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PatrickC
Guest
You know what is meant. Now bear me up on eagle’s wings or some gay thing.Heaven forbid it was feel good music.
Must have feel bad music at Mass.
Jim
Fighting over liturgy distorts purpose of Mass, papal liturgist says
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Jon_Mallory
Guest
That was unkind and uncharitable. You do realize these sorts of posts reflect back poorly on the Orthodox Church.
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Tantum_ergo
Guest
Patrick: Please. That kind of remark is hurtful. Not just to you, though it shows a kind of bitterness against your Christian brothers and sisters in that you can’t just say you don’t care for a song, you have to throw in a slur and a sneer. . …
It’s hurtful to the people who like the song. Say what you will, it is scriptural, based on Psalm 91 I believe.
It’s hurtful to those who are not found of the song, usually based on its difficulty for the average person to sing with comfort more than anything else, because now, unconsciously, any person who mentions that he or she is not fond of the song is going to be ‘tarred with your brush’ and it will be thought that, deep down, they ALSO feel it is ‘some gay thing’ even when they emphatically do NOT.
So what you’ve done (along with perpetuating the awful theft of the perfectly good word ‘gay’ and making it into a slur), is make it even MORE difficult for people to have a respectful discussion and even disagreement about particular musical pieces or styles. Thanks a whole bunch. Really. You rant over something that you never even deal with, and leave a lot of people around to pick up the pieces. How does that help anybody?
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OraLabora
Guest
Correct it is based on Psalm 91, which is also a traditional psalm for Compline. It’s a beautiful psalm on confidence in the Lord. As any student of sacred music should know, the use of psalm verses for the chanted propers of the Mass is nothing new. Most of the propers are from psalms and other scripture verses.
In that sense, it is traditional!
Only the refrain is not directly from the psalm. It’s not my favourite musical genre, but that is a matter of personal taste. There is certainly no theological objection to its use at Mass since it follows the great tradition of basing sacred music on the psalms.
In that sense, it is traditional!
J
JimR-OCDS
Guest
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Jon_Mallory
Guest
Criticizing or praising the liturgy is stupid when it is done from the perspective of mere aestheticism. It’s like a child arguing that chocolate is healthy because it tastes good. You can’t make objective statements from personal biases. Asparagus isn’t unhealthy just because it doesn’t taste good. So you think the liturgy is awesome or boring? Who cares. I don’t have mental access to your personal preferences. The sense of awe you get from the liturgy is not the same reaction I have to the liturgy. In my opinion, the body can never be one if our heads aren’t in the same place We can’t really say anything about the liturgy at all from the point of view of aestheticism.
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LiamQ
Guest
Jon, I do agree: but to be completely fair, some of the more robust traditionalist thinkers don’t really frame this in terms of preference, but in how objectively efficacious certain things are over others.
In fact, I think that whether or not certain things are truly mere preference is really what the battle is all about.
Here’s a good article one could read about this, noting that I do not endorse the contents per se, but merely that they are a non-hysterical presentation of the “other side:” u.arizona.edu/~aversa/modernism/Merit%20of%20the%20Mass%20(Fr.%20Ripperger,%20F.S.S.P.).pdf
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Jon_Mallory
Guest
I scanned the article and I’ll read it more in depth later. I did not find any argument for why the EF is more efficacious. Regarding the decora of the church, he claimed that a parish with beautiful ornamentation makes the mass have more merit than a parish that has ugly ornamentation. What constitutes ugly? Also, this notion of merit is foreign to Orthodoxy. Regardless, it is sad the FSSP can’t grow substantially because past Pope’s have made it clear that it should be celebrated in only a few places. The EF also has to be celebrated in Latin, which is an antiquated rule.
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zz912
Guest
Seems a rather dismissive and rude tone. I guess the opinions of laity are verboten.
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Jon_Mallory
Guest
Agreed. Liturgy is after all “the work of the people”, not just clerics. The liturgy cannot be a purely top down.
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Tantum_ergo
Guest
I don’t think that’s what Don Ruggerio was implying. Rather, it’s that liturgy or worship is not something that we all get together and vote on: “Do we in AD2016 in Massachusetts, or Nevada, New Orleans or Savannah, want to do THIS in Mass? What do we think needs more emphasis? More teaching on? What needs to be reworked to appeal to THIS group (whether it is liturgists, the older members, the younger members, the wealthier members, the women, the men, the children, the poor, etc.)?”
Rather, the liturgy as we know it in the US (and for which we have things like the GIRM) is something that has existed from the time of the apostles and is thus in a sense timeless, ordered in a way that God Himself, through both the actions of Jesus and the words of Jesus, found most acceptable, as well as deepening understanding of what all those things were and are, and deepening realization of how we can participate (actively and passively).
The words at your local O.F. would not be the actual words Jesus or the apostles used, but for the most part they would be equivalent understanding. The words at the E.F. would be closer to those the early Roman Christians heard, but they might not have all been heard at once in AD 205, or even AD 1505. But again, the format of the Mass itself, with its deep roots in Jewish worship, its focus on first the Word and then the Eucharist, the concept of the priest/presbyter leading the people, the very Scriptural prayers starting from the Greek Kyrie to the Latin Agnus Dei, would have been understood by any Catholic from AD33 on.
Are there different rites? There sure are, equally ancient and beautiful, based on the earliest groups of Christian adherents (such as the Eastern Catholic rites). Again, though, the use of the priest, the use of Sacred Scripture, and the focus on the Eucharist are there running through each rite like a thread of gold. And it’s the way that other parts are joined to that thread that makes any ‘change’ be either right or wrong (and remember, ‘wrong’ things can exist for years and be hotly defended. Think “Arian heresy”). But what endures, what lasts, is not something that is deemed’ ‘what the people want’ or ‘what makes this service more ‘relevant’ to today’.
Is the laity important? Of course we are. But we aren’t in the sense of liturgy equal participants with the priest (or why would we need ordained priests instead of somebody with a degree who gets elected because the people like his or her ‘style’). There is nothing shameful about being part of God’s holy people as a layperson instead of being part of God’s holy people as a priest. In fact, I tend to sigh if Father “call me Billy Bob” seems apologetic about his role, all 'hey shucks, all you people could do this so much better than I could, I’m just plain folks here, don’t give me any more attention than you do to the greeters and seaters, the kids processing, the band, etc., because dang it, you’re the reason we’re here after all, you incredibly wonderful people you." (Of course a priest who comes in with, “Address me as FATHER, this place is a disgrace, we are going to do things my way or the highway, and I’ll excommunicate anybody who says otherwise” would be equally annoying. It’s simply that I have seen dozens of Father Billy Bobs and never yet 'Call me FATHER". But I’m sure such priests are there!)
So yes, we as laity do in a sense need to let Father BE the priest he is supposed to be, and do the liturgy the way it is supposed to be done, and not all try to be little quasi-priests fixing the liturgy to our liking if in doing so, we are changing the liturgy itself.
Having people stand up before Mass and say hello is not changing the liturgy. Some might love it and some might hate it, but it’s before Mass and it is something that the laity can have a legitimate voice in, and which the priest can choose to utilize.
Having people stand up in the middle of the consecration and come up around the altar with the priest and all raising hands and saying the words of consecration IS changing the liturgy and it’s wrong. There is a reason that only the priest consecrates the Eucharist, and even if 'all the laity are priests, Scripture says so" and even if the priest and all the people in the church think this would be the greatest thing for their parish in the history of forever, it would still be something that should not be done. Not because ‘the laity don’t have a say’, but because liturgy is what it is.
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Don_Ruggero
Guest
No…the opinions of the laity are not forbidden. They may simply be of no value.
For the record, my response followed this chain:
which was followed by
to which I wrote
And indeed we are not speaking of equal opinion when it comes to contrasting His Holiness with anyone else. The mind of the Pope on the liturgy is supreme…and ALL Catholics are to yield to it completely.
The thoughts of a lay person are as valuable to me as they are steeped in knowledge or wisdom and as valueless as they lack either or both.
I remember when the decision was made to allow girls and women to licitly be altar servers in 1994 and various laity came to me to express their displeasure. My response was very direct: “I don’t care. The pope has spoken, the issue is now resolved, and that is what is going to happen. It will be implemented as swiftly as possible, according to the bishop’s will, and if you would like help to adjust, I will gladly give it but make no mistake: there will be girls and women serving Mass from here forward and that decision is to be assented to.”
Similarly when Pope Francis, finally, changed the law about the foot washing rite for Holy Thursday. “It will be done and that is not open for any discussion.” All opinions are not equal in a hierarchical institution.
I taught liturgy and sacraments as a professor across many years, among other roles more practical concerning the liturgy.
I also used to do continuing education for those involved with liturgy in the parishes…I would get interesting questions from my students in either circumstance. Useful opinions? No.
From others whom I had worked with in the academy or who were part of the liturgical movement or the liturgical reform? Oh most assuredly! Those of my old friends from those days still alive, I continue to be inspired by today. And there are many gone to God whom I miss. Laity who were not liturgical scholars? No.
It is like the earlier comment about the Life Teen Mass
The fact that you find them “little more than emotional pablum that reeks of protestant infection” has no significance to me who was a Presider at Life Teen Masses. My suggestion to such statements would be very short and very simple: “then you should find another Mass to attend because this one is not changing.”
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Don_Ruggero
Guest
This comment surprises me from one who is Orthodox in light of the chain of comments to which I was responding, which you see in the previous comment. It concerned someone who had made a reference to the Bishop of Rome and made the response that it was “his opinion.”
As an Orthodox, do you consider the liturgical decisions of the heads of the autocephalous Churches as simply opinions equal to your own? I have never before met an Orthodox who did.
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pianistclare
Guest
I frankly am soooo tired of people bashing the music ministry, when few are willing to step up to the bat, few are willing to learn chant, few are willing to sing more modern pieces that clearly the priests approve of, and most parishes pay their musicians or Directors pennies. Literally pennies, if anything.
You can’t get blood from a turnip, and most parishes want volunteers, not rained liturgists or musicians. Free doesn’t equate to wonderful.
It’s not a priority in American parishes, so you get what you get, and you don’t pitch a fit.
Been a Music Director for eons, and had to switch to Director of Religious Ed to eat.
I would give anything to be back at the head of Music Ministry, but they hired someone who can sing reasonably well, but only knows Gospel music. They pay her pennies.
That’s what matters.
People will say in one breath, we don’t go to be entertained, but then the same people will crow about the bad music.
Which is it?
Don’t answer. I already know what it is.
You can’t get blood from a turnip, and most parishes want volunteers, not rained liturgists or musicians. Free doesn’t equate to wonderful.
It’s not a priority in American parishes, so you get what you get, and you don’t pitch a fit.
Been a Music Director for eons, and had to switch to Director of Religious Ed to eat.
I would give anything to be back at the head of Music Ministry, but they hired someone who can sing reasonably well, but only knows Gospel music. They pay her pennies.
That’s what matters.
People will say in one breath, we don’t go to be entertained, but then the same people will crow about the bad music.
Which is it?
Don’t answer. I already know what it is.
D
Don_Ruggero
Guest
I remember all those years ago when I was newly ordained and I had laity who would say we need this or we need that and they professed to be all excited about it and wanted to make it a success. I would start it and the very people requesting it did not show up…let alone anyone else. That’s a lesson one learns very quickly. Very quickly indeed.I frankly am soooo tired of people bashing the music ministry, when few are willing to step up to the bat, few are willing to learn chant, few are willing to sing more modern pieces that clearly the priests approve of, and most parishes pay their musicians or Directors pennies. Literally pennies, if anything.
You can’t get blood from a turnip, and most parishes want volunteers, not rained liturgists or musicians. Free doesn’t equate to wonderful.
It’s not a priority in American parishes, so you get what you get, and you don’t pitch a fit.
Been a Music Director for eons, and had to switch to Director of Religious Ed to eat.
I would give anything to be back at the head of Music Ministry, but they hired someone who can sing reasonably well, but only knows Gospel music. They pay her pennies.
That’s what matters.
People will say in one breath, we don’t go to be entertained, but then the same people will crow about the bad music.
Which is it?
Don’t answer. I already know what it is.
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Paganus
Guest
One of our local parishes likes to sing this venerable hymn before the final blessing:
If you’re happy and you know it clap your hands (clap clap)
If you’re happy and you know it clap your hands (clap clap)
If you’re happy and you know it and you really want to show it
If you’re happy and you know it clap your hands (clap clap)
I am not kidding! This is a very important song to the priest of this parish. The priest has chased us down in the parking lot because he is concerned that my children are not clapping in church.
Incidentally, I am not critical of this priest - his homilies are superb and he is an excellent confessor. However, his style is what I would call “happy clappy” even if you are tired of the cliché. I think the cliché fits his approach to liturgy quite well.
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Paganus
Guest
At our Life Teen Mass everyone is quiet except for the musicians and the comedienne. The parishioners do not sing (who could hear them?) or clap, but they do laugh at her jokes. She takes the microphone before final blessing and typically says funny things about the celebrant and the events listed in the church bulletin. She’s very good.
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Paganus
Guest
The term “Kumbaya” is a distortion of the phrase “Come Be Here”, so you can sing “Come Be Here, Lord” if you prefer. Of course, if the Lord is truly present in Eucharistic form, this would be inappropriate and you might be better served by “Tantum Ergo Sacramentum.”
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Paganus
Guest
What an encouraging thought! I have seen a priest lose his parishes because he offered the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass ad orientem.
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JimR-OCDS
Guest
Maybe its to help the children experience joy at Mass rather than solem gloom ?
Is that the only Mass ?
Who leads this song ?
Have you brought up your objection to it ?
Have you volunteered to be part of the music ministry to help change the music to your liking ?
There are songs I don’t like at Mass sometimes.
But I don’t let it affect my contemplation in the Eucharist. I just let others open themselves to God as they are led by the Holy Spirit.
The rest is up to God.
Jim
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