Dear Father,
I have been a Catholic for my 61 years of life. I remember the more jazzy songs from my youth that seem to be used less and less these days for church services. The youth music groups are getting older and I don’t see many young people playing these days. Now we’re being told by the bishop that we have to use a certain kind of church music. He really pushes the Source and Summit books. Honestly, it seems to be very traditional stuff. Why can’t we have a mix of everything? If he wants more young people in church, he should appeal to their tastes.
– Xavier
Dear Xavier,
Music at Mass is one of the biggest hot-button issues in the Catholic Church in our country. Some say it is generationally driven (young vs. old). Others claim that there is a push to return to the long-past glory days, when the Mass was all prayed in Latin. Still others think that Vatican II eliminated traditional music.
The Mass is the Church’s principal way to worship God. The Mass derives from Christ’s own mandate to make present His one sacrifice of Himself continually. This occurs during the second part of the Mass, known as the Liturgy of the Eucharist. The Liturgy of the Word, which comprises the first part of the Mass, is based on the Jewish practice of proclaiming Scripture readings, commenting on them and offering prayers.
Just as the form of the Mass drew on Jewish forms of prayer, so too did the music used for divine worship. The human voice had precedence in expressing praise of God and various forms of prayer, such as intercession and thanksgiving. King David may have used a lyre when singing his psalms, but it was the singing voice, not the lyre, that worshiped God.
No sound from a musical instrument compares with the beauty of the human voice. Mothers and fathers treasure the sound of their infants’ and children’s voices. Spouses want to hear their beloved’s voice. Friends who have not heard from each other for a while often say, “It’s so good to hear your voice.” Probably the most ubiquitous device on our planet is the telephone, invented precisely to carry the human voice.
From antiquity, human singing has fascinated listeners. Throughout the ages, various instruments have been created to mimic the sound of the human voice (such as the pipe organ), but nothing compares to the real thing. Even today, the best auditions of singers happen when they sing a cappella, devoid of accompaniment.
Our spiritual ancestors, the Jews, chanted their prayers, believing that melody made them even more pleasing to God and expressed the meaning of the words pouring from the heart more deeply. The first Christians, like our Lord and His apostles, continued to chant prayers and psalms, with the same music they inherited from of old.
The essential difference between Jewish chant and Christian chant was that the latter focused on worshipping Christ. The chanted psalms, prayers and songs all converged on Him. Christian chant, inspired by Jewish chant, has endured through the centuries as the primary means of singing to God.
Like David’s lyre, musical instruments assisted Christian chant. Eventually, the pipe organ took pride of place as “the traditional musical instrument which adds a wonderful splendor to the Church’s ceremonies and powerfully lifts up man’s mind to God and to higher things” (Vatican II, Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy, no. 120).
That said, I underscore Pope Pius X’s teaching that “the music proper to the Church is purely vocal music.” The organ is “permitted,” he says, and “within due limits and with proper safeguards, other instruments may be allowed” (Tra le sollecitudini, no. 15). Musical instruments are meant to aid our singing, not replace it.
As a young friend told me, “singing is democratic.” “Everyone,” he said, “has a voice. Not everyone has a pipe organ or a guitar.” He makes an excellent point. God created us with a voice to communicate with one another, but primarily with Him. The Church may be hierarchical, but the hierarchy serves the laity to lift them and their prayers to God. In the Catholic Church, hierarchy and democracy coexist.
Singing our prayers to God sends them in a better way, as my friend says. Imagine a mere recitation of “Happy Birthday.” Worse yet is the recitation of Christmas or Easter hymns. “Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia! The strife is o’er, the battle done; the victory of life is won; the song of triumph has begun. Alleluia!” sounds more like a dirge when recited rather than sung.
This is true of so much of the Mass. Reciting the Gloria, or the Holy, Holy, Holy, or the Lamb of God can convey a sense of merely going through the motions of attending Mass. Indeed, there are times it is appropriate to recite the prayers of the Mass when, for various reasons, the use of sacred music is not possible. The point here is to emphasize the beauty of chant.
Singing our prayers makes them more pleasing to God, taking the focus off ourselves. Prayer, especially sung prayer, lifts us to God. Our prayers and our singing should point to God, not to ourselves.
Finally, Xavier, appealing to people’s tastes is the way that the world works. That’s the basis of commercialism. When the Church tries to be more like the world, it loses its identity as the guide and means to the Kingdom of God. Every experiment the Church has attempted at being more appealing to the populace has ended in disaster and disintegration.
Young adults actually want something different. The church music of 60 years ago doesn’t appeal to them. Nor does jazziness. Young adults understand clearly that the Church must live in the contemporary world without being part of it. See John 17:15-16 and Romans 12:2.
I submit that what the Bishop is pushing is holiness, the attainment of which results from proper worship due to God. The Judeo-Catholic tradition of chant has been used in every age by sinners to become saints. And saint-making is what we do with God in our prayer, and what God does with us through His sacraments.
Questions about the sacraments should be sent to sacraments101@columbuscatholic.org.
Related to: Why Latin? – Catholic Times: Read Catholic News & Stories