When Bad Liturgy Happens to Good Catholics

Interesting thread at Open Book

http://amywelborn.typepad.com/openbook/2007/03/related.html#comments

And some wrong-headed, and some witty comments.

Did she ever offer to help? Or did she just continue to shop, until she finally found a parish that did music the way she liked it?
The writer seems not to understand that many, many people, (in my experience the overwhelming majority of actual musicians,) went "shopping" as a last resort, when their contribution was rejected.
Many times, the gifts of the truly gifted are thrown back in the face of those who offer them. A coterie of the self-appointed, self-anointed often has more power than anyone with any genuine knowledge or skill in the area of music.
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And yet, in the last few years, I have begun to appreciate more those folks who I call "just show up" Catholics.
Ah!
A Martha moment!
We Marthas may finally learn that all those Marys have chosen the better part, and we will stop banging the pots and pans in the kitche.... I mean, stop having another committee meeting, stop forming another discussion group, stop writing a new rite to correct perceived wrongs in the right Rite the Church has given us, and "show up."Stay with Him, watch and pray," as the Taize song has it... and learn
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If we emptied ourselves more, turned outward instead of inward, and stopped concerning ourselves with pleasing our own personal preferences in music, prayer, and liturgy..."
It's a both/and situation in many regards.
We do need to empty ourselves, and we must keep things in perspective. Keeping the divine half of the Church in mind will significantly help in that regard.
At the same time, resist the temptation to think that therefore questions about the liturgy, sacred music, etc. are just asides or ultimately "subjectives" that we should focus less upon.
This is a seamless garment sort of issue, and while one should maintain their Faith in the Church through all, at the same time we don't diminuish the importance of such matters. The Church doesn't, the Pope doesn't so why should we?
There is a balance to be struck, but its a balance which finds the importance of these issues, just like doctrinal issues (the two are fundamentally related incidentally) since we're ultimately discussing four things:
1) the worship of God2) the stirring our souls (and others) to sanctification3) the catechetical dimension of the liturgy4) the evangelical power of the liturgy

All very important things.
And as almost always, Shawn Tribe (the quoted poster,) nails it.
I don't know that I had ever read these facets of the discussion enumerated quite that way
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I am one of those people who "read their way in" to the Church. The first time someone asked me seriously why I wanted to be Catholic, I repsonded that it was because I believed everything the Church taught and that it was the Church founded by the Apostles.
This was an unsatisfactory answer for the questioner, who said he couldn't understand something like that. For him, choosing to join a church depended on one's emotional response to the service and music and a feeling of belonging.
Exactly -- because we actively TEACH children that"
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I'm one of those who "read myself" into the Church. My first experience of a Catholic parish since I was confirmed has been - well, banal is the word that fits best, with (a few) punctuating experiences of beauty and grace and (more) horrifying affronts to my spirit.
I relate to what Jennifer Ferrara was seeking; I am a person who is built for spiritual experiences through beauty and art, and I'm always hungry for it. Am I sinning if I attempt to place myself in a space where I can experience that?...The more Catholic theology I read, the more convinced I am that Beauty, like Truth, is objective and knowable, not a matter of taste. The fact that the beauty of Catholic art, music, liturgy, and architecture touched and called my soul to Christ was no accident of personality on my part.

Kathleen Lundquist is very wise (though I would quibble with her judgement that a "gospel-style" ordinary is inherently inappropriate for Lent. There's gospel and there's gospel.... I can imagine such a setting that would be wonderfully apt. Then again, who was there, me or her?)
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And finally this bit of genius:"Mosh Pit of Peace" by Fr Stephanos, OSB