MUSIC IN CATHOLIC WORSHIP

Bishops' Committee on the Liturgy
United States Catholic Conference
1972

I. THE THEOLOGY OF CELEBRATION

2. We do not come to meet Christ as if he were absent from the rest of our lives. We come together to deepen our awareness of, and commitment to the action of his Spirit in the whole of our lives at every moment. We come together to acknowledge the love of God poured out among us in the work of the Spirit, to stand in awe and praise.

3. We are celebrating when we involve ourselves meaningfully in the thoughts, words, songs and gestures of the worshipping community - when everything we do is wholehearted and authentic for us - when we mean the words and want to do what is done.

4. People in love make signs of love, not only to express their love but also to deepen it. Love never expressed dies. Christians' faith in Christ and in each other, must be expressed in the signs and symbols of celebration, or it will die.

5. Celebrations need not fail, even on a particular Sunday when our feelings do not match the invitation of Christ and his Church to worship. Faith dose not always permeate our feelings. But the signs and symbols of worship can give bodily expression to faith as we celebrate. Our own faith is stimulated. We become one with others whose faith is similarly expressed. We rise above our own feelings to respond to God in prayer.

6. Faith grows when it is well expressed in celebration. Good celebrations foster and nourish faith. Poor celebrations weaken and destroy faith.

7. To celebrate the liturgy means to do the action or perform the sign in such a way that the full meaning and impact shine in clear and compelling fashion. Since these signs are vehicles of communication and instruments of faith, they must be simple and comprehensible. Since they are directed to fellow human beings, they must be humanly attractive. They must be meaningful and appealing to the body of worshippers, or they will fail to stir up faith and people will fail to worship the Father.

8. The signs of celebration should be short, clear, unencumbered by useless repetition; they should be within the people's power of comprehension and normally should not require much explanation.

If the signs need explanation to communicate faith, they will often be watched instead of celebrated.

9. In true celebration each sign or sacramental action will be invested with the personal and prayerful faith, care, attention and enthusiasm of those who carry it out.

II. PASTORAL PLANNING
FOR CELEBRATION

11. The power of a liturgical celebration to share faith will frequently depend upon its unity - a unity drawn from the liturgical feast or season or from the readings appointed in the lectionary and artistic unity flowing from the skillful and sensitive selection of options, music and related arts. The sacred scriptures ought to be the source and inspiration of sound planning, for it is the very nature of celebration that the gathered assembly hear the saving words and works of the Lord and then respond in meaningful signs and symbols. Where the readings of the lectionary possess a thematic unity, the other elements ought to be so arranged as to form a setting for and response to the message of the Word.

12. The planning team or committee is headed by the priest (celebrant and homilist), for no community can experience the security of a unified celebration if that unity is not grasped by the one who presides, as well as by those who have special roles.

The planning team should include those with the knowledge and artistic skills needed in celebration - men and women trained in music, poetry, and art, and knowledge in current resources in these areas - men and women sensitive to the present day thirst of so many people for the riches of scripture, theology and prayer. It is always good to include some general members of the community who have not taken special roles in the celebrations, so that honest evaluations can be made.

13. The planning should go beyond the choosing of options, songs, and ministers to the composition of such texts as the brief introduction, general intercessions, and other appropriate comments as provided in the General Instruction on the Roman Missal. The manner of inviting the people to join in a particular song may be as important as the choice of the song itself.

14. In planning pastoral celebrations, the people, the occasion and the celebrant must be taken into consideration.

THE PEOPLE

15. "The pastoral effectiveness of a celebration depends in great measure on choosing readings, prayers, and songs which correspond to the needs, spiritual preparation and attitudes of the participants." (General Instruction, 313) A type of celebration suitable for a youth group may not fit in a retirement home; a more formal style effective in a parish church may be inappropriate in a home liturgy. The music used should be within the competence of most of the worshippers. It should suit their age level, cultural background and level of faith.

16. Variation in faith level raises special problems. Liturgical celebration presupposes a minimum of biblical knowledge and a deep commitment of living faith. Lacking these conditions, the liturgy may be forced to become a tool of evangelization. Greater liberty in the choice of music and style of celebration may be required as the participants are led toward that day when they can share a growing faith in the whole community. Songs such as the psalms may create problems where faith is week. Music, chosen with care, can serve as a bridge to faith as well as an expression of it.

17. The diversity of people present at a parish liturgy gives rise to a further problem. Can the same parish liturgy be an authentic expression for a grade school girl, her collage-age brother, their married sister with her young family, their parents, their grandparents? Can it satisfy the theologically and musically educated along with those lacking in training? Can it please those who seek a more informal style of celebration? The planning team must consider the general makeup of the total community. Each Christian must keep in mind that to live and worship in community often demands a personal sacrifice. Everyone must be willing to share likes and dislikes with those whose ideas and experience may be quite different.

18. Often the problem of diversity can be mitigated by supplementing the parish Sunday celebration with special celebrations for smaller homogeneous groups. "The need of the faithful of a particular age level may often be met by a music that can serve as a congenial, liturgically-oriented expression of prayer." (BCL, April 1966) the music and other options may then be more easily suited to the particular group celebrating. Nevertheless, it would be out of harmony with the Lord's wish for unity in his Church if believers were to worship only in such homogeneous groupings. Celebration in such groups, in which the genuine sense of community is more readily experienced, can contribute significantly to growth in awareness of the parish as community, especially when all the faithful participate in the parish Mass on the Lord's day.

THE OCCASION

19. The same community will want to celebrate in a variety of ways. During the course of the year the different mysteries of redemption are celebrated at Mass so that in some way they are made present. Each feast and season has its own spirit and its own music. The penitential occasions demand more restraint. The great feasts demand more solemnity. Solemnity, however, depends less on the ornateness of song and magnificence of ceremonial than on worthy and religious celebration.

20. Generally an assembly or choir will want to sing more on the great feasts like Christmas and Easter and less in the season through the year. Important events in family and parish life will suggest fuller programs of song. Sundays will be celebrated with variety but always as befits the day of the Lord. All liturgies, from the very simple to the most ornate, must be truly pastoral and prayerful.

THE CELEBRANT

21. No other single factor affects the liturgy as much as the attitude, style, and bearing of the celebrant: his sincere faith and warmth as he welcomes the worshipping community; his human naturalness combined with dignity and seriousness as he breaks the Bread of Word and Eucharist.

22.The style and pattern of song ought to facilitate the effectiveness of a good celebrant. His role is enhanced when he is capable of rendering some of his parts in song and he should be encouraged to do so. What he cannot sing well and effectively he ought to recite. If capable, he ought, for the sake of the people, to rehearse carefully the sung parts that would contribute to their celebration.

III. THE PLACE OF MUSIC IN THE CELEBRATION

23. Among the many signs and symbols used by the Church to celebrate its faith, music is of preeminent importance. As sacred song united to the words it forms an integral part of solemn liturgy. Yet the function of music is ministerial; it must serve and never dominate. Music should assist the assembled believers to express and share the gift of faith that is within them and to nourish and strengthen their interior commitment of faith. It should heighten the texts so that they speak more fully and more effectively. The quality of joy and enthusiasm which music adds to community worship cannot be gained in any other way. It imparts a sense of unity to the gathered assembly and sets the appropriate tone for a particular celebration.

24. Music, in addition to expressing texts, can also unveil a dimension of meaning and feeling, a communication of ideas and intuitions which words alone cannot yield. This dimension is integral to the human personality and to our growth in faith. It cannot be ignored if the signs of worship are to speak to the whole person. Ideally every communal celebration of faith, including funerals and the sacraments of baptism, confirmation, penance, anointing and matrimony, should include music and singing. Where the Liturgy of the Hours is able to be celebrated in a community, it too should include music.

Evaluation of Music in Celebration

25. To determine the value of a given musical element in a liturgical celebration a threefold judgment must be made: musical, liturgical and pastoral.

THE MUSICAL JUDGMENT

26. Is the music technically, aesthetically, and expressively good? This judgment is basic and primary and should be made by competent musicians. Only artistically sound music will be effective in the long run. To admit the cheap, the trite, the musical cliché often found in popular songs on the grounds of instant liturgy is to cheapen the liturgy, to expose it to ridicule, and to invite failure.

27. Musicians must search for and create music of quality for worship, especially the new musical settings for the new liturgical texts. They must also do the research needed to find new uses for the best of the old music. They must explore the repertory of good music used in other communions. They must find practical means of preserving and using our rich heritage of Latin chants and motets.

In the meantime, however, the words of St. Augustine should not be forgotten: "Do not allow yourselves to be offended by the imperfect while you strive for the perfect."

28. We do a disservice to musical values, however, when we confuse the judgment of music with the judgment of musical style. Style and value are two distinct judgments. Good music of new styles is finding a happy home in the celebrations of today. To chant and polyphony we have effectively added the chorale hymn, restored responsorial singing to a great extent, and employed many styles of contemporary composition. Music in the folk idiom is finding acceptance in eucharistic celebrations. We must judge value within each style.

In modern times the Church has consistently and freely admitted the use of various styles of music as an aid to liturgical worship. Since the promulgation of the Constitution on the Liturgy and more especially since the introduction of vernacular languages into the liturgy, there has arisen a more pressing need for musical compositions in idioms that can be sung by the whole community and thus further communal participation.

29. The musician has every right to insist that the music be good. But although all liturgical music should be good music, not all good music is suitable to the liturgy. The musical judgment is basic but not final. There remain the liturgical and pastoral judgments.

THE LITURGICAL JUDGMENT

30. The nature of the liturgy itself will help to determine what kind of music is called for, what parts are to be preferred for singing and who is to sing them.

Structural Requirements

31. The choice of sung parts, the balance between them and the style of musical setting should reflect the relative importance of the parts of the Mass (or other service) and the nature of each part. Thus elaborate settings of the entrance song, or Lord Have Mercy or Glory to God may make the proclamation of the word seem unimportant; and an overly elaborate song during the preparation of the gifts with a spoken Holy Holy Holy may make the eucharistic prayer seem less important.

Textual Requirements

32. Dose the music express and interpret the text correctly and make it more meaningful? Is the form of the text respected? In making these judgments the principal classes of texts must be kept in mind: proclamations, acclamations, psalms and hymns, and prayers. Each has a specific function which must be served by the music chosen for the text.

In most instances there is an official liturgical text approved by the Episcopal conference. "Vernacular text set to music composed in earlier periods may be used in liturgical texts."(sic, NCCB, November 1967) As noted elsewhere, criteria have been provided for the texts which may replace the processional chants of the Mass. In these cases and in the choice of all supplementary music, the text must always be in conformity with Catholic doctrine; indeed they should be drawn chiefly from holy scripture and from liturgical sources.

Role Differentiation

33. In liturgical celebrations each person who has an office to perform should do all of, but only, those parts which pertain to that office by the nature of the rite and the principles of liturgy. Special musical concern must be given to the role of the whole assembly, the cantor, the choir, and the instrumentalists.

The Assembly

34. Music for everyone must be within the performance ability of those who gather. The whole assembly must be comfortable and secure with what is to be done in order to celebrate well.

The Cantor

35. While there is no place in the liturgy for virtuosity for its own sake, artistry is valued, and an individual singer can effectively lead the assembly, attractively proclaim the Word of God in the psalm sung between the readings, and take his or her part in other responsorial singing. Especially when there is no possibility of setting up even a small choir, provision should be made for one or two trained singers. "The singer will present some simpler musical setting, with the people taking part, and can lead and support the faithful as far as is needed. The presence of such a singer is desirable even in churches which have a choir for those celebrations in which the choir cannot take part, but which may fittingly be performed with some solemnity and therefore with singing." (1967, Instruction on Music In the Liturgy). Although a cantor cannot enhance the service of worship in the same way as a choir, a trained and competent cantor can perform an important ministry by leading the assembly in common sacred song and responsorial singing.

The Choir

36. A well-trained choir adds beauty and solemnity to the liturgy and also assists and encourages the singing of the whole assembly. The Second Vatican Council, in speaking of the choir, stated emphatically: "Choirs must be diligently promoted (so that) the whole body of the faithful may be able to contribute that active participation that is rightly theirs." (Constitution on the Liturgy, 114).

At times the choir, within the assembly of the faithful and as part of it, will assume the role of leadership, while at other times it will retain its own distinctive ministry. This means that the choir will lead the people in sung prayer, by alternating or reinforcing the sacred song of the assembly or by enhancing it with the addition of musical elaboration. At other times in the course of liturgical celebration, the choir alone will sing works whose musical demands enlist and challenge its competence.

The Organist and Other Instrumentalists

37. Singing is not the only kind of music suitable for liturgical celebration. Music performed on the organ and other instruments can stimulate feelings of joy and contemplation at appropriate times. This can be done effectively at the following points:

• an instrumental prelude
• a soft background to a spoken psalm
• at the preparation of the gifts, in place of singing
• during portions of the communion rite
• the recessional

38. The PROPER PLACING of the organ and choir according to the arrangement and acoustics of the church will facilitate celebration. Practically speaking, the choir must be near the director and the organ (both console and sound). The choir ought to be able to perform without too much distraction; the acoustics ought to give a lively presence of sound in the choir area and allow both tone and word to reach everyone present with clarity. Visually it is desirable that the choir appear to be part of the worshipping community, yet a part which serves in a unique way. Locating the organ console too far away from the area of the assembly cause a time lag which tends to make the singing drag unless the organist is trained to cope with it. A location near the front pews will facilitate the singing of the assembly.

THE PASTORAL JUDGMENT

39. The pastoral judgment governs the use and function of every element of celebration. Ideally this judgment is made by the planning team or committee. It is the judgment that must be made in this particular situation, in these concrete circumstances. Does music in the celebration enable these people to express their faith, in this place, in this age, in this culture?

40. The instruction of the Congregation for Divine Worship, issued September 5, 1971, encourages Episcopal conferences to consider not only liturgical music's suitability to the time and circumstances of the celebration, "but also the needs of the faithful who will sing them. All means must be used to promote singing by the people. New forms should be used, which are adapted to the different mentalities and to modern tastes." The document adds that the music and the instruments "should correspond to the sacred character of the celebration and the place of worship."

41. A musician may judge that a certain composition or style of composition is good music, but that musical judgment really says nothing about whether and how this music is to be used in this celebration. The signs of the celebration must be accepted and received as meaningful for a genuinely human faith experience for these specific worshippers. This pastoral judgment can be aided by sociological studies of the people who make up the community: their age, culture and education. These factors influence the effectiveness of the liturgical signs, including music. No set of rubrics or regulations of itself will ever achieve a truly pastoral celebration of the sacramental rites. Such regulations must always be applied with a pastoral concern for the given worshiping community.