Because people continue to request these video/audio presentations every week, from the Simple English Propers:
ATHLETA PATRIAE A Tribute to Professor László Dobszay (1935-2011)
“Balmy, Dulcet Sounds…woven into Gregorian Chant Form”
The Salt Lake Tribune reports on a concert series taking place today and tomorrow in Salt Lake City’s Catholic Cathedral. The concert is described as offering “the balmy, dulcet sounds of classical music standards woven into Gregorian chant form, all in the unspeakable visual grace and splendor of Salt Lake City’s Cathedral of the Madeleine.”
The short article closes with the thought: “Early church music represents some of the first — some would say finest — music of the western world, and Utah Chamber Artists rarely disappoint.”
The Cathedral of the Madeline will host the Sacred Music Colloquium of the Church Music Association of America from June 25-July 1, 2012.
The Word of God in Liturgy and the Church
One of things that I thank God for is that I was born within an observant Baptist family, if for no other reason that when I became a Catholic, the grace for which I thank God the most for, I already had a tremendous foundation in the Bible that made my experience of Catholicism richer. I have often in these twenty years since I left for the land of milk and honey looked back upon the onions and leeks of Nashville with fondness, so much so that I took the spoils of the Canaanites with me into the Promised Land. I received from them, not only knowledge, but a method of how to study Scripture and apply it to my life. It also has made me think a lot about the place of Scripture in liturgy and the life of the Church.
Evangelical Pedagogy
As most of you know, for the evangelical, there is only the Word. There are no sacraments. And in 500 years, the evangelicals have developed a pretty effective pedagogy by which their people learn the Word of God. It is direct, simple, and free of unnecessary theological speculation. The idea is to let the Word speak for itself to the person. This is done by private reading of Scripture in the home, Bible study at home and in the church, and preaching.
One of the most interesting things you will note is that almost the whole of an evangelical Sunday or Wednesday night service is taken up by the sermon. And that sermon can take well over an hour, and more in some places. A pastor’s sermons are collectively referred to as his “teaching” and it is clear that those who hear him are there to learn. Everyone brings their Bibles and a pen, and it is not unusual to see people taking notes in their Bible or in a separate notebook for that purpose.
Often the teaching is centered around a small passage of Scripture which is usually read by the preacher at the beginning of the sermon. Evangelicals do not try to preach on the entire Bible in a year, even if some encourage everyone to read through the Bible in a year at home. The idea is simple: short passages of Scripture which are the central focus.
But the sermon is much more than a simple exegesis of one tiny passage. A good evangelical sermon will illuminate that passage with numerous other Biblical texts and relate the whole very directly to the Christian life of faith and morals. Stories, jokes, passages from other literature are often weaved in seamlessly as the preacher brings about a point. Often, however, his point will go on over a series of successive Sundays. The point evolves over time, and gradually becomes clear, all through the preaching on the text. Sometimes a preacher will take his hearers through an entire book of the Bible, and it is not unusual for him to take months or even a year on one book of the Bible. I still remember a vivid series on the Book of Revelation when I was a kid that took a year. But at the end of that year, I knew the book backwards and forwards and can still remember much of what I learned.
Does any of this have anything to teach Catholics? I think it does. As much as some older adults complain that, before Vatican II, no one read Scripture, Scripture reading and study is a large part of our Tradition that only needs to be recovered. The problem we are grappling with is: how? No contemporary Catholic would dream of having one hour long sermons on Sunday morning (although no one seemed to have a problem listening to St John Chrysostom in the 4th century or St Francis de Sales in the 17th century for hours on end). But is there something in the evangelical pedagogical method that is useful? Yes. We have to let the Word of God speak for itself in its own power and might. But we also have to get Catholics to understand that this will happen only to the extent that private Bible reading (guided by the Magisterium of the Church, of course!), study and prayer are part of it. Also, our presentation of the Bible has to be direct, simple, free from unnecessary theological speculations, and related to actual Christian life and practice today.
The Readings
When Catholics think of the Word of God, we automatically think of the Scripture readings at Mass. We think that the only objective of the homily is supposed to explain those readings. But in our Tradition, the Word did not become a Book, but Flesh. The Word of God is seen in Scripture and Tradition. It is celebrated, not only by the readings during a Eucharistic celebration, but in the life of the Incarnation in the world and most especially by the Word Made Flesh in the Real Presence of the Eucharistic species. The Incarnational aspect of the Catholic’s engagement with the Word of God is visible, in part, in the way in which the Church celebrates the Word. The ritual accompanying the reading of Scripture underscores its importance: singing the Word, carrying the Gospel Book in procession, incensing the Word. The way in which we engage the Word at Mass through the senses is inspiring and beautiful, and should be celebrated as well as possible always.
But strip away all of the externals surrounding the proclamation of the Word, and what do we have? The readings are not proposed willy-nilly, but according to a plan in conjunction with the Liturgical Year. The Catholic Church has always had such a plan, even though it has differed from place to place and time to time in parts. And that plan consists, not only of the readings at Mass, but also the special Antiphons which come at the Entrance, Offertory, and Communion, as well as those parts of the Scripture which make up the Ordinary of the Mass. The current plan which most Latin Rite Catholics follow was designed as part of what we now call the Ordinary Form of the Roman Rite. This plan was a response to the call of the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council to offer richer fare at the Table of God’s Word.
It is true that, quantitatively, at least, more Scripture is read, during the Readings, at Mass in the Ordinary Form of the Mass than at the Extraordinary Form of the Mass which was most Latin Rite Catholic’s experience of the Mass before Vatican II. The organizing principle of the Plan behind that is for almost the entire Bible to be read on Sundays in a space of three years, and weekdays in a space of two. So the pericopes chosen are shoehorned into that scheme. Those responsible for making the Plan a reality sought to establish as many connections as possible between the Readings. Sometimes, however, the connections are forced. Also, the fact that the celebrant may often choose between an option to have a continuous reading on weekdays or choose another set of special chosen readings according to the liturgical calendar brings about the occasional odd juxtaposition of themes within one liturgical celebration.
What is the pedagogical method behind this Plan? Often the Ordinary Form is criticized for being too “didactic.” Even the arrangement of the readings according to a two and three year set of cycles is dismissed as being too pedagogical in and of itself. But, as we have noticed, our evangelical brethren, who do not have a ritual liturgical proclamation of the Readings, for pedagogical reasons, choose very short passages of Scripture as their central theme, around which other passages are used to illuminate it.
It is not clear if according to the Plan for the OF Lectionary, the same pedagogical method, which as we have seen, has its benefits, is employed. It would be understandable if, for example, the Gospel was always considered to be the main passage and the other readings proclaimed at Mass illuminated that Gospel pericope in some way, as through typology, for example. But it seems that the principles for the selection of the readings are the following: 1) we need to fit as much of the Bible into a cycle of two or three years as we can. 2) we need to arrange them so we have an Old Testament reading, a non-Gospel New Testament reading, and a Gospel reading, as well as a Psalm thrown in there too. 3) we will arrange them in such a way as that there seems to be a connection between them somehow.
The establishment of a connection across the readings comes at the end of the reasoning process, not at the beginning. It is for this reason, I contend that the Plan for the Lectionary in the OF is not pedagogical at all, or at least not pedagogically sound. The mere proclamation of more Scripture does not translate into greater understanding. Greater understanding can be had, without resource to explanation, only to the extent that a sound pedagogical method takes as its first principle one reading and the second principle the other readings which are connected with it by theme, typology, or theological verity. Such it is that Our LORD was able to illuminate words of the Hebrew Bible by His own Word.
Homily
Often Catholics think of preaching as the homily which explains the readings at Mass. Priests attempt to explain what the readings mean. Often they will ignore one or more of the readings appointed for any given day because he can find no obvious connection between them, or he forces a connection between them all. Each Sunday is seen as a discrete unit all to itself, and no attempt is made to set the appointed readings in the context of the other readings in previous or subsequent Sundays. He also attempts to do all of this in five or at most ten minutes. He might tell a joke or share a story, but because it is in Mass, he will generally respect the formal nature of the homily as a part of the Mass. And he will almost never preach outside of Mass.
I content that this situation is an unintended byproduct of Vatican II. Before Vatican II, the homily was not considered a part of the Mass. In fact, it was not considered essential, even on Sundays, although warmly encouraged. In some places, the priest took off, not only the maniple but also the chasuble, as a cue that this sermon was not a part of the Mass. But what has happened is that, the emphasis on the homily as an integral part of the Mass has led some priests to limit their preaching to Mass. It also has led many priests to preach when they probably should have not, because of illness, lack of preparation, lack of knowledge, or just plain lack of ability to speak clearly and properly.
The time issue is the first thing that must be addressed if the Word of God is to richly inform the homily. We are told that, because people’s attention span is getting shorter and shorter, we must preach less and less. Yet the same teenagers in our pew who can’t string two consecutive sentences together that have a logical connection between them can watch a two and a half hour movie rapt at attention. We often skimp on the homily because of fear of our own limitations. That, and the fact that the next Mass is in five minutes and the parking lot has to clear. So we do not teach our people the Word of God with calm and with a sure pedagogical method because of practicalities which could be re-arranged if we only have the courage to re-arrange them. We also have to spend time with Scripture and prepare our homilies well and in advance, as well as practice them. Composing them in our heads on the way to the ambo from the chair is not a way to preach!
Also, we must revisit the idea that the homily explains the readings at Mass. Often, this can become little more than an exercise in exegesis, with no application to the actual lives of people. How is the Word of God living and effective through a homily if it is little more than an academic exercise? Is that all it is, or something much more?
Also, there is precedent in Catholic Tradition for preaching outside Mass. Some priests will say, “I can’t even get them to Mass, how am I going to get them to another sermon?” But there have been other times in history when Catholics, who were not bound to come, did come, and sometimes in great numbers, to sermons held outside of Mass. Some Catholics would even come to Mass just to go to the sermon afterwards, especially during the Catholic Reformation and Patristic periods. If you preach well, they will come!
Sunday School
Often we give the Mass the burden of reading and explaining Scripture. Before Vatican II, for Protestants, religious education consisted of Sunday School for the whole family and for Catholics, the Baltimore Catechism for children preparing for sacraments. Sometimes there was more, but not often. In the Catholic Church, we have so closely linked religious education with the reception of the sacraments, that we have produced now generations of Catholics who are only barely catechized. And some are beginning to ask, Are they even evangelized?
I contend that the pastoral priority for the Catholic Church is to develop in every parish and diocese Christian formation for the whole family, for all the Church’s children of every age, and that this be, if not as important as Sunday Mass attendance, certainly next to it. In many places religious education, which once was memorizing the Baltimore Catechism, is now arts and crafts and self-esteem lessons.
Christian formation has to integrate the Scriptural and the catechetical, and be for all Catholics of any age, not just kids preparing for sacraments. There are various ways to do this: 1. adopt a primarily Scriptural model, into which is integrated the full catechetical program, for all ages. 2. adopt a primarily catechetical model, into which is integrated as much Scripture as possible. 3. a liturgical model, which integrates Scripture and catechesis into the liturgical year and celebrations. My preference is for the first. It was the way the Church Fathers did evangelization and catechesis and does not suppose such a huge gap between Scripture and Catechesis.
The Church Fathers, the evangelicals and the pre-Vatican II Church did have one good pedagogical method common to all of them: memorization. There is no reason why Catholics of all ages cannot memorize Bible passages and the Baltimore Catechism (which is a model of pedagogical soundness) in the context of a wider Christian formation which teaches Scripture, Catechesis, as well as spirituality and moral life. What has been separated out into distinct spheres for learning theology must be reunited together for Christian formation of all people.
Often Bible Studies for adults have been started in parishes. But they, along with the homilies, often do little more than repeat well-worn theories of Biblical scholars about how the text isn’t really the text or about the socioeconomic situation of the time period. They also get lost in theological speculation, much of which is difficult to square with the teaching of the Church. At any rate, much of what passes for Bible Study in the Catholic Church, particularly in canned programs, is not direct, simple, and free of useless theological speculations. It doesn’t help people get in touch with Scripture. But is there a way that can?
Lectio Divina and Collatio
In the seminary, every Monday night we gathered in the Chapel and sang the Veni creator spiritus. We would then hear the readings for the following Sunday proclaimed just as they would be proclaimed the next Sunday, ritually. Then, one of the seminary staff or a guest would give a conference on those readings. The speaker would often do a careful exegesis of the readings, bring in Church Fathers and theologians, and relate it to the life of the community. The seminarians would then go to their rooms and spend an hour praying over the readings. We would work with the Greek and Hebrew, use commentaries, write out the Scriptures in our hand, whatever we wanted to study those Scriptures.
Every day in the seminary we had a Eucharistic Holy Hour. Seminarians would often bring down their missals, Bibles and commentaries. Sometimes they would bring breviaries, rosaries or other spiritual books. But often part of that time in the Holy Hour was spent studying the Word of God, especially as it would be celebrated on Sunday. But some of us also used it to read the readings for the next day. On Fridays, we gathered in small groups, with a man from each year of the seminary, to discuss the readings and pray together. On Saturdays, the deacons would then meet with the Rector and do the same with him, often sharing what the other seminarians had come up with.
Many of the graduates of the Roman Seminary brought these traditions of lectio divina and collatio into their parishes and schools, often combined with a Eucharistic Holy Hour. Think of what it could bring to our American parishes: the lay faithful and clergy together studying the Scriptures for next Sunday, silently praying before the Blessed Sacrament, sharing in small groups the fruit of their prayer, and learning under the guidance of their pastor? Much better than canned programs of dubious orthodoxy that are boring and don’t feed the soul!
The Mass and Music
The new corrected translation of the Ordinary Form of the Roman Missal is important for many reasons. Perhaps the most important is that it returns many of our prayers, not just to the original Latin, but closer to the words of the original Scripture from which the prayers are taken. I have often remained stupefied at the fanciful interpretations for and against certain aspects of the new translation, none of which go back to the Scriptures. (Matthew 8.8. and Lord, I am not worthy that you should come under my roof comes immediately to mind).
The corrected English translation is not the only thing which will help the Word of God to be more visible within the life of the Church. There is a move afoot to replace man made hymns with the proper (mostly) Scriptural antiphons appointed in the Roman Missal at the Entrance, Offertory and Communion of the Mass. For those who are always looking out for increasing richer fare at the table of God’s word, I ask: Why then promote man-made hymns when the people can sing the actual words of Scripture which are appointed by the Church for those times? For the Word of God to be powerful in one’s life it is not sufficient merely to hear it. For the faithful, not only to say the words of Scripture in the Ordinary of the Mass every time they go to mass, but also sing those words as the appear in the Proper of the Mass: that’s a real way of offering richer fare at the table of God’s word, instead of just random songs composed by others.
The Divine Office
Finally, I would like to note that, if we are to offer the faithful more of the riches of Scripture, as well as offer them tools for Christian formation, there is no better way than the Liturgy of the Hours. The Psalter, the other scriptural readings and the texts from the Fathers, saints and other ecclesiastical writers complement the Liturgy of the Mass. Opening the treasures of the Scriptures to the faithful also entails involving them in the public prayer of the Church, the Liturgy of the Hours. How many parishes offer centering prayer, yoga, devotions, novenas and Perpetual Adoration, but not Lectio Divina and the Liturgy of the Hours?
Conclusion
It is often charged that Church musicians of a certain stripe only care about a certain type of music, and that they do not take into account the consequences of Vatican II’s call for a Church embued with Scripture. In this view, these musicians actually are an obstacle to that vision, because they propose music of a certain type, or in another language. It is also often charged that the postconciliar liturgical reform has been a tremendous success in bringing Catholics closer to Scripture. I think both charges need to be analyzed more closely.
For the Church to implement the desire of Vatican II to restore Scripture to its rightful place of honour in the Church, as well as the call of Pope Benedict XVI in his latest Apostolic Exhoration Verbum Domini, several things need to happen. First, the Church needs to discover what is the best pedagogical method by which the Church arranges her Plan for Scripture during liturgical celebrations in such a way as to be fruitful. Simply by asserting, “There’s more now than there was before” is not sufficient. We also must find ways to re-envision both preaching and Christian formation in such a way, not only to be pedagogically fruitful, but also to more effectively initiate believers into Scripture. Finally, we must take advantage of the riches of the Missal (in both the Ordinary and Extraordinary Forms) and Liturgy of the Hours to assist Catholics not only to be present at, but feast at the table of God’s Word.
Our own time, then, must be increasingly marked by a new hearing of God’s word and a new evangelization. Recovering the centrality of the divine word in the Christian life leads us to appreciate anew the deepest meaning of the forceful appeal of Pope John Paul II: to pursue the missio ad gentes and vigorously to embark upon the new evangelization, especially in those nations where the Gospel has been forgotten or meets with indifference as a result of widespread secularism. May the Holy Spirit awaken a hunger and thirst for the word of God, and raise up zealous heralds and witnesses of the Gospel. – Benedict XVI, Verbum Domini
Steubenville Liturgical Musician Retreat, Fall 2011
Last weekend I had the great honor of joining 90 liturgical musicians at the Franciscan University of Steubenville for their yearly Fall retreat. A good priest friend of mine who has recently produced a video on the new translation of the Roman Missal for the LifeTeen organization was the main speaker for this retreat in the previous two years, so I knew that I would be able to build upon his solid foundations in sacramental theology in my talk.
I presented two one-hour sessions, the first was at talk entitled “Perspectives on Liturgical Music” and the second was a workshop on the chants of the new English translation of the Roman Missal, and on a few proper settings from the Simple English Propers.
I think that if you talk to any of the attendees, the highlight of the retreat was the opportunity to sing liturgical chant together. I think that these sorts of events can so often be exercises in theory, that is, talking about liturgical music. But to actually open up the chants of the missal and to work on them together was, I think, a powerful experience of sacred music for all who were in attendance.
Our time was very short and we could only touch very briefly on elements of chant theory. We just sang. We looked at the music and we sang the chants of the missal, and a few simple propers. I modeled, demonstrated and coached, and these 90 students sang with one voice in the retreat chapel with a sonorous thunder like I’ve almost never heard before! It truly was remarkable.
Several of the students commented that simply singing these chants is what made everything that I presented in the first session come alive for them. What I have learned in this event is that we cannot underscore the importance of actually singing when we have events that discuss sacred music. Discussing in theory is one thing, but putting it into practice brings the music to life in a way that mere words cannot.
But I definitely didn’t skimp on talking, as I’m sometimes wont to do, and I have decided to share my talk entitled “Perspectives on Liturgical Music” which begins with a purely subjective (and somewhat personally revealing) consideration of liturgical music and ends in a purely objective, theological view of the question. I would like to submit that the sacramental and theological perspectives on the question of liturgical music are very important for us today and will help us transcend the mucky waters of subjective and speculative discussion. I hope that this can be a small contribution to that end.
“Perspectives on Liturgical Music” – Adam Bartlett
Steubenville Liturgical Music Retreat, Fall 2011
Steubenville Liturgical Music Retreat, Fall 2011
INTRODUCTION
It’s an absolute joy to be with you all today. The Franciscan University of Steubenville will always hold a special place in my heart. The last time that I was here was about ten or so years ago. I was at the end of my high school years and was, believe it or not, attending a Stuebenville youth conference! Although much time and many life events have transpired between then and now I remain grateful for the impact that it has had on my life.
Franciscan is known for its devotion to and love for Christ and His Church, and also for its radical orthodoxy in regards to the Church’s moral teachings, or her lex credendi or “law of belief”. I hope that today we can consider the Church’s lex orandi, or “law of prayer”, which the Church tells us is intimately connected to, and even helps properly form the “law of belief”.
There is a great event upon us at this present moment in the life of the Church. This Fall we will begin, and even now are able to begin in a small way, the introduction of the new translation of the Roman Missal. This is certainly an historic and monumental event in many ways, and there has been a great deal of conversation surrounding its reception from all quarters of the Church.
Before we get into the main part of this talk, I just want to comment on a few things regarding the
new translation of the Roman Missal.
new translation of the Roman Missal.
- Firstly, this Missal, it is a fact, has more musical settings contained in it than any other missal to ever have existed!
- Second, the General Instruction of the Roman Missal has also been newly translated, and just in the past month or so has been publicly released and will be included in the newly printed missals that we will receive this Fall.
- And Thirdly, the principles of translation that were used for this new edition of the Roman Missal, I would like to propose, have many implications for our practice of liturgical music. The document containing the guidelines for translation is entitled Liturgiam Authenticam” which means “Authentic Liturgy”. A more literal and more elevated translation of the Latin texts was mandated by this document. I think that these principles might also be able to tell us something about how our liturgical music can also be much more literally tied to the sacred music models given to us by the Church, and also be more elevated in their presentation.
And so, in this talk, which is entitled “Perspectives on Liturgical Music”, I hope that we can journey together through five perspectives with which we can view the question of liturgical music, in light of the musical implications of the new English translation of the Roman Missal.
The reason why I chose the topic of “perspectives” is because I know from personal experience, and also from observing many of the conversations around liturgical music and the new translation, that our perspectives can often become rather narrow as we go about the grind of life.
This is certainly understandable for, say, college students who already have more than a full load in their studies, and who in their spare time dedicate themselves to the service of the liturgy with their musical gifts. And believe me, this equally applies to parish music directors!
We are all incredibly busy in our service of the Church, and in the business of living faithful lives. So what I hope that we can do today is take a time-out from the business, and to look at liturgical music from a few different vantage points, in hopes that we might see something that we may not have been able to see before. Or to discover insights or solutions that may be somewhat hidden from us in our most common perspectives.
So, today I would like for us to consider liturgical music from 5 perspectives: A “personal” perspective, a “legal” perspective, a “moral” perspective, a “sacramental perspective” and lastly and perhaps most importantly a “theological perspective”.
Each one of these perspectives will, in a way, build upon the other, and will gradually take us from a purely subjective view of the question of liturgical music gradually into a purely objective consideration.
PERSONAL PERSPECTIVE
And so, let’s begin with the personal perspective.
I am sure that every single person in this room, and every single person who has made the decision in their life to put their musical gifts at the service of the liturgy has tread a unique path on their way there. We all come to the liturgy with our own life experiences, with our joys and our hurts, our comforts and our sorrows, and this is surely a good thing. Christ, who meets us in the Mass, surely embraces us where we are and guides us on our journey to holiness.
I would like to share, only briefly, a bit of my personal journey to the service of the liturgy through music. And while I do, I hope that you will also reflect on your own personal journey.
And so, my own personal journey began in a small town in the Midwest, not too far from here, in fact. I had a guitar tossed in my lap as a young child, and I played in my first Mass in the 3rd grade. In one way or another, I have continually been involved in liturgical music ever since.
The music books in the pew were Glory and Praise, and in my teen years this was replaced by Gather Comprehensive. My experience of liturgical music was mostly seen through the lens of the St. Louis Jesuits, and what some other musicians at my parish growing up affectionately called the “Haugen-Haas conspiracy”.
My involvement in the singing and playing of this repertoire brought me right up to my teen years where I continued to arrive to Church with my acoustic guitar on Sunday morning, oftentimes after a very late night with my electric guitar somewhere else the night before.
As I began to get more personally involved in my faith, and as I began to mature and grow into the bigger questions of faith and life, it was a very natural progression for me to gravitate toward the Praise and Worship genre of Christian music that was really beginning to come about in the evangelical communities, and even, to my surprise, in some Catholic parishes as well.
And it was actually on this very campus where I first encountered electric guitars and drum sets and modern, rock-styled Christian music, not only in events like youth conferences, but also in the Mass!
For me, as a 17 or 18 year old wanna-be rockstar, and virtually lifelong folk-Mass guitarist, this was very much a revelation. It was not only the music that I had an affinity for that moved me, but it was also the love of Christ that this music was able to express to me, and enable me to embrace in my life. I will always remain grateful for the way that the Lord used this music to reach out to me at a time where I was otherwise very broken and very much in need of the love of Christ.
And from here I went into my college years, where I found myself at Arizona State University in Tempe, AZ, only a few miles away from the parish that created and established the LifeTeen program in the 80’s. I soon was plugged in to the world of Praise and Worship liturgy that was so common in Phoenix at the time, and in many ways still is. The parish where I served during this time was the second LifeTeen parish ever to exist, I am told, and the person who had the gig a few years before me was a guy by the name of Matt Maher, and the guy who followed me is named Ike Ndolo. Anyone heard of these guys before?
In any event, it was during my time at this parish, and also while I was studying at music school, that I began to investigate the deeper questions of the liturgy and liturgical music.
Among the many experiences I had at this parish, one of the most striking was that people my age and a bit younger who had grown up at this parish thought that “traditional Catholic music” was “I Will Choose Christ” and “Cry the Gospel” by Tom Booth. This was shocking to me since I obviously knew that traditional Catholic music was “Be Not Afraid” and “On Eagle’s Wings”!!!
But, among the questions that were raised in my mind during this time, the question of tradition certainly was one of the strongest, and it caused me to set out on a quest to discover the true Catholic sacred music tradition, and when I first discovered it, I can tell you, I immediately fell in love.
I remember vividly the first time that I ever listened to a piece of Renaissance polyphony. It was Palestrina’s Missa Papae Marcelli. I had checked the CD out of the library at school, popped it in the player in my car, and on the ride home I just remember listening to the Kyrie over and over and over–I couldn’t even get to the Gloria! I simply melted into the transcendent beauty of this music, and I knew that what I was encountering was something truly sacred, truly beautiful, and truly Catholic, and it opened me to a world that I never even knew existed.
To my surprise, as I began to study the Church documents seriously for the first time, I discovered that the Second Vatican Council said things like:
“The musical tradition of the universal Church is a treasure of inestimable value, greater even than that of any other art. The main reason for this pre-eminence is that, as sacred song united to the words, it forms a necessary or integral part of the solemn liturgy.”
and also said:
“The treasure of sacred music is to be preserved and fostered with great care.”
and also:
“The Church acknowledges Gregorian chant as specially suited to the Roman liturgy: therefore, other things being equal, it should be given pride of place in liturgical services.”
Reading these statements in the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy from the Second Vatican Council were only shocking to me because I had virtually no experience of them anywhere in my personal experience of the liturgy in the years that were decades beyond Vatican II. This was only my first personal engagement of these questions, and I have done much to understand them more in the years that followed, but I will conclude my reflection on my own personal perspective in saying that in the years that followed this revelation I have not only continued to have a personal love affair with the sacred music tradition of the Church, but have also gone to great pains to try to understand more deeply the question of liturgical music, from a variety of perspectives.
So I have offered a vignette from my own life story. I can bet that many in this room have had similar experiences, perhaps some very similar, perhaps some drastically different.
Of course while our various experiences are important in our journeys as Catholics, we have to acknowledge that these considerations are almost purely subjective ones. Not unimportant, but are very purely and almost completely subjective.
LEGAL PERSPECTIVE
And so now, let’s transition from considering our personal and mostly subjective journeys to and through liturgical music, and begin looking at the legal perspective.
I’m sure we can all remember the time when we first discovered that there existed a thing called the GIRM. The General Instruction of the Roman Missal, along with the rubrics contained in the Missal itself (and of course I’m speaking here of the Ordinary Form of the Roman Rite) have the status of liturgical law. If your early formation in liturgical music was better than mine, you probably heard much about the GIRM, and were formed in it to various degrees.
The General Instruction is to the liturgy, we might say, as the Catechism is to the Faith. Liturgical law is to the lex orandi as the Catechism is to the lex credendi.
As I said at the outset of this talk, I know the reputation of this university when it comes to the faithfulness to the moral teachings of the Church. I am sure that all of us here today also have the very strong desire not only to embrace what the Church asks of us when it comes to our moral lives (our lex credendi, and our lex vivendi), but also see that the Church has a lot to say about the way that right prayer complements, and even helps form right belief, and from this, right living.
So it is here where we begin to look at the question of the liturgy and of liturgical music from the legal perspective. And, my word of fair warning: This just might be the most challenging part of my talk today, so please hang on tight!
I’m sure that I’m not the only one who has been in a liturgical “cage match” when it comes to interpreting the GIRM. Am I right?
While the Church’s liturgical law as found in the Missal and GIRM is rather clear and systematic in most cases, we probably all know that there are many cases where the application of it is left open for a considerable amount of interpretation.
I’m sure that everyone here is familiar with the Code of Canon Law. Does anyone know what Canon #2 says? In more or less words it says “…the Code does not define the rites which must be observed in celebrating liturgical actions.” In other words, the Code does not cover liturgical law. This is stated at the outset! The Code has washed its hands of the liturgy! And for a reason.
We don’t have time for this today, but if you ever want some amusement you should study the history and development of canon law. Before the 1917 Code, what was required to answer a question pertaining to Church law was an entire library of documents, contained in many vaults, and an incredibly talented canon lawyer who could sort through them all! And so when the decision was made to codify Church law it was decided to exclude liturgical law, and perhaps to leave it for scholars to codify in subsequent centuries.
So, what this means is that, although the General Instruction is very clear, liturgical law is always subject to interpretation and always must take into account the whole of the Church writings on the liturgy, over the course of her 2000 year plus history, not only a single contemporary document, but the whole of what the Church has said regarding the liturgy.
As we know, even with systems of codified law, such as in our nation’s judicial system, we still have murderers who are set free, and innocent people who are punished all of the time. So it can also become with liturgical law. While the presentations of liturgical law–which in our case are the Missal and GIRM–may seem to be very clear and are indeed a sure guide to right worship, if we try hard enough, we can almost always find a way to get around something, or find a “loophole” so to speak.
This is where I think that many of our liturgical battles can often go. We can resort to trying to find loopholes to justify our practices, or we can try to rationalize things in order to do what we really want to do.
And, most importantly, because we’re Catholics, we are very good at finding the bare minimum that we have to do in order to be “licit”. If you’re like me, I’m sure that you are very certain when the end of Friday exactly occurs when you’re fasting during Lent, or you have an impeccable ability to calculate exactly the time that communion is be distributed at Mass so that you can quickly pound down that Egg McMuffin on Sunday morning on your way to Church, an hour before receiving communion.
We Catholics know how to do these things! But it is my hope that when it comes to the music of the liturgy we will always strive to do so much more than “simply be legal”, and always strive instead to embrace the fullness of the Church’s vision for music in liturgy. I’m sure we can easily relate this to our lives of faith.
We can certainly be “licit” by attending Mass on Sundays and going to confession yearly during Lent, but this is no path to holiness, is it? Even if we do “just get by”, our salvation still can be in great danger.
So, when we consider the Church’s teaching on right worship, and proper liturgical music let’s always try to see the big picture, because if we focus on engaging in legal arguments over fine points only, then we may be bound to miss the boat.
And so, with all of this being said, let’s take just a very quick look at a few sections in the new translation of the General Instruction of the Roman Missal (see handout).
The first thing I would like you to notice is that every one of these rubrics pertains to parts of the Mass which ideally ought to be sung! As we said before, the new missal has musical settings for a vast amount of the texts of the liturgy. If nothing else, this should tell us that the ideal is for the liturgy to be sung.
Next, let’s take a quick look at nos. 38-40. I have emphasized a few lines here. Notice at the end of art. 38 that whenever the GIRM uses words such as “say” or “proclaim” this is understood to be something that is sung or also may be recited.
In fact, a study of liturgical history shows that the Latin word “dicere”, which we think of today to mean “to say”, in the early Church was interchangeably used for “to say” and “to sing”. There was no real distinction between the two. We will get into this more later as we discuss “liturgical chant”, but for now we can see that the same principle is holding true in our modern liturgy.
Next, in art. 40 we can see the importance of the sung liturgy expressed, and that the most important texts that are to be sung are the texts of the Order of Mass: the dialogues between priest and people, and the mostly unchanging elements of the liturgy.
Next, in art. 41 we see a statement that I think is probably the line that haunts many liturgical musicians today. It is a line that has been echoed in numerous church documents and magisterial teachings since it’s promulgation in 1963:
“The main place should be given, all things being equal, to Gregorian chant, as being proper to the Roman Liturgy.”
Note here that this does not say “pride of place”. This translates the Latin more literally, which says “principem locum”, which we could say means “principle place” or “first place”. But the new translation of “main place” seems equally accurate.
For anyone who has had a similar experience of liturgy as me, and I think there are many, it is very difficult to understand how this statement has been justified in our practice of liturgical music today.
A few rhetorical questions: Why does the Church say this? Why is chant to given the main place in the liturgy? How is it to be given the main place? Why is it presented to us here as the supreme model of liturgical music?
I’m not going to answer these right now, but we will come back to it at the end of this talk.
It goes on to say that:
“Other kinds of sacred music, in particular polyphony, are in no way excluded, provided that they correspond to the spirit of the liturgical action and that they foster the participation of all the faithful.”
And we understand the mention of “polyphony” to mean the choral tradition that developed historically after Gregorian chant and was exemplified in the works of Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina, of the Roman School, who has been called in church documents the “Prince of Music”. And after stating these two supreme models, if you will, there is also room given for further developments in the sacred music tradition.
Even Pope Benedict has echoed this in a recent statement when he said:
“An authentic updating of sacred music can take place only in the lineage of the great tradition of the past, of Gregorian chant and sacred polyphony.” Which he said speaking in the Sistine Chapel following a tribute concert to Dominico Bartolucci on June 24, 2006.
And if we proceed to GIRM #48 we see a pretty substantial change in translation, and if you have followed the blogosphere much lately this is probably not news to you:
It states “In the Dioceses of the United States of America, there are four options for the Entrance Chant: (1) the antiphon from the Missal or the antiphon with its Psalm from the Graduale Romanum, as set to music there or in another setting; (2) the antiphon and Psalm of the Graduale Simplex for the liturgical time; (3) a chant from another collection of Psalms and antiphons, approved by the Conference of Bishops or the Diocesan Bishop, including Psalms arranged in responsorial or metrical forms; (4) another liturgical chant that is suited to the sacred action, the day, or the time of year, similarly approved by the Conference of Bishops or the Diocesan Bishop.”
Now, without even commenting on this, I would like you to imagine something. Please imagine for a moment that you’ve never been to a Catholic Mass in your life. You’re an intelligent musician and someone hands you this list and says “this is what you may sing at Mass to cover the entrance procession”. What would you be inclined to sing?
Your first option is an antiphon and psalm from an official liturgical book, either the Missal or Graduale, which is proper to the day, in its chant setting or in another musical setting. Your second option is a similar antiphon and psalm, which is proper to the season. Your third option is another antiphon and psalm from a book approved by the Church. And your fourth option is another liturgical chant that is suited to the sacred action, the day, or the time of year, similarly approved by the Conference of Bishops or the Diocesan Bishop.
Now, if you were someone who has never attended a Mass before, what would you expect to be singing during the entrance procession during Mass according to this rubric? Please try to put yourself in this situation if you can.
And remember that this rubric also essentially applies to the Offertory and Communion, respectively.
I am going to leave this here for now, and allow you to reflect on this. This is perhaps one of the most controversial part of the entire GIRM for musicians. We could argue it and circle it from the legal perspective for hours, even days, but I would rather move on now and revisit it later.
Now, we don’t have time go through all of these points in the GIRM, but I hope that you will study and deeply consider them, and continue to read the Church documents pertaining to music and liturgy. The most important of these are listed at the end of your handout.
To conclude our all too brief consideration of the legal perspective we can close with the thought that liturgical law is objective in and of itself, but it will always remain subject to subjective interpretation. So reading liturgical law in isolation without a more full understanding of liturgy and music, from a host of other perspectives, I would propose, can be very dangerous.
So, we need to dig more deeply. Let’s table this for now. We’ll return to it shortly.
MORAL PERSPECTIVE
I would like to shift now, for a few moments, away even from the liturgy, and just consider the moral effects that music has on us, and would like to draw upon what I believe is a kind of examination of conscience for liturgical musicians, given by Pope Benedict, then Cardinal Ratzinger, in his book The Spirit of the Liturgy.
In his chapter on sacred music, the Pope recalls a dichotomy between two general “types” of music described in the thought of Plato and Aristotle. These he calls the music of Apollo, or “Apollonian” music, and the music of Marsyas, which he describes as “Dionysian” music.
Generally speaking, these two “types” of music affect the listener in one of two ways.
Apollonian music is music that engages the senses but lifts them and draws them into the spirit and brings man to wholeness. It elevates the senses by uniting them to the spirit.
Dionysian music, on the other hand, has the effect of intoxicating the senses; it crushes rationality, and in a sense subjects the spirit to the senses. This is the effect of pure sensuality.
This dichotomy strikes me as one that speaks directly to the morality of the passions. The catechism describes how the passions work on a moral plane:
CCC 1763: In short: “Feelings or passions are emotions or movements of the sensitive appetite that incline us to act or not to act.”
CCC 1768: “Passions are morally good when they contribute to a good action, evil in the opposite case.”
CCC 1767 “In themselves passions are neither good nor evil. They are morally qualified only to the extent that they effectively engage reason and will. Passions are said to be voluntary, ‘either because they are commanded by the will or because the will does not place obstacles in their way.’ It belongs to the perfection of the moral or human good that the passions be governed by reason.”
In other words, the catechism tells us here that the passions have to be subordinated to and governed by reason in order for us to be in control of our passions, and so that our passions are not in control of us.
Music has the power to speaks to our passions. We all know that different styles of music, and different songs and pieces can effect us in different ways.
I’m sure you can relate to times where you’ve just lost yourself in a song. Have you? How about the times when you’ve been so sad because of heartbreak and you just put that one song on repeat and just dwelt in your own misery? Or that time that you’re just angry and had to turn on some aggressive music to find an outlet for your aggression? I know I have.
I would like to suggest to you that in these cases we are seeing examples of Dionysian music in action.
Now, this is not necessarily sinful or morally wrong in and of itself. That depends on the actions that we make as a result of our passions. But can you see in these cases that our emotions and the senses become “intoxicated” to the point where our spirit and will are perhaps crippled? Can we really choose in those moments?
After a bad breakup when you’re listening to your music, balling and weeping, is this the time to call your loved one and say “can we makeup?” I don’t think so, because our rationality is crushed. We can’t be reasonable in these situations. This is an example of the effect of Dionysian music.
Now, on the other hand, have you listened to music that seemed to make you think more clearly? That makes you more reflective and seemed to enhance your ability to perceive beauty, truth and goodness? That lifts our gaze to more elevated and eternal things? Are there any styles of music that come to mind? This is the effect that “Apollonian” music has on us according to the pope.
Now, this can happen to greater or lesser effects. But the looming question now should be “how does this apply this to liturgical music?
Well, I think that answer should be clear. The goal of the music of the liturgy is not to shackle us in our flesh, but to lift our gaze to the heavens, to “undo” in us the effects of the Fall in us. The liturgy engages us in the eschatological, heavenly liturgy where God is all in all and where creation is restored to grace. The music of the liturgy should certainly assist us in this ascent, not prevent us from it.
So the Pope has given us a litmus test, a kind of examination of conscience as we consider the music that we use in the liturgy.
But this perspective still is rather incomplete, isn’t it? This still is a pretty subjective vantage point. Here we will begin to get to the heart of the matter.
SACRAMENTAL PERSPECTIVE
And, so, now we turn to the sacramental perspective. A perspective that can help us assess the question of liturgical music from a more objective standpoint.
So, what is a sacrament?
The classic definition of a sacrament is “a visible sign that makes present an invisible reality”. We are speaking here generally of “sacramentality”, and not the seven sacraments which efficaciously transmit grace. We are speaking of sacraments with a “small s”.
Article 20 of the GIRM speaks of this sacramentality:
“the entire Liturgy … is carried out by means of perceptible signs by which the faith is nourished, strengthened, and expressed…”
And so does the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy of the Second Vatican council in article 7:
“In the liturgy the sanctification of the man is signified by signs perceptible to the senses, and is effected in a way which corresponds with each of these signs…”
These signs signify and help make present to our senses the invisible realities of the liturgy. But what are these invisible realities?
Let’s look at Sacrosanctum Concilium article 8:
“In the earthly liturgy we take part in a foretaste of that heavenly liturgy which is celebrated in the holy city of Jerusalem toward which we journey as pilgrims, where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God, a minister of the holies and of the true tabernacle; we sing a hymn to the Lord’s glory with all the warriors of the heavenly army; venerating the memory of the saints, we hope for some part and fellowship with them; we eagerly await the Saviour, Our Lord Jesus Christ, until He, our life, shall appear and we too will appear with Him in glory.”
So we see that the earthly liturgy is comprised of signs and symbols that make present to us an invisible reality. But what is that reality, first and foremost, that is invisibly present in the liturgy?
It is the heavenly liturgy! We participate in the heavenly liturgy when we participate in the earthly liturgy. In the earthly liturgy we experience a foretaste of heaven, do we not? Yes, of course, we do. This is the perennial teaching of our Church.
Now, let’s consider why we need the liturgy and these signs and symbols that allow us to participate in the heavenly reality. There is a fundamental problem that we as humans have from which this need arises.
Although God has given us the fullness of salvation in Christ, we are still bound by the effects of the Fall. At the end of time when Christ returns and the earth is restored to its original purity, God will be all in all and we will see him face to face. But until then, and since Christ has been revealed to us and has accomplished for us salvation, we are only able to participate in the heavenly reality as a foretaste, and through sacramental signs in the liturgy.
The Eucharist, par excellance, is the sacrament of sacraments, the source and summit of the life of the Church, the most efficacious presence of Christ on this earth. It is the Eucharistic sacrifice that is central to the earthly liturgy. But what about the other signs and symbols in the liturgy, like the sacred art, architecture, the texts, the gestures, the vestments and vessels, SACRED MUSIC? What is their purpose?
The answer to this is that they are sacraments: they are visible (and and in our case audible) signs that make present to us the invisible realities of the heavenly liturgy in which we truly participate in the earthly liturgy.
So when we think of music as a sacrament, we acknowledge that it makes something present to us. The music of the liturgy not only affects us in an emotional way, although it indeed does this. It engages our senses and it should unite them to our spirit, give us wholeness of being so that we are able to lift our gaze to the heavenly reality that is invisibly present in the sacred liturgy.
When we ask ourselves what the music of the liturgy should sound like, what should our first answer be? I would like to propose that our first answer should be that liturgical music should sound like the music of heavenly liturgy, sung by the heavenly hosts of angels and saints, surrounding the throne of heaven. Although this perhaps is an abstract idea to us, and one that composers and artists have to grapple with, it should tell us a few things.
If liturgical music should make present to us the reality of the heavenly liturgy in which we engage and indeed participate in the earthly liturgy, what could we say liturgical music should NOT be?
When we hear music that sounds like music we hear in the Mall, does this make sacramentally present to us the reality of heaven? When we hear music that sounds like what we hear on the radio in the car, does this make us think of heaven?
So this is why the Church calls liturgical music “sacred music”. Sacred means “set apart” and that is exactly what the sacred music tradition of the Church has always been, and really should always be. It is a music that is dramatically different than that of every day life. So should our architecture be, and so should our manner of speech, as we see in the more elevated language found in the new translation of the Missal.
The signs and symbols used in the liturgy, of which liturgical music is a part, are set apart from the ordinary, and form an articulate sacramental language that is safeguarded, nurtured and cultivated by the Church, and which is reserved for the worship of God and for our sacramental participation in the heavenly reality.
THEOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVE
And so we really have now transitioned into our final perspective with which we will look at the question of liturgical music, the theological perspective.
Really, the sacramental perspective leads us to a theological consideration of the liturgy. Sacramentality deals with what we might call “ontology”. Ontology is a fancy word that essentially means “the nature of being”.
The classic definition of beauty in our Catholic tradition is not that it is found “in the eye of the beholder”. The proper understanding of beauty in the Catholic context is much more of a theological, objective consideration. The truly Catholic definition of beauty is that something is beautiful when it reveals its ontology most clearly; when it reveals what it truly is most effectively.
So when we ask whether a piece of liturgical music is beautiful, we really are asking if it is revealing the ontology of the liturgy most clearly.
And so, what is the ontology of the liturgy? This is an objective, theological question. Subjective consideration is left behind here. This is the purely objective perspective.
We can look at liturgical theology from a number of different angles. The liturgy is the at the very center of the Church’s life, and theological reflection on the nature of the liturgy surely can never be exhausted, but I would like for us to focus on one particular theological element of the liturgy, which goes beyond our consideration of the eschatological dimension of the earthly liturgy.
The theological reality of the liturgy that I would like for us to consider is this: In the sacred liturgy it is CHRIST who ACTS. In the sacred liturgy, it is CHRIST who SPEAKS. In the sacred liturgy the prayer of Christ is offered to the Father for the salvation of the world.
Therefore the content of the liturgy, the agent of the liturgy, is the logos, the Word of God, Christ, who was with God the Father in the beginning, and who in the fullness of time was made Flesh and dwelt among us.
In Christ, God revealed to us the fullness of the image of God, and gave us the promise of eternal life. But the fundamental problem that we encounter in this historical period in which we currently reside, is that we are still subject to the effects of the Fall. As we await Christ’s return, and as we wait for the day that we can see God face to face, we become one with Christ in the sacred liturgy, as members of his body, and join him as he offers perfect worship to God the Father.
So the liturgy is the action of Christ, the great prayer of Christ, and we participate in that action as part of his body, in the liturgical assembly.
In the liturgy, how do we worship God? Is this a personal time of prayer where we offer our own personal worship to God? Well, although it is good for us to constantly do this in our lives, this is fundamentally NOT what we do in the liturgy. In the liturgy it is Christ who offers perfect worship to the Father. We participate in this perfect worship of God the Father and are ourselves offered to him, as members of his very own body.
And so, what role does sacred music play in this great prayer of Christ that is the sacred liturgy?
St. Augustine said that “singing is for the one who loves”. And Christ’s prayer in the liturgy is the ultimate song of love, the ultimate prayer of sacrifice. Is it any wonder why the Church asks us to sing the liturgy? For it is in the song of the liturgy where the voice of Christ, the Word of God, the logos, is made INCARNATE in our midst!
This is worth repeating:
It is in the song of the liturgy where the voice of Christ, the very Word of God, the logos, is made INCARNATE, made flesh, in our midst!!!
It is in the texts of the liturgy, sung as the love song of the Trinity, where the Word of God, Christ, is sacramentally made flesh and dwells among us.
Now, how much does this change the discussion about the “songs that we like to sing at Mass”?
The song of the liturgy is liturgical chant. There are chants that belong to the priest (the visible head of Christ), to the people (the assembled Body of Christ), and there is also a role given to the choir, or schola cantorum, as it is called in the General Instruction. Perhaps we could say that the schola cantorum sacramentalizes the hosts of angels and Saints that join in the song of the Lamb in the heavenly liturgy.
One of the roles given to the schola cantorum, of which the assembly may also may take part, is the singing of the proper of the Mass. The form of the proper of the Mass is made up primarily of antiphons and psalmody, as we saw demonstrated in GIRM 48 and 87. The texts of the proper of the Mass are taken primarily from scripture, and overwhelmingly from the book of Psalms.
We can recall that the Psalms have always played an integral role in the life of the Church, not only in the Liturgy of the Hours, but from the very beginnings of Christianity the Psalms have also been central to the Eucharistic liturgy. In The Spirit of the Liturgy, Pope Benedict tells us about why the Psalms are so important in Christian prayer and worship. We recall that the primary author of the book of Psalms is King David.
The Pope says:
“The Holy Spirit, who had inspired David to sing and to pray, moves him to speak of Christ, indeed causes him to become the very mouth of Christ, thus enabling us in the Psalms to speak through Christ, in the Holy Spirit, to the Father.”
How profound is this? Christ, who is the “Son of David” assumes and prays the Psalms of David himself, and continues to do so throughout history through his Body, the Church, in his eternal prayer of praise to the Father.”
This is how important psalms are to Christian worship!
So when we sing the liturgical chant that forms the proper of the Mass, a role proper to the choir or schola cantorum in which the congregation may take part, we make sacramentally present in the liturgy the voice of Christ who prays the Scriptures and the Psalms in worship of the Father, and for the sanctification of Christ’s Body!
This is our role! It is no small calling. Of the sacred signs and symbols in the liturgy, sacred music has a role of singular importance, because it forms an integral part of the liturgy.
CONCLUSION
And now we draw our consideration of liturgical music from five distinct perspectives to a close. What conclusions can we draw from all of this? Let’s begin by turning to the question that was raised toward the beginning of this talk; the question of the primacy of Gregorian chant in the Roman liturgy.
I think that if we ponder deeply on the theological realities that we’ve discussed, if we look very closely at liturgical music from a theological perspective, we can see why the Church has held and continues to hold Gregorian chant to be in such high esteem. Gregorian chant is not the only archetypal form of liturgical chant, but it is a form that has given a near perfect liturgical expression to the acting Voice of Christ in the Liturgy.
But how has it achieved this? Allow me to propose three reasons:
Firstly, Gregorian chant is purely vocal music, and it is monophonic, meaning it is pure melody. Through the singing of scriptural and liturgical texts it makes sacramentally present the One voice of Christ, and allows the entire Body to join in this once voice of praise.
Secondly, Gregorian chant is not bound to a rhythmic meter. The rhythm of Gregorian chant is the rhythm of the liturgical word. In chant, it is the word, always, that has primacy. The music is always at the service of the Word. It enables the logos, the Word of God to be made manifest, to become incarnate in our midst, without distortion. Truly, in Gregorian chant, the Word becomes flesh and dwells in our midst, when it is sung in the sacred liturgy.
Thirdly, Gregorian chant has always been music that has been reserved for the worship of God. It has never been popular music. There is virtually nothing like it that exists in the popular music in history anywhere. We don’t go to Gregorian chant concerts do we? Because it just doesn’t make sense. Chant is a musical idiom that serves one purpose, and that is to bring to life the Word of God in song in the sacred liturgy.
Now, does this mean that we must only sing Gregorian chant in the liturgy? I don’t think so, and the GIRM doesn’t say this at all.
But it should be clear to us now why chant has been given such an exalted role in the liturgy, and why it is continually upheld as the model for liturgical music. It should be given the “main place” in the liturgy, says our current liturgical legislation, and this is for good reason. When we use other musical styles and repertoires, though, they should always be judged against these qualities that are exemplified in Gregorian chant, and be informed and inspired by them.
Our job as liturgical musicians is to make the voice of Christ sacramentally present in the liturgy. So our singing and the music that we sing has to have the capacity to do this to the best of our abilities.
We’re very blessed to have a resurgence in interest in the singing of liturgical chant; both Gregorian chant and other sacred vocal repertoires that are consonant with it. There have been more chant workshops happening around the country and world in the past five years than there probably have been in all the first three decades that followed the Council.
We also have a very exciting growing trend in the development of resources that make liturgical chant, as discussed here, able to be sung in almost any parish environment. While the official books of Gregorian chant are in Latin, and can be a very complex and highly specialized repertoire at times, many composers have been discovering ways to “translate” the essence of the Gregorian chant tradition into forms that we can readily utilize in liturgical practice today.
And when we extend liturgical chant into other musical styles for use in the liturgy–something that the Church has always encouraged, and does today–my challenge to you today is to look to the Gregorian chant tradition for guidance and inspiration. What Pope St. Pius X said in his 1903 encyclical holds true today:
“…the more closely a composition for church approaches in its movement, inspiration and savor the Gregorian form, the more sacred and liturgical it becomes…”
I would challenge you to deeply consider the principles of liturgical music that are modeled for us in the Gregorian chant tradition, and seek to imbue everything you do with this spirit. This not only applies to how the music is sung and played, but also to the music and texts that are selected.
The antiphons in the Missal and Graduale remain the primary sung texts for the liturgical processions. Perhaps we could look at them when making musical selections for the Mass.
The primary textual source for the liturgical processions at the Entrance, Offertory and Communion is the psalms. Perhaps we could incorporate more musical settings of the psalms, based on the texts in the Graduale Romanum or Simplex in our musical selections.
And lastly, perhaps we could even begin to sing some of the proper chants themselves, even in the most simple English settings. An incorporation of these sorts of settings in our liturgies today will resonate beautifully with the chants found in the new edition of the Roman Missal.
These are all things that we can do to bring our service in music ministry closer to the Mind of the Church on liturgical music.
Above all, though, I hope that we can always strive to make the Word of God, the logos, the very voice of Christ, perceptible in the liturgy through the music that we sing, compose, play and offer in the liturgy.
“It’s Always Better in Latin”
I’m sure that Fr. Samuel Weber has written this phrase 100 times to my email account, every time he sends one of his masterful English settings of the chant. He is right of course. And yet, he is amazing. Observe. Don’t lose this url: musicasacra.com/weber
The Inaugural Address of the Blessed John Henry Newman Institute of Liturgical Music
September 17th 2011, Inaugural Address, Fr. Guy Nicholls, Blessed John Henry Newman Institute of Liturgical Music
Your Grace, my brother Oratorians, and all brothers and sisters in Christ, welcome to this inaugural event of the Blessed John Henry Newman Institute for Liturgical Music.
The Founder of our Oratory, Blessed Cardinal Newman, is better known in the modern world as an educationalist, writer, theologian and philosopher than as a musician and liturgist. Yet to ignore these latter aspects of his life would seriously distort our understanding of his personality and of his vocation. It is true that Newman did not write a great deal about music and liturgy, but he practised them both a great deal. He played the violin from an early age and to a high standard of proficiency, and we know that he was happiest at Littlemore when he was teaching plainsong to his schoolchildren with the aid of his violin. When he came to Birmingham, he set up and even at times conducted, the Choir at High Mass – for whom his rules are still extant; and the story is still told how in his advanced old age as a Cardinal, it was his custom to sit by the door into Church, at the back of what is now his shrine, in order to hear and enjoy the singing of the choir at High Mass. As a priest, the central act of his vocation was the offering of the Sacrifice of the Mass and the fostering of a more dignified worship of Almighty God. Just like his pastoral concerns as a priest, much of what Blessed John Henry did from day to day is now only known to God and to those who benefited from his ministry. That we do not know much about them is not because they were unimportant, but because they were not the matter of his vast body of writing which he has bequeathed to us.
Let us go on then, simply acknowledging that this great Oratorian priest knew and made use of the power of the Church’s liturgy to sanctify souls and prepare them for heaven. This is exactly what we also aim to do in our own time and place.
Why, then, should it be desirable to set up an Institute for Liturgical Music now? In the first place, we want to help as many people as possible, priests and laity, musicians and congregations, to come to know and use freely, the resources of what the Second Vatican Council Fathers called “the Treasury of Sacred Music” , and described as “a treasure of inestimable price”. This needs explaining. In what does such a treasury consist? It is not simply the sum total of everything musical ever composed for, or used in, the Liturgy. The Council makes explicit that it is talking here principally about two kinds of music: first, as “proper to the Roman liturgy”, Gregorian Chant, which should therefore have first place in liturgical actions; then secondly other types of sacred music, but especially polyphony. These are, of course, sung forms of music. Instrumental music is not dealt with directly under this heading, though it is important to note in passing that the Council fathers single out for special mention the Organ, whose sound can “add a wonderful splendour” to the Church’s ceremonies and “powerfully raise minds towards God and heavenly things”.
Keeping for the moment to the matter of sung sacred music, we note that the Council recognises that the entire liturgical assembly has its proper roles, its proper repertoires. There is music for the celebrant, the ministers, the choir, the cantor and the congregation. None of these excludes the others. The crucial bond that unites then all is that they should all foster “participatio actuosa”, a well known phrase, but notoriously difficult to render well in English. It has been generally translated as “active participation”, and as such has been taken to mean that the entire congregation should be actively doing something if it is to be actively participating. But deeper reflection on this phrase and on its context within the liturgical aims of the Council Fathers suggests another meaning altogether: “actuosa” should mean “actual”, a real engagement of the whole person. Sometimes, indeed often, this will involve some form of activity, such as singing or speaking or a particular posture or gesture. But it need not require all of those at all times. Anyone can be said to be “actually participating” in the liturgy who is quite simply engaged by it. That person may be doing nothing – yet participating at a deep level through being caught up in the entire experience of what is going on, and of which he is not a mere spectator, but a member of a body involved in an action which both unites and transcends all the individual persons present. So, for instance, “participatio actuosa” can equally be ascribed to a sense of awe at what one is immersed in: the beauty of architecture, art and vesture, of the dignity of the movements of the sacred ministers, of the sight and scent of the incense “rising like prayer to God” , of the singing by those who have the necessary skill and training of elaborate and moving settings of the sacred texts, just as much as it can be ascribed to congregational singing. In fact, allowing always for the importance of congregational singing, it is still possible to say that the presence of those other expressions of beauty may enhance the congregation’s participation yet more than their own singing alone could do.
That brings us to another most important consideration: since liturgical music is pre-eminently sung music, what is it that should be sung? We have grown used to the style of celebration in which singing is something done during the liturgy, it matters less so what and by whom it is sung. In this country, generally speaking, the Mass is treated as a series of words and actions that are, at least by default, intrinsically spoken. If music is required, it is often inserted into the gaps left between words and actions, such as long pauses caused by processions and the distribution of Communion. It may be that the texts of what is sung are drawn from appropriate scriptural or liturgical sources, but that is often not the case, nor is it considered to be a fundamental criterion in choosing such music. When seen against the backdrop of a predominantly spoken liturgy, music is a “filler”. Nothing could be more distorting of the true nature of liturgical music. Music is not something to be added on to a liturgy that could actually do just as well without it, it is of the essence of the liturgy itself. Yet one can still ask: why should this be? Why should we consider music to be essential to the liturgy?
The truth of this claim for music to be intrinsic to the liturgy rather than an extra added on, however desirable, lies in the nature of music as an expression of the human spirit. If you want to understand what I mean, try saying the words of two familiar, yet contrasting texts: “Happy birthday to you” and “God save our gracious Queen”; how ludicrous and indeed highly unnatural it would be to recite these texts! The melodies which we associate with them are not simply “add-ons”, nor do they merely “belong” to the words, they both carry the words and enhance their expressive power. They help us both to assimilate and to communicate something contained in the words, yet at a far deeper level than the words alone can do. How much more important, then, are the words of the Liturgy! In the texts of the Mass, in the psalms of the Mass and the Divine Office, we are employing words which place us in contact with divine realities that transcend the limits of human language.
Singing the words of the liturgy enhances their power to thrill us, to move us, to mould us into a living unity in the Body of Christ. The sacred texts of the Mass are an expression of a reality that is far deeper than we can know, but we can touch it, we can express it, we can enhance our receptivity to it by the power of the music that belongs intrinsically to it.
It is a wonderful providence that the setting up of this new Institute of Liturgical Music should take place at the same time as the introduction of the new English translation of the Roman Missal. Many comments have been made concerning the character of the translation, and it is still unfamiliar to most of us. But what we need to note here are two central facts which are being presented to us by this new translation.
First, there is a new kind of expressiveness about the texts. They are richer in vocabulary, and more elaborate in sentence structure than were the old ICEL texts, as I shall call them. This obviously poses an initial challenge since these characteristics are in marked and deliberate contrast to those of the old ICEL texts. Yet I am confident that we will find that these qualities lend the new texts a greater power to convey a sense of the awesome difference between what we hear and say at Mass, and what we hear and say in everyday life and conversations. They come across as more lapidary, almost like inscriptions incised on stone, rather than as words simply used on the spur of the moment. This means that the liturgy will no longer sound, as it often has done, colloquial, even chatty. It is raised to what is technically called a higher “register”, a level of discourse that reflects and draws us into a higher state of communication. The liturgy, after all, transcends the limits of time and space and unites us with the angels and saints around God’s throne. The language that we use in it must therefore reflect that awesome context in which we place ourselves in the celebration of the Liturgy.
The second fact central to understanding the intended effect of the new translation on our worship, is the direct encouragement given to us to sing these texts. As Mgr. Wadsworth, the Executive Director of ICEL has pointed out, the new Missal is the most musically well-endowed in history. The texts of the Mass: greetings, prayers, acclamations, readings, meditations on the sacred word, all these are intended to be sung. This intention is made clear in the fact that all these musical settings are placed, not in an appendix at the back of the book, as frequently heretofore, but in the body of the book, exactly where it is used day by day.
This may well frighten some people. Music, they may say, is for the experts, for the choir or the music group, but not for the priest, deacon, lector, or even the entire congregation. Some may object that it is simply too difficult or too unfamiliar, but if you look closely at the Missal without prejudice, it is possible to see that the music written there is not designed to be sung by experts, but by anybody. It is designed to be an ordinary and familiar expression of the faith of the Church in action. It may seem unfamiliar at first, because we have long since grown to be unfamiliar with the idea of singing the Mass, as opposed to singing during the Mass. What the Church invites us to do in receiving the new translation is to learn to recognise it as something “beyond the prosaic” . Music, even very simple chants, help to achieve that end.
Which brings us to consider the chants themselves. This morning we are going to experience the new translation of the Mass in its musical form. We are, of course, familiar with what I may call the “flow” of the Mass, its regular exchanges between ministers and people, its alternating texts which are listened to with texts that constitute a reply, its statements of faith or expressions of sorrow, worship, adoration, praise and thanksgiving. Now we are being invited to take that familiar “flow” and make it deeper, more profound and, perhaps, more poetical. Familiarity with what may come across as banal and prosaic can only fail to feed the hungry soul. Familiarity with what is beautiful and rich in expression can stand the test of repetition and continue to disclose ever new depths of meaning. The chants of the Missal, which we are about to hear in their proper context and flow from beginning to end, may seem at first rather remote. Some of them are couched in a musical style that will be unfamiliar. They are not rhythmic. There is no sense that the texts are being forced to take on the shape of an independently existing melody. The melody flows out from the words themselves and takes on the patterns of speech. Most of us are not used to this kind of singing. Yet it is the bedrock of all liturgical singing over the ages. We call it plainchant to describe its relatively unassuming character. Yet it undoubtedly has the power to enhance the word.
So much for the words of the Mass which remain relatively unchanged from day to day. Yet there are others words which also belong to the Mass, and with which we may be less familiar. These other words, or texts, do change from day to day, to express the character of the particular feast or season. They are familiar as, for example, the short sentences which are usually read out at the beginning of Mass and at Communion time: the Entrance and Communion Antiphons. These texts are just as much a proper part of the Mass as the unchanging ones. Yet they are often omitted at a Mass which is sung, because they are not considered important. Instead, they are usually replaced by hymns or songs. It is a great loss to the effectiveness of the liturgy on us as participants that these texts are lost so often because they have usually been associated with the day or the season for as long as that feast or season has been celebrated. The chants for these texts belong to the liturgical book known as the Graduale. It is in itself a treasury of wonderful ancient chants, Gregorian Chants as they are usually known, generally sung by a choir rather than by a congregation. This morning we will use settings of these words to Gregorian chants which are simple enough for the congregation to repeat after the choir who will lead us. I hope you will see what a positive difference they make to setting the scene for the Mass which opens with one of them.
I will begin to try and draw a few threads together before concluding. In what direction does all that I have been saying point us? The work that the Blessed John Henry Institute is designed to undertake is the enhancement of Parish Liturgy. The sung liturgy is not intended to be the province of the professional choir alone, much though the Council Fathers emphasised that professional choirs should be carefully fostered wherever possible. But such things are not possible everywhere. Yet good liturgical music which aims to achieve all these ends which we have considered is both desirable and possible in any parish. Great musical skill and expertise is not necessarily required. What is needed is the desire to raise the mind and heart to God by celebrating the Liturgy itself in the most dignified and elevated way possible with the resources available. The words of psalm 46 serve as a guide: “Sing wisely”, or “with understanding.” In his book “A New Song for the Lord”, Pope Benedict interprets these words as “Sing artistically for God”. Such artistry, according to the Pope, is not meant to be understood as mere skill, but as what is done with the aim of bringing those who share in it closer to God. Pope Benedict’s understanding of the power of beauty in Christian art and music is rooted in the disclosure of God’s beauty through our humble and conscious attempt to co-operate with the Creator in our own acts of making and doing.
The Institute will therefore offer assistance to priests, ministers, lectors, cantors, choirs and members of the congregation, guidance on the best way to approach liturgical music. It will aim to do so, therefore, not only by giving practical training and advice, but also, I may even say especially, by giving a thorough catechesis on the theological nature of liturgical music. Music has the power to enhance the liturgy when those who are responsible for it have a deeper understanding of its proper place in the whole. Music must be the servant of the liturgy and of the whole Church gathered together in God’s presence. We hope to help bring about a deeper understanding of what good liturgical music is, and how to perform it. We hope to offer guidance to all those who are interested in knowing more about the history and forms of liturgical music in the Catholic Roman liturgy.
The Institute cannot function in isolation from the wider Church. There are many initiatives throughout the Church both here in the British Isles, and further afield especially in North America, whose aims are similar to our own, and whose work may well come to be closely allied to ours. There are two specific influences on me to which I wish to draw your attention. First, it would not be right for me to omit to mention my great debt to Dr Mary Berry, foundress of the Schola Gregoriana of Cambridge, of which I was privileged to be a founder member in my undergraduate days, and of which I am now a chaplain. She strove tirelessly, though often thanklessly, for a revival and understanding of Gregorian Chant within the Church’s liturgy. There are many projects now taking shape which owe a great deal to her vision, energy and her prayerful love of the Church. I also want to mention with appreciation the patient work of the Association for Latin Liturgy (ALL) with which I have had the pleasure of being closely associated for over thirty years. That Association has not only remained consistently faithful to the Church’s call for the use of the Latin language in all approved forms of the Roman Liturgy , but has applied energies out of proportion to its relatively small resources to provide practical help for the implementation of that vision in parishes since its foundation. I am glad that the ALL fully supports the aims of this Institute and look forward to continuing to work with it in fostering the use of Latin in the Liturgy.
Your Grace, You do us a great honour by your presence here today. It is a providential sign to us that this new work of the Birmingham Oratory, under the protection of Blessed John Henry Newman, is fully undertaken within the unity of the local Church. That unity is expressed both by your presence here today, by your celebrating the Sacred Liturgy for us, according to the new translation of the Roman Missal and using the chant settings which have been provided for use within the liturgy. On behalf of the Fathers of the Oratory, I also thank Your Grace for kindly agreeing to be one of the Patrons of this Institute, and allowing us to work in close co-operation with the Maryvale Institute of Higher Religious Studies.
I also wish to place on record my thanks to those who have played a special part in making this Institute and its launch a possibility. First, to Fr Richard Duffield, our Provost, whose idea it was some time ago to set up an Institute for Liturgical Music here at the Oratory. I also wish to thank Mr James MacMillan, the noted Catholic Composer, who not only kindly consented to be co-patron with His Grace the Archbishop, but who has also been of great assistance in making introductions and creating links between various Catholic church musicians and proposing various plans for future development of our work. It is unfortunate that he has to be absent today, but I am happy to record that he is directing the music at the priestly ordination in Oxford of a friend of our Institute, Laurence Lew O.P., which is taking place today. Then I offer thanks and acknowledgement to those who have been most generous in their practical assistance, especially to Carol Parkinson and Graeme McNichol who have provided invaluable Administrative assistance, ably and generously helped by Philippe Lefebvre who designed the literature and the website, and to Angela Dunn, who has contributed as always most unselfishly by producing the booklets which we will be using at Mass and Vespers today. There are others, too, who deserve thanks, but I hope they will forgive me if I make my thanks to them now in a general way.
All that remains is for me to say that I hope you will enjoy the rest of this day and I will now ask His Grace to give us a blessing to inaugurate our new work.