Back to the future?
Over the last year plus, our parish has been holding events in celebration of the 150th anniversary of its founding. As part of those activities, we have published a series of tabloid inserts in our local newspaper describing various aspects of our history and catholic traditions in general. I have authored all of the articles on worship and specifically music. This is the last of those contributions that will be published in our paper in August before our September 8th anniversary date. Just thought I’d share this with….
For the final musical installment of our anniversary tabloid series I’ve been asked to “portend” the future of Roman Catholic sacred music practice. Even though I just returned from a local meeting of diocesan musicians I won’t confine my prognostications to the future locally in Visalia or the valley parishes, but in a more universal, “catholic,” sense. I’ll do this off the cuff with only God as my co-pilot!
I remember Pastor Harry Wood (a much revered, now retired Methodist pastor) publicly remarking the most vexing and contentious issue facing his church was….. The Music Wars! How true, pretty much for many Christian communities, that remains. But I do see, after forty plus years, that reliance upon musical elements whose origins are “of the world” and continuing to integrate and add more popular forms into the worship paradigm will diminish, not improve the prayerful intent and relationship of the Faithful to God. If we insist, for emotional need or a rationale that as we are in His image, so must our worship music reflect “us,” then we will lose all interest in aspects of worship that point to the “otherness” of God, and that is integral to why we worship God in the first place: we must strike a balance between Christ at the door (Mt.25) and the “I AM” Moses encountered on Mt. Sinai in the manner in which we praise and worship the Lord.
First of all I already see the most compelling instrument changing the “economy” of musical worship is the internet. Though the sinister web is a playground for evil and malice, it also serves as a virtual infinity of historical, philosophical and practical resources by which church musicians ought to consult, communicate and continue their own understanding of their stewardship of their worship traditions as they lead their communities in sung prayer. Inasmuch as most parish musicians cannot take a busman’s holiday on Sunday’s (or Saturday’s), they certainly can have many other sacred music worlds opened to them by one mouse click.
Next, for my Church, I see that the “ship of state” of liturgical music, Gregorian and vernacular (English, Spanish, Portuguese, etc.) Chant will be saluted and finally re-admitted to its titular role as the primary musical “tongue” in which we sing. But that doesn’t necessitate an abandonment of many valid other forms of music: the strophic hymn, or the liturgical song, or even the praise and worship chorus. But those forms must sail alongside and, hopefully, more in the manner and style of the mother-ship. Because the music must serve to transcend and dispose our souls towards a music known only to angels and saints, not merely musical theater arias and pop-star megahits.
And lastly, the forthcoming of a new English Missal this Advent (a missal contains all the ritual language of the Church’s daily and Sunday calendar Masses over a three year cycle this written for non-Catholics) provides us the greatest mandate: to be faithful to the texts handed to us by the Author of Life, the Lord God, and the psalms of His chosen people’s King David, and the gospel of His only begotten Son. Music that unflinchingly serves the Living Word, and avoids ego based intention or emotional outcome in worship, will thrive on the vine. Music that is only randomly associated with the source of the vine, will become entangled in thorns and wither away.
Yes, you can sing
Paul Simon did an amazing thing at a recent concert. He invited a fan up to play his guitar and sing. The video is really inspiring as is the liberality of Simon who sees that the music isn’t really about the performer. It is about the spirit that everyone shares. I think there are lessons in this for those of us who love Gregorian chant and want to see it spread through the whole Church in every single parish. The music isn’t really about the schola but about the spirit that we all share, and we share it not only in that physical space but throughout time and into eternity. The people can sing if they come to see that the ordinary and dialogues of the Mass truly are their sung prayer. They are reluctant at first but once the spirit catches on, they feel a sense of having done something important and meaningful.
Requiem High Mass, 1962 Missal, Mobile, Alabama
Musica Sacra Choir and Chamber Orchestra of Mobile, Alabama, announces a High Requiem Mass (Missa Cantata) and Absolution at the Catafalque for deceased singers and benefactors, Friday evening, July 29, at half past seven o’clock at the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception, Mobile, Alabama.
Mass will be sung by the Very Reverend Stephen Martin, V.G., Cathedral Rector Musical Setting: Maurice Durufle. Christopher Uhl is the Music Director and Conductor (of Musica Sacra; he is a former Music Director of the Cathedral; in addition to his work with Musica Sacra, he is Director of Music of the Hoosac School, Hoosick, New York), and Jeff Clearman, organist (Organist-Choirmaster, All Saints Church, Mobile)
The public is invited and there will be a book at the door to enter the names of a departed loved by anyone who attends.
Festshrift in Honor of Msgr. Richard J. Schuler
There are some wonderful essays in this newly uploaded book: Cum Angelis Canere, edited by Fr. Robert Skeris (1990), not the least of which are the brilliant pieces by Richard J. Schuler who is the subject of this festschrift. Others pieces by Hayburn, Fowells, Mahrt, and others.
Msgr. Wadsworth news
Now, that’s a title guaranteed to draw interest, right? Msgr. Andrew Wadsworth has emerged as one of the most brilliant commentators and scholars in this age of liturgical transition. He has a way of crafting publishable articles just during his casual banter. He manages to combine a scholarly with a pastoral temperament – with content that is at once thoroughly orthodox and unconventional. In addition, in his personality, he reminds one of want a 19th-century diplomat might have been like, a person who is able to say what’s true, what’s principled, what’s wise, all while keeping the peace . I tell you, it takes a person like this to deal with the current environment.
So, with that said, see these three posts at PrayTell: his review of Fr. Cekada’s book on V2, part one of Msgr.’s New York talk, and also part two.
Martin Mosebach on Hymns and the Mass
Benedictus Dominus offers a wonderful post with words from Martin Mosebach, author of The Heresy of Formlessness. I hadn’t read this before. It is really outstanding.
“I am firmly convinced… that vernacular hymns have played perhaps a significant part in the collapse of the liturgy. Just consider what resulted in the flowering of hymns: Luther’s Reformation was a singing movement,and the hymn expressed the beliefs of the Reformers. Vernacular hymns replaced the liturgy, as they were designed to do; they were filled with the combative spirit of those dismal times and were meant to fortify the partisans. People singing a catchy melody together at the top of their voices created a sense of community, as all soldiers, clubs, and politicians know. The Catholic Counter-Reformation felt the demagogic power of these hymns. People so enjoyed singing; it was so easy to influence their emotions using pleasing tunes with verse repetition. In the liturgy of the Mass, however, there was no place for hymns. The liturgy has no gaps; it is one single great canticle; where it prescribes silence or the whisper, that is, where the mystery is covered with an acoustic veil,as it were, any hymn would be out of the question. The hymn has a beginning and an end; it is embedded in speech. But the leiturgos of Holy Mass does not actually speak at all; his speaking is a singing, because he has put on the “new man”, because, in the sacred space of the liturgy, he is a companion of angels. In the liturgy, singing is an elevation and transfiguration of speech, and, as such, it is a sign of the transfiguration of the body that awaits those who are risen. The hymn’s numerical aesthetics– hymn 1, hymn 2, hymn 3– is totally alien and irreconcilable in the world if the liturgy. In services that are governed by vernacular hymns, the believer is constantly being transported into new aesthetic worlds. He changes from one style to another and has to deal with highly subjective poetry of the most varied levels. He is moved and stirred– but not by the thing itself, liturgy: he is moved and stirred by the expressed sentiments of the commentary upon it. By contrast, the bond that Gregorian chant weaves between the liturgical action and song is so close that it is impossible to separate form and content. The processional chants that accompany liturgical processions (the Introit, Gradual, Offertory, and Communion), the responsories of the Ordinary of the Mass that interweave the prayers of the priest and The laity, and the reciting tone of the readings and orations– all these create a ladder of liturgical expression on which the movements, actions, and the content of the prayers are brought into a perfect harmony. This language is unique to the Catholic liturgy and expresses it’s inner nature, for this liturgy is not primarily worship, meditation, contemplation, instruction, but positive action. It’s formulae effect a deed. The liturgy’s complete, closed form has the purpose of making present the personal and bodily action of Jesus Christ. The prayers it contains are a preparation for sacrifice, not explanations for the benefit of the congregation; nor are they a kind of “warming up” of the latter. In Protestantism, vernacular hymns came in as a result of the abolition of the Sacrifice of the Mass; they were ideally suited to be a continuation of the sermon. Through singing, the assembled community found its way back from the doubting loneliness of the workday to the collective security of Sunday– a security, be it noted, that arose from the mutual exhortation to remain firm in faith, not from witnessing the objective, divine act of sacrifice.”