tea is attractive. Attractiveness is not inevitably linked to good or bad, licit or illicit.
A musical note or rhythm does not have a moral nature. It is not innately rebellious, ugly, destined for a club or showy any more than your favoured Romanticism-inspired classical music is over-emotional, individualistic, subjectivist, anti-society and escapist. Notes and rhythms can be used for any purpose. It is cultural context which adds value judgments such as “rebellious/individualistic” or intent such as “spiritual/prayerful”. Thus dancing in church is not considered inappropriately showy in an Ethiopian orthodox church but it is considered so in a Roman church. If we are supposed to be in this world and not of it and therefore not accepting of secular styles such as pop music, why should post-Romantic secular classical music style be accepted at mass at either?
I am a Western Catholic and therefore I would not tell Eastern Catholics or people of other denominations what to do with their musical culture. I refer you to articles 40, 119 & 120 of Sacrosanctum Concilium, particularly where it refers to considering “which elements from the ... culture of individual peoples might appropriately be admitted into Divine Worship.”. The Latin part of the church is the western part, but the classical mainstream is not the only western European style of music, nor should small-minded classically-trained Catholic musicians regard the Catholic liturgy as theirs alone. There is more to the Western Catholic musical tradition than the modern classical style. The so-called classical aesthetic (it’s really post-Romantic) has developed the way it has but that doesn’t mean that it’s an appropriate aesthetic for Gregorian chant. The effete sound of such a style might please a lot of ears but it makes me want to jump on the next plane to Greece.
The fact is that the Western Catholic church has changed drastically since Vatican II and allowed other forms of western European music into the liturgy as well as American pop music. To throw out all the vernacular-style music from the liturgy now would be pastorally damaging on the scale of what happened when all the music in Latin was dumped. The fact that pop music is energetic and secular does not mean that elements cannot be appropriated for the liturgy any less than the elements of modern secular classical styles, some of which are quite musically extreme. A beautiful hymn will always be beautiful whether it is set to a beautiful pop tune, a beautiful classical tune or a beautiful traditional tune.
Bibbit, you wrote, “I don’t think the folks in the western tradition who rejected (for hundreds of years) the music more akin to the tastes of folks who like rock masses did so to be cultural imperialists. I think they did so because they concluded (properly so in my opinion) that the music was not worthy of the mass.” Gregorian chant is historically culturally imperialist. Charlemagne was an emperor and his documented desire to have everyone singing like Romans ultimately destroyed swathes of chant tradition all over Europe. Should we continue this trend and attempt to extirpate the performance of Ambrosian chant? Styles of music were considered not worthy of the mass because the soul was not raised to God by them, not just because of their musical style.
Don’t know if this applies or not, but our parish switched to the Gloria from the Missa de Angelis for Christmas (here’s a link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rkLSiR1QWLA&playnext=1&list=PLFA5E6A4670123B5F&index=13) and I taught it to my youth choir girls - ages 7 to 14. They picked it up relatively quickly and sang it at the Christmas Vigil Mass. There’s something beautiful and haunting about this piece.
I gave them the English translation so they know what they are singing; they did remarkably well and are helping the rest of the parishioners to learn or re-learn it by singing it as members of the congregation, not in the choir, every weekend at Mass.
Incidentally, I am not a trained music teacher; I’m a volunteer and my musical education is just standard public school stuff. YouTube was a great tool to help get the music into our heads.
There is also a biological dimension to music and prayer that has little to do with cultural conditioning.
When one listens to music, some of the experience is completely involuntary. Music enters the nervous system where it effects heart rate, breathing, and concentration instantly. Upbeat rock music is going to speed things up and scatter awareness, while the sentimental soft rock they play on my local Protestant radio stations will bathe your brain in its naturally occurring opiates.
In the Catholic tradition of prayer there are two false spiritualities that correspond directly with these two musical extremes. “Illuminism” is the error of simulating religious peak experiences through deliberate excitation. “Quietism” is error of pursuing the same result by the opposite means. Traditional sacred music moderates these biological extremes to steer the the listener/singer right down the center into a meditative calmness, alertness, and consciousness.
This is an irreplaceable support!
David, the appropriateness of music in any situation is often a matter of degree in relation to culture, not biology. Compare current Youtube clips “Heavenly chant” on Gere3025’s channel with “Ethiopia Traditional Dancing” on btrunk2345’s channel. Or “Thanksgiving Mass - Bishop Badejo - Part 7 of 8” on oyodiocese’s channel with ” Incredible Dununba Djembe Drum and Dance Party in Mantanlido (2), Guinea West Africa Part 2” on michaelpluznick’s channel.
Cultural bias frequently depends on false reasoning as justification, such as “pop music doesn’t have the creative capacity be spiritual enough”. Romantic era “classical” music also has the ability to excite and depress as historical testimony verifies. Are we to exclude Bruckner’s Christus factus est pro nobis from mass on the grounds that it belongs to the Romantic style? (Youtube currently has “Anton Bruckner - Christus factus est” on PapalMusic’s channel.)
The musical item on “Here I am, Lord (Catholic Church Song)” on thedulcimer’s channel - is it pop, classical or traditional? I would say that that question doesn’t matter and that facilitating the soul being raised to God is the most important thing and not the imposition at mass of the musical style I prefer on many people who do not prefer it. Musical appropriateness is a culturally subjective matter. You can use every weak justification you like but the argument boils down to those two things at the end of the day. The immediate future requires appropriately inclusive musical traditions in the Catholic church, not a so-called “classical music” monopoly.
I find a tunnel vision view of Catholic liturgy as being only pleasing to God with classical music to be insensitive to non-Western cultures. At a time when Catholicism is growing in Africa, to suggest that drums are sacrilegious and only the oldest (read: white) forms of church music are acceptable is ridiculous. While I know the article above would actually eliminate many people’s favorite classical music as well as the rock music (since interviewee seems to want to eliminate songs during the mass altogether to be replaced with chants), reading through the comments it seems like some may need a reminder that not every church can afford a giant pipe organ; maybe a parish only has a brave and prayerful guitarist volunteering to lead the congregation in song.
Personally, I find chanting through the whole mass numbs the congregation so they do not listen to the words being spoken since it all ends up bleeding together. I went to a Good Friday mass where the Passion reading was chanted instead of spoken. A quarter of the way through you could see many had stopped listening and several had fallen asleep. DURING THE PASSION. I’ve never seen anything more depressing. Maybe the people chanting felt closer to God but the congregation tuned out during arguably one of the most central readings in the Bible.
Whatever music illuminates the word of God to the congregation is the music I prefer. Sometimes that’s Mozart and sometimes that’s Bob Hurd. Contemporary music is swimming with musical influence from all over the world. The church today is diverse, and everyone should welcome that diversity reflected in the music.
If a parish can’t afford an organ, fine. The human voice is the primary instrument of liturgy. It seemed to work for the first 1000 years, in a hugely diverse Christian world.
Ms. Low, your message raises the important point that a condemnatory reaction to pop music in the liturgy is not the only pastoral musical concern we must treat seriously. People’s condemnation of chant is also something for us to take into account.
To be fair, in mechanical terms, I would say that the most likely cause of people zoning out and losing consciousness during the lengthy passion reading is the fact that they are sitting down and that, in modern popular culture, they’re not used to having to concentrate on a recitation, or a piece of music, for such a length of time. Even seated classical music aficionados fall asleep at concerts despite being accustomed to listening to long pieces of music. Ancient culture clashes with modern by assuming that most people can be attentive for a long reading of this kind.
The Passion reading is exceptional and, less than a week before Good Friday, a different reading of it has already been heard. Had people been standing up to listen (it is the Gospel after all), they would be much less likely to lose consciousness and even less likely to zone out. Were they following a written text as they were listening? That would help to stimulate their senses. If they lost concentration with a text in front of them, I would find it difficult to believe that chanting the text was really to blame, as the words being chanted would still be quite clear for them to follow.
In non-mechanical terms, if the people you mention lost interest because they don’t like chant, the traditional music of the prayer of the church, then it would seem that modern culture has made people musically very small-minded rather than broad-minded. There can be no truly inclusive diversity if we don’t want to participate in a chanted Passion reading, one of the great traditions of the church, on the grounds that the kind of singing used is not of our preference. That surely can’t be a positive argument but a negative attitude of exclusion of a specific musical culture (the traditional Roman one, at that) at prime moments in the annual liturgy.
Chant should be reintroduced to the mass right across the board, rather than just by parishes that like it, particularly for the dialogue parts of the mass, so that people are much clearer that we, as Catholics, belong to the Roman tradition, not just to our own smaller national tradition, blind and unappreciative to all outside our modern culture. The rejection and deprecation of chant by Catholics is repugnant to me. If parishioners will not tolerate chant at mass, even when sung in an overly affected post-Romantic style, why should other parishioners tolerate brash modern pop?
Jeffrey, parts of that hugely diverse Christian world did not use organs and still don’t. They used forms of percussion and dance and still do. It seemed to work for nigh on 2000 years. To justify the idea that an organ can be put to sacred use in Christian liturgy but that cymbals can’t is to condemn their use in Coptic liturgy. This very particular attitude of condemnation is a strong feature of the Chant Cafe and Musica Sacra forum which has recently been given rein despite the unprovable things written about David Haas’ character. Adam Bartlett censored completely certain innocuous messages of mine with no justification, deleting them with other messages drawing attention to the fact that I had been personally insulted on the same thread. The insult was not withdrawn nor apologised for. I have a record of the exchange on the thread.
The musical culture expressing itself via the above-mentioned sites you would promote is heavily coloured by intolerance. I would expect moderators to abide by, and not exceed, the forum’s stated etiquette guidelines but my own experience has shown me that at least one moderator is intolerant: I dared to disagree respectably with Fr Columba Kelly on a point of musical interpretation and that post was removed. “We will not tolerate any abusive, insulting, hostile, or threatening posts about anything or anyone ... Members may not level insinuations of heresy, bad faith, or criminality against members ...” That bad behaviour is precisely what is fostered on those websites, no further comment is necessary as evaluation of them. I would not want singers in parishes subject to a widespread version of that kind of culture with those kinds of attitudes. You should be ashamed that people are being treated so unfairly and cruelly on your forums in direct contradiction of your own stated rules of conduct. Such conduct is just as bad as some of those who vehemently wish to keep the Latin musical tradition out of parish liturgy altogether.
I don’t think many Catholics have a blanket condemnation of chant; Chanting The Lord’s Prayer together (which most churches in America do) is always great, and gives particular emphasis to it. Many masses have priests that chant during the Liturgy of the Eucharist is great. But I think if an entire mass is chanted, it becomes one big blob.
Liturgists shouldn’t ignore history; but they shouldn’t ignore the present either. I would wager that many people think Bach’s sacred pieces are integral to church tradition, but all of that was controversial in it’s time as well. If we only adhere to the first 1000 years of the church, we’re ignoring the second 1000.
And I think the extremism of this philosophy is the major problem with this movement towards solely chanted music ignores the other hundreds of years of church history that includes the church’s ardent support and development of sacred art and music. Many congregants would indeed embrace chanting more of the mass, but asking them to give up Christmas carols like “O Come All Ye Faithful” (which I imagine from reading the interview would have to go) will never be accepted.
Ms. Low, I readily add my agreement that support and development of sacred art and music is essential. The apostolic exhortation Ecclesia in Europa says, “new artistic expressions of the faith should be promoted through a constant dialogue with those engaged in the arts.” The fostering of only ancient Catholic music with or without post-Romantic so-called “classical” music would constitute small-minded institutional denial to the faithful of beautiful new musical expressions of the faith outside those genres. That would be reprehensible. I note that Ecclesia in Asia says, “liturgical inculturation requires more than a focus upon traditional cultural values, symbols and rituals.”
More directly pertinent here are the following quotes from Ecclesia in America. “Just as she was able to evangelize rural culture for centuries, the Church is called in the same way today to undertake a methodical and far-reaching urban evangelization through catechesis, the liturgy and the very way in which her pastoral structures are organized.” Yes, the liturgy. “... it is necessary to inculturate preaching in such a way that the Gospel is proclaimed in the language and in the culture of its hearers.” Yes, the culture. “The Church “recognizes that it must approach these Americans (indigenous and African origin) from within their own culture, taking seriously the spiritual and human riches of that culture which appear in the way they worship, their sense of joy and solidarity, their language and their traditions”.“ Yes, the way they worship. The spiritual and human riches. Their traditions. Take them seriously. Music included.
Ms. Low, I heartily concur that support and development of sacred art and music is essential. The apostolic exhortation Ecclesia in Europa says, “new artistic expressions of the faith should be promoted through a constant dialogue with those engaged in the arts.” The fostering of only ancient Catholic music with or without post-Romantic so-called “classical” music would constitute small-minded institutional denial to the faithful of beautiful new musical expressions of the faith outside those genres. That would be reprehensible. I note that Ecclesia in Asia says, “liturgical inculturation requires more than a focus upon traditional cultural values, symbols and rituals.”
More directly pertinent here are the following quotes from Ecclesia in America. “Just as she was able to evangelize rural culture for centuries, the Church is called in the same way today to undertake a methodical and far-reaching urban evangelization through catechesis, the liturgy and the very way in which her pastoral structures are organized.” Yes, the liturgy. “... it is necessary to inculturate preaching in such a way that the Gospel is proclaimed in the language and in the culture of its hearers.” Yes, the culture. “The Church “recognizes that it must approach these Americans (indigenous and African origin) from within their own culture, taking seriously the spiritual and human riches of that culture which appear in the way they worship, their sense of joy and solidarity, their language and their traditions”.“ Yes, the way they worship. The spiritual and human riches. Their traditions. Take them seriously. Music included.
Church music is praise from the simplest form to the most complex. Anyone who threatens to leave the church because of the music is probably already waivering in their Catholic faith with other issues. Follow your heart, if your distaste and frustration of the music is upsetting you so much then you need not be sitting in the pew. Go and find where you’re happy and comfortable and get your praise on! As Catholics we also go to church as a community and are there for each other. Too many people today want the Mass to be tailor made to fit what they want. They either grumble about the homily, the priest, the noisy kids in church, the collections, the changes, the Pope, etc. The Catholic church tries to keep tradition and modernity in balance but it’s tricky and maybe they don’t always get it right. On my way to Mass I listen to Urban gospel music to get my body moving and yet I always tear up when I hear Ave Maria. It’s all good…....Praise Him!!
I direct a small choir in the southern US. When I got to this church, they were playing old traditional hymns, and the music at Mass was painful to sit through. There was no group there that was able to handle Gregorian chant, nor classical/romantic period church music. I had been in choirs before, and although I had no formal training, I started a small group and was blessed to have good musicians join. After a short time, we were doing all types of music in Mass…ranging from Mozart and Bach to Taize mantras, from Haugen and Haas, to traditional music, and contemporary pieces from the likes of Angrisano and True. People didn’t know what to make of it at first because it wasn’t the same old thing. After playing “Sing of the Lord’s Goodness” for the first time at Mass (which, for those of you who don’t know the piece, sounds like “Take Five” by Dave Brubeck”), I had someone ask how we could play that in church. Now, after a decade of playing in this church, people have grown to expect a variety of things from our group. Not every song speaks to every person, but I try to make the music diverse enough, so that people can leave the church with the song in their heart and on their lips. I can’t tell you the number of times that people have stopped me in the supermarket to say, “I really liked that song you sang at Communion this week, and I can’t get the words out of my head.” Isn’t that what we should strive for? Our church is supposed to be universal. That doesn’t mean that there needs to be a monopoly on certain types of music because it doesn’t fit some preconceived idea of what church music should be. We may bring people closer to God by singing “O God, You Search Me” because it’s something that people understand and may relate to. That doesn’t diminish the value of the “Ave Verum.” I know I’m showing my age, but the needle didn’t need to get stuck in one place in order to please God, or to bring people closer to God. The funny thing is that the older folks in my parish…the ones who weren’t familiar with the much of the music in the song books, because the needle had been stuck, are now the loudest singers and the biggest supporters of this diverse music. Imagine that!
First let me give thank and respect to Calum who is trying to engage all the people who post comments. Jeffrey Tucker is not entirely wrong. God does love human voices that He created, especialy the singing human voices that praise Him and glorify Him. I also love the Gregorian Chant, especially the value of the chant is the first recording of the music with a pen for us people to enjoy in hundred years to come. Sacred music before the Gregorian Chant was equally amazing, according to researchers. However, Jeffrey Tucker is narrow minded. I am very blessed to have lived in many places in South East Asia. I can tell you that if you have ever heard and understood the beautiful choral voice how the Vietnamese sing the psalms, you will perhaps drop to your knees and your eyes will be filled with tears. It will be more powerful than your conversion from Protestant to Roman Catholic. It will be a conversation of your heart.
“Isn’t that what we should strive for?”
I’m so sorry but, no, that is not what we should strive for. The point is NOT to leave a song on the lips of people in the congregation. No. Absolutely not. If that is the result, no objection. but it is not the objective. All Church makes it clear that we should being striving to assist the liturgy and its words and ennoble them, beautify them further, and serve the word above all else. There is a huge difference.
Your approach sounds very confused. I’m sure you are doing your best but you owe it to yourself to come to understand the role of music in the Roman Rite of Mass.
And I thought we were all striving to leave church with God in our hearts and praise on our lips? As far as “serving the word above all else,” as Christians don’t we really serve the Lord above all else through our words and actions. JT your viewpoint I find rigid and a bit elitist. What about deaf people and the hard of hearing who maybe don’t sing and sign? What about other cultures using different styles, instruments; does it make them any less Catholic, diminish the Mass because of the music? I don’t believe our God has distinct styles of praise, prayer and music He prefers over another. Jesus was a Jew, he didn’t speak Latin and there was no music at the Last Supper! And remember Handel’s Messiah is beautiful but it’s not Catholic.
Maggie, music for the Mass is really music OF the Mass. This is the whole history of the Roman Rite - the push toward giving flight to the word. It’s not like Mass is a social gathering with music piped in. That’s not the point at all. There are propers of the Mass for the schola to sing, collects and prefaces and dialogues for the priest to sing, and the ordinary of the Mass for the people to sing. This is the core of the musical framework - and it has nothing to do with whether hymns (which belong normatively to the Office, and not Mass with the exception of the Sequences) are traditional or contemporary.
Believe me, I understand where you are coming from. Your suppositions here are widely shared and widely held but that makes them no less of a departure from what is expected of musicians in your position. You owe it to yourself to be educated on these matters, and then inspired by the demands and the challenge to do what is right. It is not about personal taste, yours or mine. It is about the liturgical structure, which, if we follow it, produces very beautiful, holy results.
By the way, I said nothing about the Handel, and how do you know there was no music at the Last Supper?
Khuong Trinh, thank you for your kind comments. I enjoy hearing the Vietnamese psalms and other items from the mass.
Jeffrey, the only suppositions which depart from those “expected” by the church are your own. You still show no instinct here towards anything other than the exclusion of other musical cultures from mass as if Catholicism and European ‘classical’ music are one holistic continuum today. That is not in conformity with the relevant authoritative documents. It is not the case that the only sanctified or sanctifiable music in the world derives from Western Europe.
You give no indication of accepting the implications for sacred music of certain statements in Ecclesia in America about indigenous and African origin Americans about inculturating the preaching so that the Gospel is proclaimed in the liturgy in the culture of its hearers. Small wonder that you give no such indication. Pope Benedict himself has criticised the ‘elitist ghetto’ of ‘classical’ music which hints at their smallness of mind if not soul. My own sense is that it would pain ‘classical’ musical snobs to concede that their favoured ‘classical’ music is not actually the be-all and end-all at mass because it is not the only musical style which God has ordained as beautiful. Your attempts to devalue other musical cultures liturgically will always be resisted where people are aware of that truth. It is a truth you should cherish in line with the instructions given us, not downplay or ignore as you do here.
Ok, this is getting ridiculous. I never said anything about “classical” music. You are arguing with someone else. when you are ready to dispense with polemics and talk seriously, you can write me at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
Jeffrey, the only person engaging in polemics is yourself when you write “this is getting ridiculous ... you are arguing with someone else. when you are ready to dispense with polemics and talk seriously, you can write me at ...”
Thankfully, not everyone who has posted here would regard me as “getting ridiculous” or “not talking seriously” or not addressing you, Jeffrey Tucker. When you are willing to reply to points made by me, you can write to me here as, having already been laughed at and insulted and unjustifiably censored on, and then removed from, the Musica Sacra forum without intimation or reply to complaint, I have no wish to approach any other site which is visited by the same people who treated me that way and who have not replied to my e-mails about the treatment.
The main points in my last message, which you have not replied to in substance, were as follows. i) You do not show, in your interview given here or in your messaged replies, acceptance of the implications for sacred music in certain statements in Ecclesia in America. ii) You apparently do attempt to devalue other musical cultures liturgically by proposing their exclusion from the liturgy. iii) It is your suppositions which depart from those “expected” by the church. iii) You should not ignore the potential and real Catholic liturgical beauty in other musical cultures than what you propose. How ridiculous are all these statements? The third party reader can judge for themselves.
It is understandable that you haven’t said anything about ““classical” music” here: you would term it “serious music” as you do elsewhere. You do refer to “chant and polyphony here” and call chant “serious”. I quote Jeffrey Tucker: “... the new liturgical movement as led by Benedict XVI ... believes in freeing the classical usage of the Roman Rite so that everyone can have access to our tradition and grow to love it and embrace it as our own”. “Catholic liturgical music is serious…” Your words. Is the Roman Rite as culturally classical or not, serious or not, the third party reader may ask.
It is obvious from what you say that there are other musical cultures which are not your own preference in liturgy. This does not mean that the Holy Father intends to exclude all of them, and you have given no clear reply to any point on this page to indicate that you would not exclude all of them. On the contrary, the “ridiculous” begins with quotes such as this from your interview: “Church music uses free rhythm that always points upwards in the same way that incense is always rising. ... Secular styles of music, in contrast, use rhythms that elicit temporal thoughts and emotions.” This is gross simplification which asserts that free rhythm in Arabic song elicits temporal thoughts and emotions but the allegedly free rhythm of Gregorian chant, in contradiction, points upwards; iambic dimeter in Horace elicits temporal emotions but in Ambrose it, in contradiction, points upwards; syncopation in Ethiopian Coptic chant points upwards but, in contradiction, elicits temporal thoughts in Stevie Wonder.
There is much rhythmic common ground between the sacred and secular. There is the potential for excess and restraint in most musical styles. How ridiculous is that?
I guess I really don’t understand why the Church is moving backward instead of forward. Austin Cline in his article about the papal cnadidates described our current pope: “Joseph Ratzinger is wildly popular among conservatives, but just as unpopular among liberals. The election of Cardinal Ratzinger would represent a strong vote in favor of conservatism, traditionalism, and a continued fight against the modern world.” He was totally right. I had been rooting for Cardinal Francis Arinze from Africa because I felt so much promise for our faith having a pope of color. I know the current pope didn’t start the missal changes but now they are being implemented under him. It’s just my opinion that having a pope of color would have moved the church into a more modern, worldly, more liberal direction. I’m sorry but chanting and the music outlined here takes us back to the medieval times and makes us look more cultish. I thought we were supposed to be evangelizing gently and increasing our numbers. And please no hateful comments I’m expressing just how I feel, it doesn’t make me any less Catholic or wrong.
There is nothing conservative or liberal about chant. It is not about politics. It is about the sung of the ritual in a manner that is native to it. Within this ideal and structure, there a tremendous amount of room for creativity - as the whole history of music demonstrates. We need to be singing the Mass first, not merely attaching music we like to the liturgy and thereby displacing the normative liturgical song.
Calum,
You’re right, chant can look cultish in certain eyes. Kneeling at the altar rail to receive communion can look a bit vampirish to certain eyes too! However, chant is also extremely attractive to people of another type and the reverence shown at communion can affect lots of people in a very positive way.
I find Cardinal Francis Arinze’s comments on church music in 2005 interesting. Several years ago, he said “For music in the liturgy, we should start by saying that Gregorian music is the Church’s precious heritage. ... But, the Church is not saying that everything should be Gregorian music. There is room for music which respects that language, that culture, that people. ... The ideal thing is that the bishops would have a Liturgical Music Commission which looks at the wording and the music of the hymns. And when the commission is satisfied, judgment is brought to the bishops for approval, in the name of the rest of the conference. But not individuals just composing anything and singing it in church. ... The local church should be conscious that church worship is not really the same as what we sing in a bar, or what we sing in a convention for youth. Therefore it should influence the type of instrument used, the type of music used. I will not now pronounce and say never guitar. That would be rather severe. But much of guitar music may not be suitable at all for the Mass. Yet, it is possible to think of some guitar music that would be suitable, not as the ordinary one we get every time, the visit of a special group, etc. ... Also, because there are other instruments in many countries which are not used in Italy or in Ireland, for instance. But music should nourish faith, burst from our faith and should lead back to the faith. It should be a prayer. Entertainment is quite another matter. We have the parish hall for that, and the theater. People don’t come to Mass in order to be entertained. They come to Mass to adore God, to thank him, to ask pardon for sins, and to ask for other things that they need.”
Jeffrey, you must be out of touch if you think that Gregorian chant is generally not punted by many conservatives and generally not shunned by many liberals. The politics exists and chant is unfortunately one of its inanimate playthings. One conservative boots chant right up the field only for another liberal to boot it right back down again. Your apparent solution is simply to exclude whole musical realms as they would “displace” the Gregorian but this is against the vein of current authoritative statements.
The relevant texts intend that singing the mass involves, where appropriate, musical innovation and inculturation, not merely ancient “native” European song forms. It might help if the bishops pay much more attention to the relative amounts of newer and older music, and where and when they are being used at mass. The current lack of assigning music to the liturgy in more specific ways in parishes surely does not help the politics at parish level.
If conservatives can’t come to terms with musical innovation and inculturation which is not derived from the church’s classical tradition, and if liberals can’t come to terms with the church’s classical tradition, then they are surely in contradiction of current authoritative writings on the matter.
I am writing from Toronto, Canada. I am a member of St. Patrick’s Gregorian Schola, started 5 years ago by a very Catholic and gifted young musician, Surinder Mundra.
It has been and is a blessing to us choir members who not only sing with one voice but are united in charity and humility as we strive for holiness.
People both young and old who have not stepped into a church for many years now come. They tell us that the Gregorian chants have brought them back. The reverence and respect shown for Holy Mass and the Holy Eucharist in our singing has been noticed.
We do not take credit for any of this. We are grateful that God in His great mercy has used us as instruments to bring about conversions and attract non Catholics and non Christians to join our choir.
As I too have experienced, people of all ages are tired of the irreverence, applause and casualness with which Holy Mass is celebrated. They tell us if they wanted popular, pop, rock, country music they do not have to come to church. Guitars, drums, bands and Brittany Spears type of voices are not suitable for the Divine Liturgy in the Catholic Church. Singing for Holy Mass is not a talent show or a performance.
Singing for Holy Mass is a sacred duty for choristers to draw themselves and the faithful to God. It is to be approached with utmost humility, reverence and hard work. Through the great mercy of God, we seek only the honour and glory of God in this supreme act of adoration and Praise.
More churches should go back to the true worship of God by their reverence, respect and the understanding of the reality of what THE HOLY SACRIFICE OF THE MASS is.
Celine, “They tell us if they wanted popular, pop, rock, country music they do not have to come to church.” I’m sure they do. Perhaps they mean, “If somenoe can’t accept such a restriction, they should go away.” If so, that would speak volumes about the absolutists in this argument as such an attitude is against the magisterium. Rock music might not help you revere or express serious devotion but others state that it does, whether you respect that experience or not.
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