Lady With a Baby on Board, or where did that person go?

When I was learning to drive, (which I did at a bizarrely advanced age for a suburbanite, but why bother when there are 6 people or so who would have dibs on the driver seat, and indeed the car itself, ahead of you? but I digress...)
When I was learning to drive, I had an outlook, almost a mantra, there's a woman in labor in the back seat.
Huh? you ask.
It was my clumsy way of incorporating Renoir's everyone has his reasons... into my life.

Yes, that driver cut me off/ran that stop sign/is going far too fast/nearly ran me off the road -- but maybe he or she had good reason, of which I can know nothing.

And since I can't know it, I'll give'm the benefit of the doubt, and drive accordingly, more importantly think accordingly.

Where did that Me go?
I don't think that way anymore, I don't drive that way, I don't treat people that way.

Sometimes it seems that life experience forces you to choose, do I want to be a cynic or a chump?

Is being a chump such a bad thing?

Believe it or not, it was choir, and choir attendance that kicked off the soul searching, but that is another matter...

Anyway, I want to go back to smiling, even if I risk having my teeth kicked in.

San Francisco CA and San Antonio TX , Singers and Support Sought

First, a schola in the North Beach/Telegraph Hill area is seeking new members.

And parish politics seem to be wreaking a bit of trouble on a schola in Texas; they could use more singers, but perhpas even more importantly they could use the support of those who long for a restoration of the sacred in Catholic liturgical life -- don't just long for it, work for it, speak up for it!

The Reform of the Liturgy, the Ideal of Ecumenism, and the Way It Actually Played Out...

Conspiracy theorists abound, but I don't think it is necessary to impute malice to those whose actions brought about near-disastrous consequences. Quoth one Combox Commando:

Many faithful Catholics in the aftermath of the Council shared almost euphorically the expectation that the new liturgy would spur a wholesale influx of Protestants into the One True Church. Of course, we now know that nothing of sort happened—and instead that the Church itself was Protestantized—but in that time of hope the optimism seemed neither suspect nor unrealistic.

Another asks:

Is it any wonder that only 30% of Catholics now believe in the Real Presence?

People don't really listen to the spiel given by the flight attendant before take-off, do they? (Of course, flying was less common, then -- had either of the popes who presided over VCII flown?)
Good advice in any number of circumstances:

“If the cabin looses sufficient pressure, a mask will drop down from your over-head compartment. Secure the mask around your head like this, and breathe normally. Don’t be concerned if the bag doesn’t inflate. If you are traveling with a child or someone who needs assistance, secure your own oxygen mask first, and then offer assistance to your companion.”

Because chances are you can't give meaningful assistance to someone else after ya lose consciousness, ya know?

"Can I bring anything, honey? well, at least let me help with the dishes..."

It's good, as we stumble along, to remember exactly what it is, with which we are dealing.

For a variety of reasons, we have been slow to take [the family meal] aspect of the Eucharist seriously.

Perhaps this is because its other dimensions seem more sacred.

Our reluctance to accept this is evident in the simple criticism that is made of people who go to church principally because of its social aspect: "She doesn't go to church to pray! She just goes for the socializing, for the chance to talk with others!"

That is always voiced as a negative when, in fact, it a good reason, among others, to go the Eucharist.

The ritual of the Eucharist was given to us because we are social in our very make-up.

To go to church to socialize is reason enough to be there.

Chant in Metuchen NJ

Those in the tri-state area may be interested in this.

Graduale Romanum - The Songbook of the Church: Chanting the Liturgy in English and Latin

Graduale Romanum - The Songbook of the Church: Chanting the Litugry in English and Latin
Date: Nov 17, 2009
Time: 7:00 PM - 9:00 PM
Location: St. John Neumann Pastoral Center
146 Metlars Lane
Piscataway NJ 08854
Directions Cost: Per person - $ 10.00

Payment: Please make checks payable to 'Diocese of Metuchen'

"The Church acknowledges Gregorian chant as distinctive of the Roman liturgy; therefore, other things being equal, it should be given pride of place in liturgical services." (Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy # 116)

Presented by: Mr. Christopher M.C. Deibert

Workshop Description: This instruction comes to us directly from the Fathers of the Second Vatican Council, the Roman Missal and the Graduale Romanum being the keys to unlocking our understanding of the above instruction from the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy. Armed with the knowledge of these two marvelous volumes, we may guide our parishes and worshipping communities to be more closely united with the Church universal.

This workshop, given for priests and parish musicians, will explore the history of the music contained within the pages of the Roman Missal and the Graduale Romanum, and will offer insight on practival implementation at the parish level, both in English and Latin.

Who Should Attend?
Priests, parish music directors and those involved in music ministry or liturgical planning.

About the Presenter:

Christopher M.C. Deibert is the Director of Music Ministry at Saint Mary Church, South Amboy, where he directs five vocal ensembles, a bell choir, a chamber orchestra and a concert series. He is a member of the Church Music Association of America, the National Association of Pastoral Musicians, and other professional orgainzations. Mr. Deibert was the 2007 recipient of the Award of Distinction from the National Religious Music Week Alliance.

Registration Information: Please register by November 10.

"At the Name of Jesus..."

How does a mess of cretins behave?

Okay, we're singing something, (yes, it was I who programmed it, there are considerations...) an ordinary, both for which I don't care, and than which we can do much, much better.

And I realized that without ever having stated it, one of my standards for suitability and the quality of the setting, and a tool for determining appropriate tempo is -- can the Holy Name be properly reverenced when it occurs in the text?

Without incurring whiplash?

It's something I think actual Catholic musicians understand instinctively, but I don't know that I've ever heard or read it articulated.

"What about bad music?" Dr Jeff Mirius asks

H/T to Rich Leonardi for Catholic Cultures face-lift.
Here is Dr Mirius's article in its entirety.

It is a feature of human nature that all normal persons respond emotionally to music. For this reason, music is often described in emotional or quasi-emotional terms. It may be languorous or bombastic, martial or lyrical, peaceful or agitated, soothing or exciting, and so on. But in addition to the connection between music and human moods, music is also perceived as beautiful (or ugly) and the human intellect naturally wishes to understand those properties of music which, if properly manipulated, produce beauty. Finally, the essentially moral character of the human person leads us to ask whether music can affect either morals in particular or spirituality in general and, if so, how.

It is possible to draw from these considerations three questions of great interest to most serious Catholics in today’s culture: First, can different kinds of music in themselves be either morally good or evil? Second, is it possible for music to influence a person’s moral behavior? Third, are some forms of music more suitable than others to worship and especially to the Divine liturgy? Prescinding for the most part from the problem of what makes music beautiful or ugly, it is these three questions that I intend to address below.

Morally Good and Bad Music

One surveys the comments of ancient, medieval and modern philosophers in vain to find a consistent rational exposition of the nature of music or its potential moral effects. Different philosophers from Confucius to Nietzsche, including Plato, Aristotle, Boethius, St. Thomas Aquinas, Kant and many more, have made assertions about music, its essential character, and its impact on morals without the development of any single consistent rational line of argument that could be used to distinguish legitimate conclusions from mere opinions. This dearth has been alleviated to a modest degree by the aesthetic studies of neo-Thomist philosophers in the 20th century, including the work of Jacques Maritain, and by documents written to reach out to artists by Pope John Paul II. But we are a very long way from understanding—if we ever will understand—exactly what distinguishes music from noise, what makes music beautiful, and exactly why and how music reaches to the core of the human person.

Those who have been exposed to “arguments” on the subject of whether some music, or perhaps some rhythms, are intrinsically disordered and therefore morally evil, should have noticed that these “arguments” are always either mere assertions or they are supported only by appeal to some authority. When the authority in question is consulted, one always finds another mere assertion, without any sort of logical argument that may be tested by another. In reality, it is oxymoronic to describe either rhythm or music as “disordered”, for in fact it is precisely the ordering of sound in particular ways which creates both rhythm and music as a whole.

Therefore, even a cursory study of past serious thought about the nature of music forces one to conclude that it cannot be successfully argued that any form of music is evil in itself, but only that it sometimes appears to be evil in certain of its effects, which are always obscured in human responses conditioned by many things outside the music itself.

Music and Moral Behavior

A moment’s reflection will enable us to see that any particular type of music that we do not like, or to which we are personally opposed, can be used to produce an effective, pleasing artistic effect in some context of which we would approve. We may abhor the sound of “death metal”, for example, yet the same sound may be a stroke of artistic genius in a section of a modern opera which portrays a suicide. This leads to an extremely important point, which may be further illustrated by the use of music in film scores. For it is undeniable, as I noted in the introduction, that music stimulates emotional responses and can therefore influence our moods, and this reality is routinely exploited not only in “occasional music” such as that used on patriotic occasions, at sporting events or at dances, but in any form of art which employs music in the telling of a story. Moreover, music has been used in many periods of history to assist in the treatment of various human disorders, up to and including clinical trials in our own time. This may not get us very far in terms of aesthetic theory, but it does provide a universal human experience on which to base certain legitimate conclusions.

The first conclusion, from both our own experience, the widespread experience of others, and even various clinical trials, is that music tends to intensify human responses to other stimulants. Insofar as we are beginning to feel suspense at a certain point in a movie, the right kind of music heightens that feeling. Insofar as we are upset but have something within us which desires peace, tranquil music usually has a soothing effect. Insofar as we are attempting to stir ourselves up to an act of military valor, the right musical accompaniment can stimulate our courage and hasten us to action.

At the same time, however, the human person always retains the innate capacity—the power of will—to nullify these emotional effects of music. He may psychologically detach himself from the movie, if it is not to his taste or if he has pressing business, and so make himself effectively impervious to the normal effect of the music. Not wishing to be “tranquilized”, he might grow angry at a crude attempt to pacify him through musical sounds. Opposed to war, he may scoff at or condemn martial music without being stirred by it in the least. He may laugh at that which is palpably designed to make him cry, and cry when he hears happy music, perhaps because it reminds him of a lost love.

The second conclusion is that, just as well-chosen music tends to make us feel more deeply certain experiences to which we are otherwise disposed, so too is the emotional impact of music both altered and significantly intensified by association with things that are extrinsic to the actual musical forms. These may be associations which we already have in our own minds, or associations which we form when listening to music that includes lyrics, which possess something that pure music does not, namely the intelligibility unique to human speech.

Lyrics

The most obvious examples of these associations are found in the rise of many new musical forms in various cultures among musicians who are either rebelling against the mores of the culture or who are using particular forms of music to accompany immoral behavior. We could point to several examples quite easily: The rise of certain Greek forms in orgiastic rites, the emergence of jazz among musicians who typically played in bordellos, the development of hard rock and heavy metal in a counter-cultural movement too interested in tearing down conventions. Such music, which in itself might be said to produce effects of restless animation, romantic relaxation, or throbbing anger, has been used as an accompaniment either to immoral activities or to lyrics containing harmful messages, or both.

Those who care about the activities or the messages, finding them immoral or false, will naturally associate these musical forms with evil and so will often experience them as intrinsically evil. Clearly, in this moral context, moral listeners will scarcely perceive as neutral those emotional tendencies of the music which have made it appropriate to the lyrics or activities in question; rather, they are likely to react with disgust or anger. These associations and these lyrics are often very significant, and they are by no means to be lightly dismissed, especially in the formation of those who are young and impressionable. But the moral evil at work is not intrinsic to the music itself, as one final consideration will easily demonstrate.

With the passage of time, typically a generation or a little more, each new musical form tends to rise to general acceptability, in a particular context or usage, as the form is appropriated to other purposes and loses a large part of its original associations. It is too soon to see the end of this process in, say, hard rock or heavy metal, but it ought to be exceedingly clear in the case of jazz, which eventually worked its way into polite society, concert halls and university music programs, and which is considered a sort of gold standard today by a great many of those who cannot tolerate more recent musical forms. Yet in its origins, it was often regarded with horror.

There is another aspect of this progress of musical forms which also plays a critical role: familiarity. When we are used to particular forms and comfortable with them, we may find new forms distracting, jarring or otherwise annoying and unpleasant, and this certainly accounts for a large part of the immediate dislike of new music on the part of older people even as it is embraced with joy by those who are younger and more malleable. This alone is sufficient, even without various associations or problems with lyrics, to account for the common generation gaps in musical taste. But it also accounts for a very important phenomenon in the field of sacred music.

Sacred Music

If we conclude that music has no intrinsic moral quality, then we must ask a different sort of question when we consider which musical forms (or instruments, for that matter) are appropriate for divine worship. As you would expect, the evolution of the Church’s teaching on sacred music has been guided by the Church’s understanding of the Divine liturgy, in which the central and essential element (from the human point of view) is words. The Mass is a prayer of words, and insofar as music has been introduced into the public worship of the Church, its purpose has always been to give greater beauty and penetrating force to the words: the psalms, the readings, the prayers which accompany the actions of the Mass, and so on. This also has deep roots in worship under the Old Covenant.

There are two other significant considerations for Sacred Music as well. First, one must take account of the associations connected with various musical forms. It is at best pointless and at worst counter-productive to bring into Church for the purpose of worship those forms of music in any given culture which are associated primarily with frivolous or even immoral activities. This is simply a matter of common sense. Second, the Church considers the emotional tendencies of the various musical forms used in the liturgy. According to the rhythms of the liturgical year, the mood of the worshippers is appropriately glorious, joyful, martial, reflective, contrite, peaceful, sad, or even bereaved. The music should intensify rather than counteract these highly appropriate moods, which flow not only from the season and the occasion but from the liturgical texts themselves.

So Sacred Music must be conducive to the understanding of words (which suggests that interludes of “pure” music without lyrics should be rare or non-existent); the forms used should not have primarily secular associations of any kind; and the forms, settings, rhythms, and arrangements should be conducive to the emotions appropriate to the season, the feast and the texts. Now it so happens that Gregorian chant possesses an astonishing ability to intensify text (it is, after all, chant, not song); it is almost completely devoid of association with secular pursuits; and it tends to induce a strong emotional sense of the spiritual and the eternal even as it changes easily from sadness to joy. All these things have combined with the force and associations of the Catholic tradition to give Gregorian Chant a certain pride of place in the Church's liturgy. While too often ignored in practice, this position still obtains both in theory and in the Church's official recommendations today.

Perhaps more to the point in our discussion, there are several features of music (or instrumental accompaniment) which can interfere with worship precisely because they interfere with our focus on the words and their meaning. These features include novelty, complexity, and sheer distractive power. For this reason, in addition to the condemnation over the centuries by both saints and Church authorities of forms of music and particular instruments which were at any given time associated primarily with secular or immoral pursuits, there have been similar restrictions placed upon forms and instruments because the complexity of either the score or the sounds have made it more difficult to focus on the words, or because the very novelty of a particular form or instrument rendered it inevitably distracting.

Thus did a form now as revered as polyphony come under condemnation and severe restriction in the Church’s liturgy, when it was new, and thus has a strong distinction quite properly arisen between sacred music (music used for worship) and more broadly religious music. Indeed, some of the greatest religious compositions—one thinks of Bach or Beethoven—are not generally appropriate for worship. The music is so splendid, so powerful, so generally moving and perhaps even ecstatic that the listener may, through this medium, experience a significant deepening of religious devotion. But he will not thereby have entered more deeply into the Sacrifice of the Mass, unless the music has fulfilled the more modest office of helping to release within him a more deeply-felt understanding and appreciation of the meaning of the rite as conveyed through its words.

Appreciation

I am painfully aware that an essay such as this cries out for more examples, and for appropriate quotations from philosophers and saints, popes and councils. There is insufficient time and space to provide them here. Instead, it is best to offer a brief word of practical advice, a word about how we must prepare ourselves to assimilate the powerful experience of music through what is commonly called music appreciation.

By music appreciation I am not referring exclusively to the ability to discern the various elements which make up a musical composition, to trace their history, or to better understand the techniques and talents of either the composers or the musicians. These aspects should be cultivated whenever possible by frequent listening and by formal study, but they are not essential. Yet just as surely as everything we are given is to be used for the glory of God and our own union with Him, so too should every person strive for the same result in music. For most of us, and especially for youngsters who are very much in the process of moral, spiritual and indeed fully human formation, the essentials of music appreciation must not be ignored.

De gustibus non disputandum: There is no arguing about taste. But the essentials of music appreciation consist in five key elements which each person should learn to understand, and on which I intend to close:

1. The emotional impact different kinds of music can have, along with the general characteristics that tend to produce various moods;
2. The importance of lyrics as intelligible in a manner that pure music is not, and the ways in which their power is increased by music;
3. The nature of the associations which attend upon various musical forms, especially contemporary forms, by virtue of their origins, the uses to which they are frequently put, or the attitudes and performance behaviors of the musicians;
4. The nature of the liturgy and the reasons that some musical forms and instruments are more appropriate for liturgical use than others;
5. The possibility and the importance of deliberately adjusting one’s own musical tastes through careful listening, through accurate discernment of the effects each kind of music has in one's own life, and through spiritual reflection.

Somebody Interrupted a Street Fair With a Mass

I have often threatened, (insincerely, I hasten to add,) to just stop playing some loud hymn or postlude in mid-phrase, loud and unresolved, as a snotty protest at the din down below, (and to see if anyone noticed.)

Well, today, I did it inadvertently, absolutely not on purpose.

I finished the final hymn, (well, what we call "finished," two verses,) and was playing a brisk, short postlude, hadn't piled on anymore ranks than for the hymn which was a loud, moderately well sung, (for one verse, anyway,) one and stopped in mid, dissonant phrase and swung around on the bench, alarmed.

In all honesty, the noise was such that I actually thought something disastrous had occurred, that someone had fallen or had a seizure -- it was that deafening.

People wereliterally shouting greetings and farewells to each other across the nave, jokes were being told.... I just don't understand it, nor why it is allowed.

I have to find a way out of the funk I am falling in to.

Deception

I hope to attend this concert.

Haydn: Lord Nelson Mass

Bach: Passacaglia and Fugue in C Minor

Bruckner: Ave Maria, Locus Iste

Mendelssohn: Am Charfreitage, Weinachten

Hildegarde Von Bingen: O viridissima virga

My chances were improved by convincing Himself that Hildegarde was associated with a crooner, and may have had a hand in the writing of "White Christmas."

The best laid plans...

I put a certain amount of effort into deciding exactly when to tell everyone concerned what our intentions were and our timetable was, regarding the Big Move, (both official and social"notice" --although I work without benefit of contract and could legally just not show up, and ethically probably just give 2 weeks,) while fulfilling previously accepted commitments.

I needed to give others sufficient time to find replacements but not leave so long a time that my successor would be thrown in at the deep end or be forced by time constraints to accept my decisions in matters that were rightly his purview;
couldn't add another burden at specific times when those most affected by it were already overburdened;
could not leak information to certain people when there would be no immediate opportunity to tell others who were next, or even higher, in the pecking order, whose noses, or I guess, "beaks" to stick with the metaphor, would then rightly be out to joint to have heard through the grapevine rather than it being personally communicated to them in a timely manner;
didn't wish to present one last proposal as a "lame duck" (oh, the bird similes are just piling up!);
couldn't bear to do it immediately after a foreseeable but unavoidable conflict that was looming, lest my leaving be perceived as anything other than amicable...

And what happens? the one who will be charged with securing my replacement has an enormous burden that far outweighs the scheduled duties of the liturgical calendar thrust upon him, the opportunity to present the proposal has been shuffled waaaaaaaaaay off in the calendar, and a bit of unpleasantness sprang up out of nowhere, (and for once, I am not, so far as I can see, to blame in any way, shape or form.)

I can't win.

I sometimes feel inclined to just drop it like a bomb, in the sacristy at, say... 8:55 a.m. this coming Sunday?

After all my time is so worthless, there must be scads of people you can get to do the same things by just snapping your fingers.

I understand...

... that the committee is considering renaming it the "Nobel Not-Being-George-Bush Prize."

(Which in and of itself may be a worthy endeavour...)

Much as it pains me to come out on a side where I will surely be in the company of.... Red Sox fans, I have to ask, Why The Face?

In other news, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has nominated me for an Oscar for the story proposal I am shopping around but for which I have not yet found a studio, much less written the screenplay.

"What kind of health problem would you like? What sort of therapy appeals to you?"

The Lutherans, (LCMS,) have recently put out a few theses about worship, as they struggle through their own liturgy wars, and while I don't necessarily agree with every one of them -- wait, cut it out!
Okay, I disagree with some of them. There. But others really strike a cord. (Strike a "chord?")

And I will delve into that a bit more at some point, but in reading about it, I came across this article by Dr. Dean Wenthe on the Synod's site, Divine Service and Reverence.

It was first published in Lutheran Worship Notes, in '95, but is relevant to much of the conflict in current Catholic liturgical circles.

In today's culture, the word "reverence" often conveys an overtone of the artificial. Reverence suggests to many the outward and formal in contrast to the inward and the real. ... that which is informal and casual is viewed as authentic and true....

Now, as helpful as these assumptions may be in the realm of politics, it is important to ask about their value in worship. Does it follow, for example, that more casual and unstructured worship is more authentic and true? Or, does "reverent" worship denote that which is dead and without real spirit?

These questions are important for several reasons. First, few would doubt that the majority of Christians form their thinking about God around what they experience in Sunday morning worship. Scripture reading, devotions, and catechetical training remain elusive for many Christians. Sunday morning is the strategic moment for reaching, teaching, and nourishing. Second, while most Lutherans have historically kept Sunday worship as an appropriate time to be "reverent," significant voices now question whether a more casual and informal mode of worship wouldn't better serve the outreach of the church.

What is at stake in this debate? ... is "reverence" necessary for worship? To answer these questions, it is crucial that we do more than hand out questionnaires! If one had conducted a public opinion poll before the flood,the answer would have been obvious: "No way! There has never been nor will there ever be such a deluge." Our "felt needs" are not necessarily our real needs. It would be inappropriate for our physician to say: "What kind of health problem would you like? What sort of therapy appeals to you?"

...Where is a Bible passage that says "how" we are to worship? Where does the Bible make a case for "reverence" as central to an appropriate response in worship?

It is important to begin, in this case, at the beginning. The first book of the Bible stretches from Genesis to Deuteronomy. There "worship" receives lengthy and detailed attention. Not only do the patriarchs build their altars, the Exodus happens so that the people might be free to worship the true God (Ex. 3:18). After the people are free, numerous chapters are spent describing precisely what sort of surroundings and what sort of worship are appropriate to such a God. The description of the tabernacle follows God's own blueprint (Ex. 25-40). Similarly, the sacrifices and the priesthood of are divinely stipulated (Lev. 1-10). What these texts tell us is that the God of the Old Testament was very concerned about the way worship occurred!

Similarly, in the New Testament, St. Paul disapproves of worship which is inappropriate (1 Cor. 11:17-22; 14:1-40). The worship of the first Christians, like that of the historic liturgies of the church, was rooted in the Sacred Scriptures. These Sacred Scriptures, for the earliest Christians, were primarily the Old Testament. The apostles, taught by Christ, viewed the Old Testament as a description of Christ and his Kingdom. So, rather than create a form of worship on readily available Greco-Roman models, the church continued the worship of Israel with the confession that the sacrifice had now been offered (Heb. 8-10). Christ, the Passover Lamb of God, was now the center of all community life (1 Cor. 5:7-8).

Why was God so interested? Wouldn't it have been equally appropriate to hold hands in a circle in the desert and speak a spontaneous prayer? [emphasis supplied] In fact, wouldn't that have been better than the routine of offering sacrifices to God in the manner that he prescribed? Wasn't God simply giving a primitive society a set of visual aids?

The answer is "no!" What was at stake for the Israelites was the very nature of their faith. God was the one who had done specific things and revealed himself in specific ways. To say that these details could be bypassed was to create a golden calf. It was, quite simply, to worship another god. It is the character of the God revealed in the prophetic and apostolic Scriptures that calls forth appropriate worship.

Prayers, for example, may reflect our deepest hurts and highest hopes. They may be authentic in expressing our feelings. But, tragically, they may not be prayers which nourish our souls. Dietrich Bonhoeffer makes this point in a book entitled Psalms: the Prayer Book of the Bible:

Lord, teach us to pray! So spoke the disciples to Jesus. In making this request, they confessed that they were not able to pray on their own, that they had to learn to pray. The phrase "learn to pray" sounds strange to us. If the heart does not overflow and begin to pray by itself, we say, it will never 'learn' to pray. But it is a dangerous error, surely widespread among Christians, to think that the heart can pray by itself. For then we confuse wishes, hopes, sighs, lament, rejoicing-all of which the heart can do by itself-without prayer. And so we must learn to pray. The child learns to speak because his father speaks to him. He learns the speech of his father and mother. So we learn to speak to God because God has spoken to us and speaks to us. God's speech in Jesus Christ meets us in the Holy Scriptures. If we wish to pray with confidence and gladness, then the words of Holy Scripture will have to be the solid basis of our prayer. For here we know that Jesus Christ, the Word of God, teaches us to pray. The words which come from God become, then, the steps on which we find our way to God (pp. 10-13).

It might be added that our Lord, at the key moments of his life (Maundy Thursday, Good Friday) used the Psalter for his prayers. What this all points toward is the fact that the Triune God of Holy Scripture has revealed himself in specific words and events. They provide us with a true characterization. The Creator. The Holy One. The Provider. The Deliverer. All of these attributes and many more are revealed to us.

Now how do God's people react to such a God? Throughout Sacred Scripture there is a holy awe and respect, a "reverence" on the part of those who are privileged to see God clearly. Moses displayed it. Jesus, the Word made flesh, embodied it. In Scripture, the people who treat God lightly or casually really haven't understood his character. Nor, for that matter, have they faced the facts about their own character before such a God.

Our reactions and attitudes must reflect the real and true nature of God. This does not mean, of course, that an "appropriate" response earns us a place before God.

[No, of course not. It is the dishonest debating habit of some about the blogosphere to pretend that those of us who think reverence is necessary believe it is sufficient. As I said, dishonest. They also take the same tack to defend their ignoring or belittling rubrics.]

...

When we are baptized into Christ, we put on Christ (Rom. 6:1-11). His attitude becomes ours. Jesus invites us into an attitude of holy awe and respect before his Heavenly Father. Indeed, a text which distills the essence of reverence is Psalm 130:4: "But with you there is forgiveness; therefore you are feared." Many Christian traditions articulate the majesty and might of God, but leave worshipers with a fear of God that misses the heart of the Bible's message.

It is, in a word, forgiveness - the Gospel - that evokes true "reverence" in those who behold the character of God in the Bible. This is the fitting and appropriate response. It is the response that has shaped the historic liturgies of the church. With all their variety and richness, the worship of Christians has been marked from the first by "reverence." Here, in our worship, God is truly present. ....
[and think how much more then, his words apply to Catholic liturgy, where in addition the Godhead is present in so much more sublime a form!]

When Mary and the apostles stood before the cross, there was no informality. There was pain and mystery and awe and reverence. When we worship before that cross, we behold the true character of the Triune God. Our impulse is not to go after trendy emotions or religious "buzzes." These were offered in abundance by the Baalism of Palestine and every trendy religion of the Greco-Roman empire. No, the cross remains an offense and a scandal today as then because it separates worship of the true God from myriad manifestations of human religiosity. It is also the source of true "reverence." It is authentic and it is real, for it alone reveals the true character of God and true nature of his redeemed children. Such reverence will forever mark the worship of God's people.

The Church of No Hard Sayings and Whether You Should Poke Dogs in the Eye With Pencils

Cardinal George is agin' it. (Okay, I'm just assuming he's against poking dogs with pencils, but the Church Of No Hard Sayings? He's definitely come out against that.)

The presider over the USCCB has a book debuting next week, The Difference God Makes: A Catholic Vision of Faith, Communion and Culture, and John Allen interviewed with him.

I think his Eminence nails the current situation "on the ground" as it were, and shows a pretty good awareness of how things are amongst those of us who don't live in the manse, or work at the chancery.Some bits and bites:

George argues that liberals too often function as “chaplains of the status quo,” taking their cues from the prevailing secular mindset, while conservatives often end up in a sectarian dead-end, clinging to a narrow and triumphalistic version of Catholic identity sealed off from the surrounding culture. [Amen]...
"If there are lacunae in the culture that is ours, which we all have to love, it’s a lack of appreciation for relationships that you can’t un-choose and that are constitutive of your identity, and also this ability to see the whole thing, to see it as global, to get outside the national parameters that define how we look at everything, including the church....

The church is strangled by putting its voice into a system of communication that doesn’t understand her, and doesn’t want to understand her....

Allen:you write that for modern American culture, everything is tolerated but nothing is forgiven, while for Christianity it’s exactly the reverse – many things aren’t tolerated, but everything can be forgiven. ...

bishops take on an importance that’s disproportionate. ...

Liberals are critical of [authority], although they’ll use it when they’re in power. Conservatives would tend to be less critical, but equally dependent upon it.

Consequently, when you get into the church, you get the conservatives unhappy because bishops aren’t using power the way they’re supposed to, the way they want them to. You get liberals who are unhappy because [the bishops] have any power at all. Both of them are defining themselves vis-à-vis the bishops rather than vis-à-vis Christ...
How can [the bishops] be related without controlling everything? This is what Americans don’t see, that you can be related even if you don’t control. Liberals say you have to be independent, because to be related is to be controlled. Conservatives say that because you are related, you must be in control, and if you’re not in control there’s something wrong...
The Second Vatican Council said we have to present the [C]hurch to the world... that you don’t have to worry about people who don’t believe... this is so beautiful that they will come along and accept it, but that’s not true. [emphasis supplied]You have people who weren’t catechized – not because they weren’t told the truth, but because they weren’t told ‘this is not the truth, and here’s why.’ That’s why I write about putting apologetics back into catechesis.

The bishops did that same thing for a while. They explained the documents of the council, they talked about the beautiful vision of a united world coming out of the council. They didn’t pay attention to the fact that a lot of people, in order to understand, have to know not only the truth, but they have to know what’s false. Now, the catechetical problem has been attended to, at least in theory, at our level … whether or not it’s the same at the level of teaching, I don’t know.

I imagine that's a diplomatic way of saying that it hasn't really been put into practice -- and he may be a little overly optimistic that all the Bishops of the world are on board with the the splendor of Truth.

But what really caught me was George's acknowledgment that you cannot teach without negatives.
Let me repeat that, you cannot teach without negatives.
I got in trouble once in a family situation because a child, (I think she was 3 at the time,) was jabbing a pencil into a dog.
The nearest adult, I cried out, "stop that!" and took the pencil, envisioning the little sweetie with half her face gone and the holiday evening spent in a hospital emergency waiting room.

I was warned off by a parent who came flying in from the next room, who whispered, horrified, "We NEVER talk to her that way, or say negative things! This is the way it should be done," and turning to the little sweetie, cooed, "Samantha may pet the nice doggie. Wouldn't Samantha like to pet the doggie?"



I'm not sayin' there're parallels here, I'm just sayin'...

Nationalism

Love for country is certainly a Christian principle, but the deviation of nationalism is "wholly anti-Christian," according to Cardinal Angelo Sodano.

Hmm... how'bout exceptionalism?

Of LitComs and Nostalgia

Yes, I'm feeling a bit of the latter, anticipatorially, as freedom from the former looms.

But that's not what I'm thinking about today.
I came across this, several months old post, on the blog of the religion writer for the Times, UK. Ruth Gledhill, not a Catholic herself, had asked Chris Gillibrand to comment on a dust-up over some shoddy and dishonest journalism by The Tablet, a Catholic periodical in the UK, as they tried to put a spin on some words of the new-ish Archbishop of Westminster, the de facto leader, (or at least first among equals,) of the Catholic Church in England and Wales, making it seem he liked what they liked and descried what they descried, and had put England's trads in their place, (the dust-bin of history to the Tablet's way of thinking.)

(The Tablet's dishonesty was so egregious that an auxiliary bishop corrected them publicly and in print, incidentally, lest I be though to be exaggerating.)

Anyway, not being a partisan per se of the EF, (I am in favor of equal rights for equal rites,) this was the part of Gillibrand's comments that interested me:

Thousands, upon thousands, of authorised permutations for celebrating Mass exist, which becomes an unknowable number, possibly approaching infinite, when all the variations that exist that have never been authorised are taken into account. These variations are in the hands, at best, of the parish priest, and, at worst, a parochial liturgical committee.
....If we accept the argument that personal preference should play no role in liturgy, it is time to close down every liturgical committee in the land, and produce proper rubrics for the new Mass, so that its dignity of celebration can approach that of the Latin Mass.

Once during a typically interminable committee meeting, after a twenty minute conversation on the height of the platform on which the creche was to be placed, a member turned his attentions to the settings of psalms I had been programming, saying that the diocese had decreed that some musical compositions to which I never had recourse could be used.
I declared that just because someone at the chancery said they could be used it did not follow that they must be used.
Well, if you're not going to take our thoughts into consideration as to what music you use, what in the world is the liturgy committee for?

And I regretted my instant reply of, I dunno... to decide where to put the creche? because the crimson face and literal sputtering of my interrogator made me fear someone in the committee room would need to give immediate first aid to yet another a stroke victim.

But in all seriousness, what is the LitCom for?
When all is said and done, even if the meeting ends with a definitive, so we've decided, we're going to have the sprinkling rite every Sunday of Easter, if the celebrant doesn't want to do it, come 11:00 Mass in April, the mere presence of the aspergillium [sp?] on the rim of the font, the will of a handful of lay people, and the gimlet eye of the committee head fixed upon him, boring into him from the front pew -- they all matter not, he cannot be made to stride down the aisle spoiling everyone's new silk frocks with water spots.
(Me, on the other hand, they can have fired....)

Gillibrand's idea that the creation of "proper rubrics" will acheive much seems naive to me -- the rubrics that exist now are ignored.

I do agree with what I think he is saying, that there are simply too dang many options for ritual to ensue reliably.

There is always a feel of Sunday Morning at the Improv for many parishes, from the get-go.
Hymn end after the last verse? or stop instantly when the celebrant signals by his loudly impatient singing that that's enough, he's ready to begin, who cares if the Holy Spritz is given short shrift?
Do those processing genuflect? do they bow? and do they realize it is a ritualistic gesture, has anyone informed the servers of this? or does it seem like embarrassed calisthenics?
Is the Lord be with you too feeble a greeting, so we need to preface it with Good morning, everyone, isn't this a glorious day?
Which form of the penitential rite, A, B or C? or, much feared by MDs, the made up D, for the priest who hates saying the confiteor, just sing that short Kyrie, no invocations.
Gloria... oops, stupid organist shouldn't have played the intro, this is the celebrant who likes to give a little explanation before we begin. You know, because it's in English, so we won't understand what the words mean, from themselves. :oP
And from the fact that they are the same words every week.
Opening prayer - which one? even if we're celebrating the actual Mass of the day, there's almost always an alternate. (Why?)
The odd thing is, in many places, aspects that are subject to change, where there are legitimate options, are sacrosanct. (We can't eliminate the closing song! people will think it's Lent!)

All that said... a glimmer of hope. A LitCom leader of my acquaintance, late 60s, is my guess, though perhaps a septuagenarian, previous partisan of liturgical dance, (me, I like liturgical tap...:oP) had a glow of enthusiasm recently expounding on the current crop of young religious who embrace the habit, want to pray in community.

And this isn't nostalgia, he insisted as if he had just discovered it, They're not old enough to remember the way it used to be! They want to priest facing what they call "ad orientem," so that they are all in this together, facing the same way, GOING the same way....

Don't worry, I'm not going to get careless and optimistic.

Earlier that day, when I had collected a Latin motet which I decided we simply didn't have time to get back in shape before the Sunday on which it would be appropriate, (because TPTB had changed for the third time, what mass we would be celebrating, but that's another story...) one of the sopranos said, that's probably good because some people have been complaining that they can't understand all the Latin we're doing.

She is, you will gather, the liturgical equivalent of the letter writers to Anne Landers, or the Playboy Adviser, "I have a friend who...." and is full of suggestions and complaints which she charitably and tirelessly transmits from mysterious and unnamed other persons who are too diffident to speak for themselves.

Yeah.

It was this messenger's misfortune that I was feeling feisty. Oh, we shouldn't sing things that people don't understand? Okay, no more of those French hymns... (this was a French-Canadian parish, but 150 years on, no one understands a words of the hymns and beloved carols for which they still clamor.)

Oh, well, no, she didn't say anything about FRENCH.

Well, if people are complaining about things they don't UNDERSTAND, I don't want to be upsetting people, so I...

Oh, NO, I sure she didn't mean....

Yeah, right.
SHE didn't mean...

So, it is not only parish music directors...

... who say a bit too much about perceived injustices perpetrated by those with power over them, and find themselves tossed out on their keystrokes.

I'm not a conspiracy theorist, but....

... something odd struck me in reading a jeremiad aimed at one of President Obama's appointees.

Obama science czar John Holdren stated in a college textbook he co-authored that in conditions of emergency, compulsory abortion would be sustainable under the U.S. Constitution, even with Supreme Court review.

WND has obtained a copy of "Ecoscience: Population, Resources, Environment," published in 1977 and co-authored by Holdren with Malthusian population alarmist Paul R. Ehrlich and Ehrlich's wife, Ann. As WND reported, the authors argued involuntary birth-control measures, including forced sterilization, may be necessary and morally acceptable under extreme conditions, such as widespread famine brought about by "climate change."

To prevent ecological disasters, including "global warming," Holdren argued the U.S. Constitution would permit involuntary abortions, government-imposed sterilizations and laws limiting the number of children as steps justified under the banner of "sustainable well-being."

(What's a "science czar", anyway? Does he get to wear one of those cool Russain crowns with the fur around them? How many Faberge eggs as perks?)

Now without taking a stance on the morality or validity of this man's positions, (after all, it would be possible to argue that something one knows is heinous is allowed under current law and that this is a loophole that must be closed!), or even whether he still hold opinions he once held, (I believe in redemption, not to mention growing up,) let us stipulate that whether Holdren is one of them or not, there are indeed people and states who believe that over-population is damaging Planet Earth, that this is a problem, and that the private murder of the unborn, even without the consent of the proprietor of the womb occupied by that unborn child, is an acceptable way of dealing with the problem.

This is of major concern to anyone who holds to the sanctity and dignty of human life.

Now, a television show I had followed and enjoyed was abruptly canceled. (Bear with me.)

Not the sort of thing I usually watch, SFX heavy sci-fi, lots of CGI dinosaurs and other creatures.
But snappy dialogue, interesting characters, and time travel, (not a plus with me, but catnip to Himself, and it's always easier to stay involved with a series if ones intimates are as well.)
It was called Primeval.
So far as I had read, its ratings were excellent, its critical reception laudatory, its creators keen to ride it out.

And then poof! gone.

None just gone, but gone on a cliff hanger, canceled with its protagonists stranded and separated in the Jurassic age, or something, (once I recovered from my 1st grade intention to be a paleontologist, and yes, that was the word I used, I ceased to pay attention to that sort of detail, and am woefully ignorant of such matters.)

No warning, just gone. Extinct, if you will.

Now, here's the conspiracy part -- its primary antagonist was utterly un-PC.

A real, practically mustache-twirling, (though it was a woman,) villain.

Why so Politically Errant? What would be most upsetting to the Politically Correct in fictional villainy? Who would be to most upsetting to the sensibilities of most media types? a member of an oppressed minority? a fundamentalist muslim? a LBGT dwarf of color?

No, this absolute monster of a brilliant mad scientist had taken the "Save the Planet By Destroying Surplus Human Beings" dodge to its logical extreme: she was going back in time to kill the first hominid ancestors to prevent humanity from ever having existed. So rather than positing the wimpy, half-hearted:

To provide a high quality of life for all, there must be fewer people

Helen the sinister and sexy scientist concludes:

Planet Earth Would Be So Much Better Off Without Mankind

The ultimate Malthusian, no? Or just the big picture equivalent of your crazy aunt with the plastic slipcovers who never lets ANYONE set foot or tuckus in the salon with the absurd misnomer of "living" room.
And since she is clearly presented as evil, and um... wrong -- and well, we can't have such ideas being held up for what they are, evil, and um... wrong, can we? something must be done.

Okay, I'm crazy, never mind....

However, if and when it is brought back, especially if its American -- betcha the new villain espouses evil notions we have all agreed to vilify.

Like, eating saturated fats.

Don't get me wrong, I LIKE poetry....

... and I don't think the word of our prayers to the Triune God or to those nearest and dearest to Him should have the rhythm and feel, oh heck... the flatness and banality of a request for a side of mayo with those fries.

I want prayer to be beautiful and poetic, the words rich and evocative, and even, (ineffably?:oP) unusual.

But Lord save us from facilitator-speak!
"Teach me to focus on every detail."
Why?
"Help me befriend today as the best way to love God."
What?

There seem to be a great cloud of persons with dominion over the printing presses and photocopiers who take their language cues either from self-help articles in mass market women's magazines with a new-agey feel, (or rarely, but occasionally, from trade journals for teaching pre-school teachers how best to communicate with their charges.)

And they are the ones composing our corporate prayer it seems.
I know I have railed before about the particular, er, I mean general intercessions.
"For the XXXXs and expecially Y, that..."

Why Y? why him especially?
Yeah, sure we may know Y personally, but what is that to God?
Wouldn't it be better to pray "For Y, and for all the other XXXXs..." reminding us that we personally know someone going though some trial but thre are faceless millions if not billions more undergoing the same trial with no one to pray for them, to whom we owe just as much love?
For that matter how do you know, composer of the Prayer of the Faithful, or lay reader directing us for whom and for what to pray that those faceless unknown are faceless and unknown? Perhaps when you want me to pray "especially" for Y, I want "especially" to pray for my cousin Z who is, unknown to you, in the same predicament.
For a while our Prayer of the Faithful was coming off the ticker on CNN, "For the 7 farmers in Mongolia who...., the NATO leaders meeting at..."

But even worse is the "O Lord, for so-and-so, (so far so good) that thus-and-such,"so that we not only present the Almighty with our concerns, but then proceed to give Him advice on what WE think He ought to do about them.

And most jarring of all, like the bad old devotional waltzes and ballads of yesteryear and the smarmy religious crooners ditties of today, many prayers lack diffidence and display an excess of affect in their expression that makes them unsuitable for corporate prayer.

I found myself recently reading, "rattling off," I could say, as part of a "ritual," with several hundred others, a long rambling prayer that went, in part, ""Teach me how to pray. Sometimes I am speechless and don't know what to say. Often I simply rattle prayers of others or count on rituals to please you. Help me get in touch with my heart."

You do the math...

Without You we can do nothing...

I think you've done well if you can take one gem, one single nugget of wisdom away from a work-shop, or day of reflection.
Sifting through the bushels of facilitator-speak, there is almost always some kernel of great truth to be found, right?
And besides, this is the midwest, the hospitality is always generous, the food always good.

I attended one diocesan thang when I had just begun doing this for what I laughingly 9or laughably?) call a "living", where the key-note speaker, possessor of a very Big Name in the liturgical-industrial complex, began his address smiling about all the work he had put in on the past Christmas.

"I did THIS, and this, and then I did that, and I had done all of those, and gotten new ones of these and spent all this time planning that, and arranged and wrote and stapled and composed and phoned and directed and played and found and persuaded and taught and...."
He had a stand-up's timing, and a funny charming manner, and I thought excellent, and waited for the punchline.

And it came, "and then at 12:05 pm I slumped on the organ bench and thought, is that all there is? isn't anybody going to THANK US for the Christmas liturgies we made for them, all the things we gave them?"

And we all roared with recognitions, and I thought good, now he'll give us sitting here all smug the zinger we deserve -- WE didn't make anything, GOD DID IT ALL.

Of course you will always feel dissatisfied if you are looking for credit for something you didn't do. (Not to mention a fundamental misunderstanding of the identity of your employer/boss/client. Hint: not the guy who signs your check. As Gaudi liked to remark)

But that wasn't where he went with it, his talk went on to be about how we as pastoral musicians must avoid burn-out since we are so under-appreciated.
He wasn't being ironic at all! And around me people nodded even more knowingly at that!

So the nugget of wisdom I took away from that day didn't come from the speaker -- it was my realization that if the whole thrust of liturgical planning as taught by the LIC, and the focus of so much of the music, (actually, the texts thereof,) pushed by the LIC seems wrong, wrong, wrong... well there's a reason for that.

And that is that their understanding is wrong, wrong, wrong.

They really DO think it's all about what we do and what we're gonna do, and what we can do... no wonder so much of the prayer we sing is Pelagianism Lite.

But the leading lights of the LIC are coming around:

About 18 months ago I heard a lecture by a prominent liturgist who suggested that, instead of thinking that the liturgy is primarily the "work of the people"—as it is described in many liturgical circles—we should first think of the liturgy as the work of God. Look at that prayer again: "for when we proclaim the death of the Lord (the very definition of what we do at Mass) you continue the work of his redemption." God is always at work; working on each and every one of us and we experience this at Mass when we celebrate the Eucharist, proclaiming the cross and resurrection of Christ. But this is a holy exchange of work, for we must do our part, the necessary work that it takes to "proclaim the death of the Lord."

When I shared this with the members of the liturgy and spiritual life committee at our meeting last night, it dawned on me that this is a great stance to have when going to Mass: expecting that God will be hard at work on me, while I am doing the work of the liturgy.

I need to find "A Prayer Before Blogging"

Zenit carried this:

Benedict XVI has chosen to dedicate World Communications Day 2010 to the theme "The priest and pastoral ministry in a digital world: new media at the service of the Word."

The message for the 44th world day is addressed especially to priests, as the Church continues to celebrate the Year for Priests. The message also comes in the wake of last October's synod of bishops on the Word of God.

A communiqué from the Pontifical Council for Social Communications announced the theme today, feast of the archangels.

The Holy Father urges priests to "consider the new media as a powerful resource for their ministry in the service of the Word and wishes to express a word of encouragement in order to address the challenges stemming from the new digital culture," the communiqué explained. "If the new media is adequately known and appreciated, it can offer priests and all pastoral agents a wealth of data and content that previously was difficult to access, and it facilitates ways of collaboration and growth of communion that were unthinkable in the past."

Reaching out

The communiqué highlights the fact that "thanks to the new media, those who preach and make known the Word of life can reach, with words, sounds and images [...] individuals and whole communities on every continent."

This enables the creation of "new areas of knowledge and dialogue, enabling one to propose and carry out programs for communion," the council affirmed. "If used wisely, with the help of experts in technology and the culture of communion, the new media can thus become for priests and all pastoral agents a valid and effective instrument of true and profound evangelization and communion."

The Pontiff's statement suggests the hope that the communications media will be a new way to bring Christ to the streets.

"The priest's principal responsibility is to proclaim the Word of God made flesh, man, history, thus becoming a sign of that communion that God effects with man," the communiqué noted.

The World Day of Communications is the only worldwide celebration established by the Second Vatican Council. It is observed in most countries the Sunday before Pentecost.