Maybe if you live somewhere that doesn’t offer a lot of Masses, this could be a problem. I hope you can find a Mass that expresses the reverence you’re seeking.
In my home parish, there are 3 regular old NO Masses on Sunday and one on Saturday evening, the kind that use the music of the last 40 years. At noon, there’s a man playing a guitar, the same guy that was playing in 1965 when we moved to this parish. Once a month, some teen-agers play guitars at that Mass instead. They play different music, more contemporary. I don’t care for that music because it doesn’t sound like it’s quite gelled to me. It’s more like a bunch of notes strung together. I avoid those Masses and if I end up at one of them, that’s what I get for being too lazy to get up earlier. At 3pm every Sunday, we have an old fashioned all in Latin facing the altar kneel down for Communion type Mass.
The parish where I sing has the Saturday evening Mass and 2 Sunday morning Masses with the music of the last 40 years. Once a month, the teens play either on Saturday or the 11am Mass on Sunday, but they play the same music. I sing with the choir at the 9am, and occassionally cantor the 11am without the choir. Except for the hugging that so many people do at the Our Father, I love the 9am Mass, and it’s otherwise quite reverent.
There are so many Masses of every possbile style and language in St. Louis, you should be able to find something that has the right reverence for you.
I’m not sure what people mean about the Mass getting a Protestant tone. I’ve been to two Baptist services which are nothing like a Mass in any way, and to several services at the UCC church where my sister’s family worships. They were very nice pleasant services, and the music was very well done and I like the songs. Last summer I was visiting some friends, went to Mass at 7am and then met them at their Christian church for the 8am service there. They sang songs I’ve been singing since 1954 when my mother started teaching me the songs she sang at Mass, very pleasant too. What I see at Mass is nothing like anything I’ve ever seen at another church, so I kind of don’t get it.
Boldface mine. You are so correct. Protestant worship services are NOTHING like a Mass. I grew up evangelical Protestant, and have been involved with other Protestant churches, and it’s NOTHING like a Catholic Mass, even the most “contemporary” Catholic Mass.
I don’t see how anyone can find any similiarities, other than the fact that we are both proclaiming Jesus Christ the Son of God, Savior. That’s about it. (And that’s why Mormons should not be included in the list when you mention Protestants, for they do not proclaim this.)
Contemporary music in the Catholic Church? That’s such a laugh!! At the Life Teen Mass in our parish, most of the music is at least 20 years old. I used to do some of those songs with the children in my children’s church services in the Christian and Missionary Alliance church!
And the so-called “folk” music is much older, at least 40 years old, and some of it is almost a hundred years old. Check the dates of some of those hymns that you all hate so much.
Most evangelical Protestant churches do NOT do this kind of music anymore, and actually never did.
Sometimes our youth group meetings would feature the type of songs that some of you are calling “folk.” But not the worship services.
Evangelical Protestant churches do a lot of the Praise and Worship songs nowadays, which is so simplistic compared with the beautiful Catholic hymns and their metaphorical language that the St. Louis Jesuits have written. Don’t even think of comparing them. A lot of P&W music consists of one phrase repeated over and over again, often several dozen times. And usually the P&W music is accompanied by what we used to call a “geezer rock” band–a lot of people in their 40s and 50s who play acoustic and electric guitars, drums, keyboards, and sometimes horns or woodwinds.
Sometimes the wealthier Protestant churches will have an orchestral accompaniment (with string and brass instruments) and do more traditional hymns and traditional praise music (Sandi Patti, Keith Green, Evie Tournquist, some of the vintage Amy Grant and Michael W. Smith, etc.)
And also, many Protestant churches will feature a REAL rock band (not a group of volunteer geezers!), who play pretty good rock music. So far, I’ve never seen this at Life Teen–all the Life Teen musicians are teenagers who usually aren’t very professional-sounding.
But folk music–I don’t know where y’all visit Protestant churches (HAVE any of you visited Protestant churches lately?), but folk music–
. Haven’t heard it for decades. And I don’t remember much of it back when I was growing up Protestant in the 60s and 70s.
I wish that some of you who keep comparing Mass to Protestant worship services would spend some time actually visiting Protestant churches. You would quickly see how incorrect you are.
A lot of Catholics throw around the term “Protestant” to describe abuses in their Masses and music that is not chant or classical. I WISH THEY WOULD STOP DOING THIS! They have no idea how ignorant that sounds to Protestants. Protestants would laugh at some of the comparisons on this Board. This is the kind of thing that hurts the Catholic Church, because Protestants would say, “Well, Catholics have no idea what they’re talking about when it comes to church music and Protestants. How can I be confident that they have any idea what they’re talking about when it comes to Bible, theology, history, etc? They’re all full of it. Obviously they don’t know what they’re talking about and I’m not going to listen to ignorant people…”
I always smile and greet my neighbor and sometimes I whisper to them. 
