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Sacred Music
Music
Religious Music
Sacred Music
Liturgical Music
Why is music important to the liturgy?
“handmaid of the liturgy”:
bears the sacred words of the liturgy
Christ is present in his Word
and is, in fact, the Word of God
Music is the only sacred art that has the privilege and
responsibility of bearing Christ in his Word.
Why kind of music is appropriate
for the liturgy?
“[T]o ask what is ‘suitable’ must
always be the same thing as asking
what is ‘worthy.’”
Pope Benedict XVI
What instruments are
worthy of the liturgy?
PIPE ORGAN
• supports congregational singing by
providing powerful musical foundation for an
entire congregation singing with gusto.
• only single instrument that is versatile
enough to
- express the full range of human emotion,
while at the same time
- help to draw our minds to the power and
grandeur, tenderness and mercy of God.
What instruments are
worthy of the liturgy?
HUMAN VOICE
• All other instruments were modeled after the
human voice.
CHOIR AND ASSEMBLY
• The choir and the assembly are the musicians
that are most vital to the liturgy.
Why should I sing at Mass?
“…the faithful assemble for no other object than
that of acquiring this [true Christian] spirit from its
foremost and indispensable font, which is the
active participation in the most holy mysteries and
in the public and solemn prayer of the Church”
(Pius X – Tra le sollecitudini, 1903).
Congregation encouraged to chant Ordinary:
“In order that the faithful may more actively participate
in divine worship, let them be made once more to sing
the Gregorian Chant, so far as it belongs to them to take
part in it” (Pius XI – Divini Cultus, 1928).
Why should I sing at Mass?
“Through this active and individual participation, the
members of the Mystical Body not only become daily more
like to their divine Head, but the life flowing from the
Head is imparted to the members…”
(Pius XII – Mediator Dei, 1947).
Through grace, the liturgical assembly partakes in the life of the Blessed
Trinity, which is itself a communion of love. In a perfect way, the
Persons of the Trinity remain themselves even as they share all that they
are. For our part, “we, though many, are one body in Christ and
individually parts of one another.”The Church urges all members of the
liturgical assembly to receive this divine gift and to participate fully
“depending on their orders [and] their role in the liturgical services.”
Within the gathered assembly, the role of the congregation is especially
important.
(USCCB – Sing to the Lord, 2007)
20-21st Century Catholic Liturgical Reform
Documents
Pius X
Motu proprio: Tra le sollecitudini
1903
Pius XI
Divini Cultus
1928
Pius XII
Mediator Dei
1947
Pius XII
Musicae Sacrae Disciplina
1955
SCR*
De musica sacra et sacra liturgia
1958
Vatican II
Sacrosanctum Concilium
1963
SCR*
Musicam Sacram
1967
USCCB
Sing to the Lord: Music in Divine Worship 2007
*Sacred Congregation of Rites
Pius X Motu proprio - Tra le sollecitudini 1903
Sacred Music must be:
Holy, “True Art,” and Universal
Appropriate
Inappropriate
Gregorian chant and polyphony
Anything secular or theatrical
Clerical (therefore male) choirs
Mixed choirs
Organ (winds by permission only)
Piano, percussion, bands
“…the faithful assemble for no other object than that of acquiring this [true
Christian] spirit from its foremost and indispensable font, which is the active
participation in the most holy mysteries and in the public and solemn prayer of
the Church” (Tra le sollecitudini, Introduction).
Pius XI
Divini Cultus
1928
Short reiteration of Pius X’s Motu Proprio, because:
“… these most wise laws in some places have not been
fully observed, and therefore their intended results not
obtained.”
Congregation encouraged to chant Ordinary:
“In order that the faithful may more actively participate in
divine worship, let them be made once more to sing the
Gregorian Chant, so far as it belongs to them to take part in it.”
Pius XII
Mediator Dei
1947
“Through this active and individual participation, the members of the
Mystical Body not only become daily more like to their divine Head, but the life
flowing from the Head is imparted to the members…” (#78).
Pius XII Musicae Sacrae Disciplina
1955
Organ and strings are instruments appropriate to liturgy
Ambrosian, Mozarabic, Gallican chants no longer overlooked
Considered appropriate for respective rites
Mixed choirs permitted
Vernacular hymnody allowed
4-hymn pattern: Entrance, Offertory, Communion, Recessional
SCR
De musica sacra et sacra liturgia 1958
Practical instruction on documents above
Forbids automatic instruments and recordings, but amplification allowed
Bells permitted (handbells associated with liturgy)
Paul VI
Sacrosanctum Concilium
1963
Liturgical music:
Adds delight to prayer, Fosters unity of minds
Confers greater solemnity upon the sacred rites
Chant and the pipe organ have the “pride of place” in the liturgy.
Pope Benedict XVI
on Sacrosanctum Concilium, 1963
Tension within Council document reflects tension inherent in subject
Desire to affirm “treasury of sacred music,” but
also desire to see liturgy open to common participation
Tension between art and simplicity of the liturgy.
example: Gregorian chant vs. participation
Participatio actuosa: “fatally narrowed down” to “evidence of external activity”
Article 30 of SC speaks of silence as mode of participation
SCR*
Musicam Sacram
1967
Three forms of liturgical participation
Sacramental
Internal - greater emphasis on need for silent participation
External – active participation manifested by singing
Catechesis should lead to more complete participation
4 categories of sacred music after the Council
Chant
Proper antiphons
Psalm/Gradual
Ordinary and Canon of Mass
Polyphony
Instrumental
Sacred music of the people = hymns
Pope Benedict XVI:
A Theology of Liturgical Music
Benedict XVI on Plato
“Through rhythm and melody themselves, pagan music
often endeavors to elicit an ecstasy of the senses, but
without elevating the senses into the spirit; on the contrary,
it attempts to swallow up the spirit in the senses as a means
of release. This imbalance toward the senses recurs in
modern popular music… Here music does not purify but
becomes a drug, an anesthetic… If music is to be the
medium of worship, it needs purifying; only then can it in
turn have a purifying and ‘elevating’ effect” (Feast of Faith,
118-9).
“Sing Artistically for God”
The Theology of Music from the Psalms
(A New Song, 102)
Psalm 47:7 – Two translations
Sing sapientier - with wisdom or understanding
Intelligibility = Word-oriented
Reason = Logos-oriented
Sing cum arte – artistically, with excellence
Challenges highest abilities of musician
Ordered, artistic singing
Example of Exodus
Theology of art developed from construction of the
sacred tabernacle:
*Artists themselves do not plan what might be
worthy of God and beautiful.
*Artists have been given understanding and skill
to carry out what God has instructed them to do.
The Lord “called by name” the principle artist
Shares with prophet vocation of “seeing together
with God” (New Song, 103).
Exodus to Psalms
This theology of art not depicted elsewhere in Bible, but
Psalter being dedicated to King David draws similar
analogy.
David gave God his dwelling place in Israel
He in turn showed the Holy People how to praise
God with dignity
Thus Old Testament theology of art is contained in the bene
cantare of the Psalms.
The criterion for a properly spiritualized
music that maintains its harmony with
Logos (Reason and Christ):
“Does it integrate man by drawing him to
what is above or does it cause his
disintegration into formless intoxication or
mere sensuality?” (Spirit of the Liturgy, 151).
“It is above all in Church music that the
sober inebriation of faith takes place…
[T]his intoxication remains sober, because Christ and the Holy
Spirit belong together, because this drunken speech stays totally
within the discipline of the Logos, in a new rationality that, beyond
all words, serves the primordial Word, the ground of reason.”
(Spirit of the Liturgy, 140).
“The whole of Church history can be seen as the struggle to
achieve the proper kind of spiritualization… [T]he fruit of
this struggle has been the great church music of the West –
indeed, Western music as a whole. The work of a Mozart or
a Palestrina would be unthinkable apart from the dramatic
interplay in which creation becomes the instrument of the
spirit, and the spirit, too, becomes organized sound in the
material creation, thus attaining a height inaccessible to
‘pure’ spirit. Spiritualization of the senses is the true
spiritualization of the spirit” (Feast of Faith, 119).
“[T]o ask what is ‘suitable’ must
always be the same thing as
asking what is ‘worthy.’”
Pope Benedict XVI