Emphasis on Chant vs Latin

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mymamamary

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**Dear brothers and sisters!

May the SACRED HEART of Jesus bless You all!

I am writing a paper for rhetoric class. All polemics aside, I wanted to know which position would be better to argue from:
  1. The use of using gregorian Chant sung in Latin at Mass to increase the investment of the worshipping faithful in the Mass and thus through the Mass in daily life of Faith.
  2. The use of Latin in Mass to increase the investment of the worshipping faithful in the Mass and thus through the Mass in daily life of Faith.
I have to write a 1,000-1,300 word essay on this and I whittled my options down to two. I know that Latin is the more “focused” of the two, yet I find that there are very few things that move the soul as much as Gregorian chant has the potential to (an emotional value that latin does not have).

I am open to suggestions **
 
#1 already includes #2 (Latin) so argue for #1! Also, the current General Instruction of the Roman Missal calls for Gregorian Chant to have the “main place” in music at Mass. Latin Mass parts do not get the same strong endorsement, so go with chant!
 
I agree.

Do you get extra credit if you write the essay in Latin?
 
And chant can be in latin. Will lead people to an interest in latin as well as chant etc.
 
Agree with the above. Also, some parishes already sing well-known hymns in Latin (Adeste Fideles, Tantum Ergo, etc.) so singing chant in Latin could make Latin a little more accessible for many.
 
I can’t remember where I heard this, but a priest wrote not long ago something to the effect of, “the language of worship may not necessarily be Latin, but it has always been chant.”
 
The two really are inseparable. First of all the traditional Gregorian melodies were written for Latin and the accentuation of the Latin word.

Secondly, the purpose of chant is to enhance and emphasize the Word of God. The melody is secondary to the words, which in chant come mainly from scripture and psalm verses (the main exception would be the hymns of the Divine Office, which are not from scripture, and some of the Ordinary of the Mass).

The chant is made to emphasize the message that the verse is trying to transmit, whether it be joy, adoration, sorrow, mysticism, etc.

Therefore you can’t really say there’s an emphasis on chant, because for chant the emphasis really is the Word and since most chant was written for the Latin language, then by necessity it’s the Word that really is the emphasis.

So here I would like to interject what your paper should focus on (IMHO; as I say to my kids my opinion is free, and you get what you pay for 😛 )

You could discuss this very topic, how chant is made to emphasize the Word. Note my emphasis on the Word, and not on the Latin language. The issue is that the melody was written to emphasize the Word in the Latin language, and chant using the Gregorian melodies applied to other languages simply doesn’t work as well due to the different structure and accentuation of that language. IMHO, chant divorced from Latin loses much of its meaning. In French, in particular, psalm tones had to be greatly modified to work and some have tried instead, peculiar translations to get the same effect.

So, by extension: if chant is to be preserved as part of the beautiful musical patrimony of the Church, by extension Latin has to be preserved as part of that patrimony, because chant was written to emphasize the Word, and when chant was written, the Word was expressed in Latin. Chant necessarily means Latin, but Latin does not necessarily require chant.
 
Good post. All one has to do is to listen to an extended Introit or Gradual chant to appreciate the Latin vowel and consonant sounds in different pitches. Truly a magnificent way to worship God. The Vatican II documents were spot on with this.
 
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