Posted on 01/31/2016 1:45:08 PM PST by marshmallow
Bishop John Doerfler of Marquette, Michigan, has issued directions for all parishes in the diocese to institute programs that will lead to the congregation chanting the Ordinary parts of the Mass.
Following up on the work of his predecessor in Marquette, then-Bishop Alexander Sample (who is now Archbishop of Portland, Oregon), Bishop Doerfler has called for the action to carry out the vision of Vatican II, which encouraged the use of Gregorian chant and congregational involvement in the singing.
In a pastoral letter released in 2013, Bishop Sample had also called attention to the Council's directives on liturgical music, as well as similar directives from post-conciliar Pontiffs and from the US episcopal conference. "Given all of this strong teaching from the Popes, the Second Vatican Council, and the US bishops, how is it that this ideal concerning Gregorian chant has not been realized?" he asked. Bishop Doerfler said that he was taking action to realize his predecessor's ideal.
(Excerpt) Read more at catholicculture.org ...
Where`s my Liber Usualis” I know I put it somewhere hmmmm
Chant is good. Chant and cantor is better.
We used to chant at my parish in San Antonio. Our choir director had an enthusiasm for it for a while. However, based on the reaction to our occasional attempts with my Spanish choir, it’s white noise to the Hispanics.
We do chant and cantor at most of our Masses. It is really nice and everyone has gotten used to it.
Axios!
I love Gregorian chant. When I was in college, before I was a Catholic, I used to accompany my sorority sisters to Mass at the Newman Club in Berkeley. At that time, Newman Hall was in an old, beautifully paneled building and Mass was held upstairs. They used something called “The Congregational High Mass”. This was before Vatican II.
If you arrived a tiny bit late (which happened because we all walked) you could hear the strains of the chant drifting down the stairs and out the doors before you ever actually arrived. It was mystical and probably contributed to my conversion.
Later, after I was married, my husband used to fish in a pond on the St. Mary’s College, Orinda, campus. You could hear the Brothers chanting vespers in the evenings. The music would drift across the meadow. So soothing! Didn’t matter whether you caught any fish. More reverant than church!
Very good.
Therefore, the bishop said, all parishes in the Marquette diocese will be expected to teach chant to the faithful, and introduce the regular chanting of the Ordinary parts of the Mass. These steps, Bishop Doerfler said, “can be taken by the smallest parishes in the diocese.” He ordered that all parishes have chant programs in place by the end of the year 2020.
Bishop Doerfler also announced that the diocese would prepare its own hymnal, and only music from that hymnal will be approved for use at Mass in the diocese. He said that a diocesan director of sacred music will be appointed, to help parishes instruct the faithful and prepare for the new programs.
References:
“Sing to the Lord, All the Earth!” (Marquette diocese)
Bishop Sample issues pastoral letter on sacred music (CWN, 2/15/13)
Wow, a bold step!
Thanks for sharing a beautiful memory.
Have you seen the new Newman Hall Center (College Avenue and Dwight Way)? Brutal concrete structure. They try to soften the interior with felt banners.
The closest I get to it is on CDs and Youtube.
“Liber Usualis”!
I still have my copy, 100% in Latin. It was given to me in 1973 by a young priest who knew how much I missed the Tridentine liturgy & that I was already sick of guitars, tambourines, and the `sign of peace’.
“What’s past is prologue.”
Oh yes. My husband helped raise money for that building the last year he was in college. It is stark. When it first opened, howeve, they used the Gothic crucifix and priest’s chair on the altar. I thought it was a gorgeous mix of new and old.
Then, one day the old furniture and crucifix vanished and that new “early stonehenge” furnitture showed up. The space lost all its charm.
Do you know why it’s not completly “in the round”?
A neighboring property owner refused to sell to the Catholic church for the new structure, and he even wrote it into hs will with a deed restriction that hs property was never to be sold to the Catholic Church. (Deed restrictions were legal on those days in CA)
The architect just modified the drawings so that the new building has a chunk taken out of it. It’s like a missing piece of pie.
When that building first opened pre Vatican II, we had something called “Prayers of the Faithful”. We still have that, but it’s different now. In the mid 60s at Berkeley, the congregation was encouraged to stand up and offer spontaneous prayers.
One Sunday morning, after a particularly “hot” Berkeley demonstration where a grad student had been shot and killed by a National Guardsman, a student stood up and offered prayers for the soul of xxxx Rector (the young man who had died the day before.) The atsmosphere of the church was glum and grim, as you can imagine. The next person who stood up asked for prayers for his “friend who has finals the following week” and everybody starting laughing.
They discontinued spontaneous prayers from the assembly shortly after that.
Finally a good move from our bishops.
It was 50+ years ago. The "whole congregation" part, as I remember it, never happened because it was swamped by the appalling post-V2 tsunami.
But anyway, the whole congregation basically "saying" what the acolytes said, and "chanting" what the choir was chanting, was what was then called "Liturgical Reform": the "Dialogue Mass." I'm still for it.
Archbishop Sample is a great blessing to the Portland, OR, area. I have family there, and they send me some of his letters. We just need a few hundred more like him.
50+ years ago, I hadn’t been born. I recently concluded that I’m not Catholic enough for those who are Catholic enough. I don’t care if the choir is singing Halestorm songs in Spanish and the priest is speaking Swahili. The only liturgical concern I have is whether my children need to be removed before someone clubs them with a chair.
Beautiful story, thanks for sharing it!!!
For what reason?
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