Hymns or Heresy?

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By Birgit Jones

This will be short and sweet. Yours truly is weary of church songs, masquerading as hymns, portraying something other than Church teaching. It’s bad enough that every Tom, Dick, and Harriet wants to see himself (herself) as a composer, leaving us with what amounts to a roller coaster ride up and down the scale. Vapid words, loosely connected in some vague way to scripture, mostly out of context, and unpoetic poetry are like clanging cymbals in my ears.

Although I am only mildly musical, my husband describes my voice as ‘a good voice for blending with others’ , I do have a hearing ear. Tempo, imagery, and melody do matter but, what matters more is accurate adherence to scripture, dogma, and faith. Adding synthesized beats, twirling and whirling through the octaves, and being ‘unique’ does not a hymn make. What it does is create a song, albeit not a very good one, which fails the faith test.

Mere Songs or Real Hymns?

There are many such songs in our hymnals today. They prance around, pretending to be hymns but are really only annoying songs. They are in our pews because of a tacit sin of omission. It goes something like this. The Church asks potential hymns to have the approval of the diocesan bishop. Only then should they appear in our hymnals.

What happens, instead, is the cart is put before the horse. Creative juices flow within the breast of an aspiring music minister and a song is born. This song (not hymn) is added to the ‘music issue’ and makes its grand entrance. The bishop isn’t told, nor does he notice, so there is no objection to this melodious piece of heresy. Viola! Inferred approval is invoked and a new pseudo-hymn is born. Consequently, the people, gnashing their teeth, are bound to sing or to stand by, silently praying for relief.

Below you will find one such song. In the past, we’ve been forced to sing about being Christ for one another, a loosely applicable notion given that we are to lead Christ-like lives. But making the jump from that to actually being the Bread of Life, broken and shared, is just too much. The allusion to the Eucharistic Sacrifice just brings my voice to a screeching halt.

Singing Heresy

Words have meaning and power; within the context of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, it’s vital that composers adhere to Church teaching. Some concepts are simply not true nor are they acceptable. It’s one thing to dislike a song as a matter of taste; it’s quite another when a hymn fails to follow Truth.

Which songs cause you to grind your teeth? Is it a matter of taste or theology?
O Lord, please spare us and bring us back to the hymns of old. If that can’t be done, won’t you please at least bring back faithful, God-centered hymns? Amen!
I Myself Am the Bread of Life

Refrain

I myself am the bread of life.

You and I are the bread of life.

Taken and blessed, broken and shared by Christ

That the world might live.

Verse 1

This bread is spirit, gift of the Maker’s love,

and we who share it know that we can be one:

a living sign of God in Christ.

Refrain

Verse 2

Here is God’s kingdom given to us as food.

This is our body, this is our blood:

a living sign of God in Christ.

Refrain

Verse 3

Lives broken open, stories shared aloud,

Become a banquet, a shelter for the world:

a living sign of God in Christ.

Refrain

Rory Cooney

© 1987, North American Liturgy Resources, Published by OCP Publications

linkis.com/catholicstand.com/33fbm
 
Just so we use the word correctly:

“Heresy is the obstinate post-baptismal denial of some truth which must be believed with divine and catholic faith, or it is likewise an obstinate doubt concerning the same” CCC

I do not see how a song can be said to be obstinate.

I do not care at all for the hymn above. I do not like confusing symbolisms, especially when those symbols have their own significant meaning and can lead to false theology. But in all fairness, I do not care for The Glories of Mary by St. Alphonsus Liguori for the same reason.
 
In general, I agree with the quotation from Birgit Jones. However, I would wish for an argument that was better written and didn’t confuse the problem of unmusical “music” with the problem of less-than-theologically-faithful lyrics, from a writer who knew the difference between the French word voila and the musical instrument, the viola.
 
Rain Down by Jaime Cortez tops my list of church tunes which grate upon the ear. I think it sets some sort of record for the number of times “god” is used in song. It also reminds me of that song from the Flintstones involving a feud with the Hatrocks.

Anything by Dan Schutte, David Haas, or Marty Haugen. Two of the three have actually performed concerts at various local parishes in recent years, at $20 a head. I do not understand the need for such concerts. Well-attended by parish pastoral administrators, music directors and choir leaders I believe. Any coverage in the local Catholic newspaper featured closely-cropped photos showing 1 or 2 attendees singing from sheet music.

Our parish music director usually limits song selections to the above-mentioned tune-smiths. She seems especially smitten with Schutte, who I consider to be the Barry Manilow of church music, but for different reasons. Haas is a ‘local talent’ and comes in second. I loathe his re-purposed sea chanty based on Shenandoah. Imagine what he could do with Paradise Street.
 
I rather like the extended metaphor of the “Bread of Life” song. Obviously we are not literally the Eucharist, but we are the Body of Christ in a different sense, and the idea that we, like the other Body, are “taken, blessed, broken, and shared” by Jesus for the life of the world is a good overview of our mission. Of course, if that is taken as devaluing the actual Eucharist because we are all that matters, that would be wrong.

Usagi
 
It won’t happen just because you “sing” about it.

Do they actually teach you it?
 
We sat there and they got us to sing “If I had a hammer” and “We shall overcome” and didn’t bother to tell us what.

They didn’t care to help my parents prepare me for life.

They didn’t bother to catechise.
 
Usagi said:
I rather like the extended metaphor of the “Bread of Life” song. Obviously we are not literally the Eucharist, but we are the Body of Christ in a different sense, and the idea that we, like the other Body, are “taken, blessed, broken, and shared” by Jesus for the life of the world is a good overview of our mission. Of course, if that is taken as devaluing the actual Eucharist because we are all that matters, that would be wrong.

Usagi
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I do also. We tend to downplay the teaching that Christ calls us to carry our crosses, unity with him as one body means broken and shared.

Also, the opening word can be taken as paraphrase of Jesus.
 
The prophets wrote that way a lot:words attributed to God mixed in with third person.
 
I have a theory that many hymns of the kind referred to deliberately avoid overtly-Catholic theology in their hymns in order to appeal to a wide audience including non-Catholics (in fairness, Haugen is notably not Catholic). :hmmm:

That said, I’d say that the simple reason why such hymns are popular with (some) priests, pusic directors, etc is simply because they belong to their generation. For example, Joncas wrote “On Eagle’s Wings” in 1975-76, “Be Not Afraid” in 1975, “Here I Am Lord” in 1981. Of course, that also means that, like the hymns’ composers, those with whom they’re popular are typically well into their 60’s (if not older). The question then becomes, what next?

Catholicism, unlike some protestant denominations, doesn’t have much of a history of liturgical music (beyond chant of course) - at least not in the liturgy. So, in some ways, these composers and their works represent the “first wave” or generation following the reform of the liturgy by the Council Fathers. Personally,I’m not really a fan of these hymns partly because they tend to lack a strong tune / melody (admittedly, there are some exceptions) but more importantly because they’re lacking in theological depth.

In contrast for example, the Wesley brothers, who founded Methodism, were only too aware of the importance of hymns as a means of catechesis and many others both before and after them similarly utilised hymns for this purpose. In short, the test of any hymn is time - many hymns which are still in use today were composed in the 1800s (and some even earlier).

At the same time though, as one composer pointed out to me when I took a passing swipe at “Come Back to Me” - some hymns hang around, not because they’re necessarily good but simply because nobody’s written anything better! Perhaps it’s there that the real challenge lies for those who are critical of the Joncas / Haugen / Schutte / etc hymns…
 
InThePew said:
For example, Joncas wrote “On Eagle’s Wings” in 1975-76, “Be Not Afraid” in 1975, “Here I Am Lord” in 1981.
At the same time though, as one composer pointed out to me when I took a passing swipe at “Come Back to Me” -
Click to expand...
:rotfl:
I use all four of these! I am particularly fond of the last one, as Hosea has always been one of my favorite prophets.
 
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