Ah, to be in Fez....

... now that June is here.

The Fifteenth Fez Festival of WORLD Sacred Music adorns that city right now:

Running this year from May 29th to June 6th, the festival draws guests from places as diverse as France and India, Algeria and Azerbaijan, Spain and Greece and more. Established artists and rising stars rub shoulders and share the same spiritual passion.

An ever-increasing number of people who love sacred music of all hues meet every year in the imperial city and send out a message that crosses religious and ideological boundaries, said Fatima Sadiqi, the president of the Spirit of Fez Foundation.

"This is a glimmer of light in these times when we need more than ever to understand one another and join together," she said.

The Festival remains faithful to its message: bringing peoples and religions together through sacred music. "This message touches the entire world, because sacred music and the thoughts it arouses belong to no particular age or religion, but speak to all, without distinction," Sadiqi noted.

The yearly festival sees itself as a centre of culture and music where the artistic and the sacred come together, with the major objective of promoting the image of Fez as a centre for peace and dialogue, both intra- and inter-culturally.

I think familiarity with GENUINE sacred music of other cultures and faith-traditions would contribute far more to a right understanding of Catholic liturgical music and a revival of faith and the Faith, than the introduction of religious texts tarted up with pop, theatrical, operatic and other secular styles into the sacred mysteries of the Church ever could.