J
jbuck919
Guest
This is one of those threads that got big relatively fast, and on top of that I was away from a computer because of a necessary trip for two days, so I apologize in advance for not reading every other post.
As a trained and experienced church musician who has worked more for protestant denominations than for Catholics (which I would vastly have preferred, but I became long ago resigned), I cannot assert arrogantly that I know all about protestant hymnody, but I do know a very, very great deal, which I have to imagine is more than most people here. I offer the following thoughts, in no particular order:
First, the tradition of hymnody stemming from the reformation has no strong connection with Catholic worship. It is at its best and on its own terms a marvelous tradition that the Lutherans and Anglicans, for instance, have made great use of (other denominations have rather tended to debase it). But nothing on God’s Earth can make it into something Catholic. At best, it can only be an acceptance of something suitable in the sense that the individual hymn has an acceptable message not contradicting Catholic teaching. (In fact, very, very few protestant hymns actually contradict Catholic teaching,.)
Having said that, there are in fact “protestant-style” hymns that are of Catholic origin. Many of these come from German song books of the 18th and 19th century; so we are not talking about a completely new phenomenon here. That old favorite “Holy God We Praise Thy Name” is in fact a Catholic hymn that was back-adopted into many protestant hymnals.
I would like to point out that I myself hate syncretism and believe in authenticity to one’s own tradition, assuming there is anything in that tradition worth being authentic to (not in question in Roman Catholicisim). If you go back far enough, Roman Catholic worship and the music associated with it is inherently syncretistic, beginning with the Kyrie being in Greek, and moving on from there, but that is rather a different matter than wholesale adoptions from Reformation-inspired traditions because we can’t do any better. The problem is that in offering an alternative (e.g., Gregorian with appropriate congregational participation), we perplex ordinary congregations who, in the US at least, go cross-eyed when someone makes such a suggestion.
Finally, I would like to address the possibility of Catholicism producing its own modern hymnody. The problem here is that it has already been done, with disastrous results. Almost without exception, modern hymns written specifically for Catholic worship are dreadful, comparable to the tent revival hymns of lower protestant denominations if not worse. Give me the choice between those and the strong protestant tradition and I will say: You have given me no choice at all; go back and find another alternative.
As a trained and experienced church musician who has worked more for protestant denominations than for Catholics (which I would vastly have preferred, but I became long ago resigned), I cannot assert arrogantly that I know all about protestant hymnody, but I do know a very, very great deal, which I have to imagine is more than most people here. I offer the following thoughts, in no particular order:
First, the tradition of hymnody stemming from the reformation has no strong connection with Catholic worship. It is at its best and on its own terms a marvelous tradition that the Lutherans and Anglicans, for instance, have made great use of (other denominations have rather tended to debase it). But nothing on God’s Earth can make it into something Catholic. At best, it can only be an acceptance of something suitable in the sense that the individual hymn has an acceptable message not contradicting Catholic teaching. (In fact, very, very few protestant hymns actually contradict Catholic teaching,.)
Having said that, there are in fact “protestant-style” hymns that are of Catholic origin. Many of these come from German song books of the 18th and 19th century; so we are not talking about a completely new phenomenon here. That old favorite “Holy God We Praise Thy Name” is in fact a Catholic hymn that was back-adopted into many protestant hymnals.
I would like to point out that I myself hate syncretism and believe in authenticity to one’s own tradition, assuming there is anything in that tradition worth being authentic to (not in question in Roman Catholicisim). If you go back far enough, Roman Catholic worship and the music associated with it is inherently syncretistic, beginning with the Kyrie being in Greek, and moving on from there, but that is rather a different matter than wholesale adoptions from Reformation-inspired traditions because we can’t do any better. The problem is that in offering an alternative (e.g., Gregorian with appropriate congregational participation), we perplex ordinary congregations who, in the US at least, go cross-eyed when someone makes such a suggestion.
Finally, I would like to address the possibility of Catholicism producing its own modern hymnody. The problem here is that it has already been done, with disastrous results. Almost without exception, modern hymns written specifically for Catholic worship are dreadful, comparable to the tent revival hymns of lower protestant denominations if not worse. Give me the choice between those and the strong protestant tradition and I will say: You have given me no choice at all; go back and find another alternative.
