Singing prayers instead?

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Sometimes, I can’t focus on my words, or feel lost, and a hymn or Christian song comes into mind. We’ve all heard “singing is praying twice”. Does anyone else sing a hymn/song when doing their prayers? Is it less ‘holy’ than traditional praying?

Christina
 
I’d say you can’t really compare “holy” because they are both holy. But I think music is very rich medium, which affects the person praying and anyone listening in deeper ways than just vocal prayer.

Every day I play piano and/or sing. I play hymns for Mass on piano or occasionally organ. It involves my whole body much more than just talking.

I would usually rather talk when I’m trying to think something through, and in some other situations. But for praise? Give me music every time.

Sing Your Praise to the Lord!

Alan
 
I like to sing. At our church, we often sing the “Sanctus”, “Agnes Dei”, and “Our Father” when we would normally speak them (e.g. during daily mass). We have an elderly priest that started this, and the Pastor and Parochial Vicar are doing it now too. It is very beautiful.

I have certain hymns I like to sing when I am in a praying. And sometimes after praying for a while, I suddenly start singing short tunes that I believe the Holy Spirit is giving me.
 
WaitingForJesus said:
I like to sing. At our church, we often sing the “Sanctus”, “Agnes Dei”, and “Our Father” when we would normally speak them (e.g. during daily mass). We have an elderly priest that started this, and the Pastor and Parochial Vicar are doing it now too. It is very beautiful.

I have certain hymns I like to sing when I am in a praying. And sometimes after praying for a while, I suddenly start singing short tunes that I believe the Holy Spirit is giving me.
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That’s very nice.

They sing the divine chaplet on EWTN every once in a while. It’s very nice too. You might want to try singing it with them sometime. Very beautiful.

Someday I would like to compose a simple melody for the Hail Mary so that the Rosary can be sung. The ones that I’ve looked at are more sophisticated.

Just a thought.​

“There is a longing in our hearts, O Lord, for you to reveal yourself to us. There is a longing in our hearts for love we only find in you, our God.” (hymn)
 
Neither is holier than the other. But if singing helps you focus on God better, by all means sing. The monks at a monestary not far from me sing a lot of their prayers.
 
I don’t sing but I do play an instrument (Irish whistle) that is part of my prayer life. To me it’s a personal way to pray and also thank God for the great gift of music.

I’d like to share this from the Bible:
26 Now as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and blessed, and broke it, and gave it to the disciples and said, “Take, eat; this is my body.”
27 And he took a cup, and when he had given thanks he gave it to them, saying, “Drink of it, all of you;
28 for this is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.
29 I tell you I shall not drink again of this fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father’s kingdom.”
30 And when they had sung a hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives.
(Matthew (RSV) 26)

👍
 
When alone before the Blessed Sacrament or the Tabernacle, I will sing a Divine Mercy Chaplet. Would like to get a group together, actually.
 
po18guy said:
When alone before the Blessed Sacrament or the Tabernacle, I will sing a Divine Mercy Chaplet. Would like to get a group together, actually.
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Good idea.​

“We hold the death of the Lord deep in our hearts.” (hymn)
 
ccmcmg said:
Sometimes, I can’t focus on my words, or feel lost, and a hymn or Christian song comes into mind. We’ve all heard “singing is praying twice”. Does anyone else sing a hymn/song when doing their prayers? Is it less ‘holy’ than traditional praying?

Christina
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Not sure what “traditional praying” is…
 
ccmcmg said:
Sometimes, I can’t focus on my words, or feel lost, and a hymn or Christian song comes into mind. We’ve all heard “singing is praying twice”. Does anyone else sing a hymn/song when doing their prayers? Is it less ‘holy’ than traditional praying?

Christina
Click to expand...
No problem. I used to enjoy singing hymns as prayers with my kids (when they were small) while I picked along with my guitar. As you say, we’ve all heard that “singing is praying twice,” but for you math majors . . . If you sing the prayer and play a musical instrument at the same time,* is that praying two or three times*?

And if the progression is geometric, would it then be praying four times, perhaps?
 
I’d give my right arm to be able to sing my prayers…or anything!
I’ve got such a bad singing voice I’m afraid God would cover his ears. The ability to sing even reasonably well is the one talent I would most like to add to my original repertoire.

I say belt out you prayers if you are half way good. And be grateful for that voice!
 
Deltadeliquent said:
I’d give my right arm to be able to sing my prayers…or anything!
I’ve got such a bad singing voice I’m afraid God would cover his ears. The ability to sing even reasonably well is the one talent I would most like to add to my original repertoire.

I say belt out you prayers if you are half way good. And be grateful for that voice!
Click to expand...
I feel your pain. I play piano and I remember when I was in college my fraternity brothers would stand around singing as I played the piano. They kept trying to urge me to sing, and I’d say I can’t sing. Nonsense, they would say, everybody can sing. I told them I can’t. Finally I caved and tried singing. They immediately knew what I was talking about and told me to quit, and never asked again. I told them, “I told you.” When a bunch of drunk fraternity brothers can’t stand my singing you know I’m bad.

Plus it seemed like other people all sang in choir in school, or sang as a class or something. I didn’t have anything like that in high school at all and hardly at all in grade school.

So after I got out of college I decided it was awful not to be able to sing and I found a teacher, I don’t remember how. I may have called the music department of a nearby college; anyway they set me up with a guy who met me in some church and really, I was amazed at how quickly I progressed to “not sucking” status, and then “hey this is fun.” The results were more than golden. I taught my kids to sing, and they have all sung as cantor for me at Mass. We have music and singing literally every day in our house, and it’s a joy. Those singing lessons were some of the best money I’ve ever spent. I’m not of a quality to sing big solos in front of a great audience, but I can do a respectable job of singing a psalm response. My biggest problem that I see is I haven’t a clue how to do vibrato. Maybe some day I’ll take up lessons again (it’s been since 1985 since I took, and then it was only a few months) but being able to sing and not offend people was life-giving.

Probably the first thing I learned was that when holding a note, you sing on vowels and not consonants. It was a great revelation to me. Other people said, “of course, you didn’t know that?” Well, I didn’t know it until somebody told me! :rolleyes:

Alan
 
The church extols the virtue of singing our prayers and scriptures.
The General Instruction for the liturgies of both the Eucharist and the Liturgy of the Hours clearly states that singing the prayers is the prefered option, with Gregorian Chant being given Pride of Place. (But other forms also encouraged)

I would point you, however, in the direction of the Catechism, which describes 3 types of Prayer:
  1. Vocal Prayer. This includes every type of Liturgy. Everything that is read or recited. This includes Spontaneous Prayer: the prayer of our own heart, not reciting words and formulae of scripture or others defined prayers.
    Vocal prayer may be Said aloud or Sung, it may also be said silently. It engages the mind and the voice in stating our prayers to God.
  2. Meditative Prayer: In this form of Prayer we take some Concept, Idea, or Scripture and hold it in our conscious mind. We actively think about it. we actively explore it.
    Examples include:
  • Meditating on the Mysteries of the Rosary (While simultaneously reciting the vocal prayers with our mouths). Breifly reading a scripture related to the mystery before the decade, and having an icon depicting the mystery helps here.
  • The Stations of the cross (where we meditate upon each station)
  • The Lectio Divina (where we meditate upon a scripture of the day)
  1. Contemplative Prayer. This is not often taught to ordinary Lay catholics and this is a great shame. This is the form of prayer where we quiet our mind and listen to God. The easiest way to describe it to a lay person is that it has a lot in common with easter forms of meditation like “Transcendental Meditation”. (There are very significant differences though)
    In this form of prayer we empty our mind of scriptures or mysteries. we relax deeply and allow ourselves to commune with The Lord.
    One example is the often quoted description of a poor lay Catholic sitting in the church during Exposition of the Blessed Sacrament. he described his stillness to a priest as “It’s me looking at Jesus, looking at me, looking at Him”.
    There’s no attempt to make God speak to us, it’s just pure adoration.
Another thing it’s similar to is lying or sitting closely with your beloved staring into eachothers eyes, saying nothing just being together.

Here’s the page in the Catechism. It’s part of a whole section on prayer. (the whole of Section 4)
 
Wow, ALAN. That’s an I credible story. I ll think about some lessons. I’d would so love to be able to sing. You have encouraged me!
 
fred_conty said:
That’s very nice.

They sing the divine chaplet on EWTN every once in a while. It’s very nice too. You might want to try singing it with them sometime. Very beautiful.

Someday I would like to compose a simple melody for the Hail Mary so that the Rosary can be sung. The ones that I’ve looked at are more sophisticated.

Just a thought.​

“There is a longing in our hearts, O Lord, for you to reveal yourself to us. There is a longing in our hearts for love we only find in you, our God.” (hymn)
Click to expand...
Hi Fred! I love the sung version of the Divine Mercy Chaplet. In fact, I had the CD but played it so much that it wore out. I took that as a sign from God that I needed to pray a little differently, and that has workd well for me. I love your idea of a sung rosary!
 
Thank you very much! 🙂
anruari said:
The church extols the virtue of singing our prayers and scriptures.
The General Instruction for the liturgies of both the Eucharist and the Liturgy of the Hours clearly states that singing the prayers is the prefered option, with Gregorian Chant being given Pride of Place. (But other forms also encouraged)

I would point you, however, in the direction of the Catechism, which describes 3 types of Prayer:
  1. Vocal Prayer. This includes every type of Liturgy. Everything that is read or recited. This includes Spontaneous Prayer: the prayer of our own heart, not reciting words and formulae of scripture or others defined prayers.
    Vocal prayer may be Said aloud or Sung, it may also be said silently. It engages the mind and the voice in stating our prayers to God.
  2. Meditative Prayer: In this form of Prayer we take some Concept, Idea, or Scripture and hold it in our conscious mind. We actively think about it. we actively explore it.
    Examples include:
  • Meditating on the Mysteries of the Rosary (While simultaneously reciting the vocal prayers with our mouths). Breifly reading a scripture related to the mystery before the decade, and having an icon depicting the mystery helps here.
  • The Stations of the cross (where we meditate upon each station)
  • The Lectio Divina (where we meditate upon a scripture of the day)
  1. Contemplative Prayer. This is not often taught to ordinary Lay catholics and this is a great shame. This is the form of prayer where we quiet our mind and listen to God. The easiest way to describe it to a lay person is that it has a lot in common with easter forms of meditation like “Transcendental Meditation”. (There are very significant differences though)
    In this form of prayer we empty our mind of scriptures or mysteries. we relax deeply and allow ourselves to commune with The Lord.
    One example is the often quoted description of a poor lay Catholic sitting in the church during Exposition of the Blessed Sacrament. he described his stillness to a priest as “It’s me looking at Jesus, looking at me, looking at Him”.
    There’s no attempt to make God speak to us, it’s just pure adoration.
Another thing it’s similar to is lying or sitting closely with your beloved staring into eachothers eyes, saying nothing just being together.

Here’s the page in the Catechism. It’s part of a whole section on prayer. (the whole of Section 4)
Click to expand...
 
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