Probably very true.
Why do you suppose there has been such widespread disobedience to the Holy Father and the teachings of the Church?
I would suggest reading the rest of this thread, especially the early posts.
It’s not “disobedience,” it’s ignorance of the techniques and literature.
I’m a pianist, a good one. I don’t teach singing and I don’t sing that well myself, although I sing correctly. I have a pretty good knowledge of piano literature, but little to no knowledge of sacred choral literature, and absolutely no knowledge of Gregorian chant literature. When various chants/pieces are mentioned in this thread, I have no idea what anyone is talking about.
Yes, of course I can google it. But looking up pieces of chant and knowing what to do with them once I find them is not realistic. Besides, I am just a pianist. I am not in the position of authority to take over the parish music program and totally re-do it. There is another person in that position, and he is actually not very knowledgeable about liturgy or music. He’s just an organist and that’s it. We’re actually lucky to have him–we went for almost a year with only a few pianists (including me) subbing at Masses and many Masses had no music and the people hated it!
In an earlier post, I described my parish of over 7000 fairly well-off people, and not ONE musician who knows how to do chant, especially Gregorian chant. The few musicians who might have had the training/knowledge to do chant and train others to do it departed after our fantastic organist came out as openly gay and looking to adopt a child along with his partner. He was fired, and in a show of solidarity, most of the “good” musicians in the parish left and made a public show of it. It was a huge scandal in our city, and many musicians openly express their disgust with our parish and diocese. The church is on the American Guild of Organists blacklist, and no organist in the guild will play at our parish, and most musicians who have any skill will NOT sing or teach at our church for a Mass. For a paid concert, yes. But even then, we have a hard time recruiting “good” musicians. I’m probably their best, and that’s pretty sad!
Frankly, I’m glad that the church cleaned house and fired the organist. It was a huge scandal in our city, and one that I believe was orchestrated by certain gay advocacy groups. I believe our diocese and our parish did the right thing, the moral thing, to fire the organist. But we sacrificed “good” music and probably will struggle for a long time just to get people who are able to play and sing the very simple songs in the OCP hymnal. It is unrealistic to expect that our parish will begin to include Latin chant in our Masses anytime soon. Perhaps in a few decades, when all the people involved with the gay scandal are dead. Or if we get a parochial vicar who is talented musically and has a good working knowledge of chant and most importantly, is able to TEACH people chant, not just sing it at them during random Masses.
I am really wondering how many other Catholic parishes also have trouble getting really good musicians because of the homosexual issues. MANY “good,” well-trained and educated musicians are either gay or very sympathetic to gay issues, and many are in complete and vocal disagreement with the Catholic Church’s stand against gay marriage. Just this weekend, my daughter’s graduation at St. Louis University was marred by a protest; the speaker has been known to speak out against gay marriage, and the “rainbow” group showed up at the graduation.
This issue could be causing the majority of “good” musicians to stay away from the Catholic Church, and THIS could be the major reason why you are not seeing a great deal of Gregorian chant. If there are no classically-trained musicians who are knowledgeable about Gregorian chant, you won’t be hearing any Gregorian chant in your parish, and it does you no good to complain about it. Tell the musicians in your community.
Always keep in mind that if the majority age of a congregation is 50 or younger, and if there is a large contingent of converts, these people did NOT grow up with chant or any kind of traditional music, and have no knowledge of how to perform chant or teach others.
If the Catholic Church wants parishes in the U.S. to institute Gregorian chant regularly in the Masses, she must create some kind of systematic plan to introduce Gregorian chant to the congregations and teach them how to do it correctly. Considering the very poor compliance with the rule to not use the Name “Yahweh” during Mass
mainly due to wretchedly-poor communication of this dictum to the local parish music/liturgy directors, I would say that it’s not likely that the Catholic Church will have any organized and logical and well-communicated plan to institute Gregorian chant anytime soon, and therefore most parishes in the U.S. will continue to use hymns, mainly hymns from the readily-available and easy-to-play and sing OCP publications. **If you don’t like that, then stop complaining about it and criticizing all of us who really do love English hymns and take some action to CHANGE IT! The best way to do this, IMO, is to raise up your children to love and learn classical and traditional sacred music, then send them to a college that will train them in educating others, and then encourage them to take on prominent roles in local parishes in the liturgy. **
It’s easy to criticize others like me and accuse us of disobedience to the Church. It’s a lot harder to work actively to correct matters. At least benedictgal is actively working to effect changes in not only her local parish, but across the U.S. I respect this. I have a harder time respecting those who simply pine for the “good old days.” Well, get hopping. Do something to bring them back.
, I have them on my Zune and listen to them regularly when I drive 
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