Liturgical Muzak Concert and Workshop in Bend, OR

I was appalled interested to see the following blurb in the Diocesan bulletin in the “Parish News” section:

Catholic Composer, author, and workshop presenter David Haas will present an evening concert at 7:30 p.m. Friday, March 8 and liturgy workshop Saturday, March 9 from 8:30-2:30 at St. Francis Church in Bend [Oregon]. A few of Haas’ well known songs are “You Are Mine,” “Blest Are They,” and “We Will Rise Again.”

Actually, I have no problem with these people bringing in David Haas for a “concert”; there’s no accounting for personal taste, after all. I do wish they would hold the concert in the parish hall rather than the church itself, though; that kind of “worship” music really does not qualify as sacred liturgical music, and so shouldn’t be presented in a church setting. The proof is in the pudding, indicated by this addendum:

People involved in all ministries from all faiths are welcome to attend.

How very ecumenical. There are probably people from “all faiths” who like that music, largely because there’s not very much authentically Catholic about those tunes. So let them all join the fun, but let’s not pretend that it’s the sacred liturgical music of the Catholic Church.

So it’s not the concert, but rather the “liturgical workshop” that bothers me. To my mind, the composer of “pop” worship music has no business conducting such a workshop. For one thing, his music has no place in liturgical worship!

In our Diocese, far-flung as it is, with little communication between parishes, there are different modes of “worship music” being used, but mostly things are pretty sad, with plenty of piano and guitar accompaniment, and the occasional tambourine thrown in for good measure. In the “Spanish” Masses, there’s often a tendency toward mariachi band music, or just the use of what seems to be the standard Hispanic hymnal, “Flor y Canto”.

I know of at least three priests who are trying to improve the quality – and liturgical correctness – of the music used at their parishes. One priest went on a quest to find something to replace “Flor y Canto” in his largely Hispanich parish; I do not know whether he was successful. Another priest replaced the standard OCP fare with a “The St. Michael Hymnal”. Still another is implementing training of the “choirs” in his cluster of parishes to sing the “Gloria” that is included in the new Roman Missal.

That last development brings us to another point: the “new translation” implemented in Advent of 2011 brought us a new edition of the Roman Missal which includes more music than any other previous edition. The intent of the bishops was clearly to induce the priests and the faithful to “sing the Mass”, rather than to “sing AT Mass”. As I’ve noted before, prior to the implementation of the new translation, the USCCB’s website promotion of the changes stated (my emphases):

[The Church] has been blessed with this opportunity to deepen its understanding of the Sacred Liturgy, and to appreciate its meaning and importance in our lives… [T]he parish community should be catechized to receive the new translation.  Musicians and parishioners alike should soon be learning the various new and revised musical settings of the Order of Mass.

That did not happen in our diocese. Oh yes, there was some “training”, almost after the fact, but it did not emphasize singing the Mass, nor were the musical settings of the Order of Mass given much attention. The main thing that happened throughout the diocese was that cards were placed in the pews with the new words people needed to learn for the Gloria etc., but there was no mention that we should be changing our liturgical music habits as well. And we didn’t.

There was an attempt in our Diocese by the Society of St. Gregory the Great to bring the idea of “singing the Mass” to our parishes. The Society is a membership association of Catholic laity formed in 2008 to promote divine worship in accordance with the Supreme Magisterium of the Church.  Though it’s been somewhat squelched by the powers-that-be, the Society, for a time, had its own schola cantorum, and regularly sponsored presentations and workshops on the Sacred Liturgy, Gregorian chant, and sacred polyphony. This isn’t happening currently…and sadly.

Without the leadership and direction of the bishop, there will not be uniform changes to the liturgical music used in a diocese. Across the US, there have been some bishops who took action toward catechizing the faithful about the music: Bishop Thomas Olmsted in the Diocese of Phoenix; Bishop Joseph B. McFadden of the Diocese of Harrisburg; and Bishop Alexander Sample of the Diocese of Marquette (and, please God, he may bring new life to liturgical reform in the Archdiocese of Portland when he takes on his new assignment!). I’m sure (at least I hope) there are others, as well. But not here.

Here, in the Diocese of Baker, we see those few priests already mentioned struggling against the OCP pop music tide; but then we find that the pastor of a large and influential parish (where a new church seems to be supplanting the Cathedral as a place for ordinations) is promoting exactly the kind of music other priests are trying to eschew. Lord help us!

Although Bishop Vasa did address some liturgical abuses through his pastoral letters when he was our bishop, he did not do much about the music. (Of course, he was transferred to Santa Rosa before the New Translation was instituted, so I don’t know what he might have done with that.) When Bishop Vasa came to the Cathedral for Christmas, Easter, and the Chrism Mass, he would often chant the preface and some other parts of the Mass. It was always a startling disconnect to hear him intone a prayer only to have it followed by a country western version of a sung response be the people, complete with tambourine-jangling and upbeat guitar-strumming. I always wondered why either he or the “folk group” did not hear the discontinuity and adjust for it!

When, oh when, will priests and bishops recognize and respond to the facts that a) Gregorian chant has pride of place in the Mass; b) the organ has pride of place in the Mass; c) Gregorian chant propers (and ordinaries) are the preferred music – in particular the text of those chants – for the Mass? The few bishops who have provided leadership in this area give me hope, but I am tempted to despair when I look at the Diocese of Baker.

“Save the liturgy, save the world”, says Fr. Z. If bishops all over the country don’t start to understand this and do something about it, things are going to get worse and worse in the world.

Oh…wait… 

Giving Life to Little Souls

I was greatly saddened by an article (reported by LifeSiteNews) by Emily Rapp, who says she would have aborted her son, had she known during her pregnancy that he had Tay-Sachs disease (which results in blindness, paralysis, and death at a very early age). She writes:

If I had known Ronan had Tay-Sachs… I would have found out what the disease meant for my then unborn child; I would have talked to parents who are raising (and burying) children with this disease, and then I would have had an abortion. Without question and without regret, although this would have been a different kind of loss to mourn and would by no means have been a cavalier or uncomplicated, heartless decision. I'm so grateful that Ronan is my child. I also wish he'd never been born; no person should suffer in this way—daily seizures, blindness, lack of movement, inability to swallow, a devastated brain—with no hope for a cure. Both of these statements are categorically true; neither one is mutually exclusive.

I don’t doubt this mother’s love for her son, and I don’t doubt her sincerity in wishing she could have saved him from his suffering. What mother doesn’t want to save her child from harm?

But her statement tells me something else about her. She does not know God as the omnipotent, loving, merciful Father He is. She doesn’t know the salvific value of suffering. She does not know that regardless of the suffering we endure on earth, it is nothing compared to the eternal happiness and perfection that is offered in Heaven to those who believe in Jesus Christ and follow him faithfully.

In the big picture, it really doesn’t matter whether a person’s life “is worth living” according to the standards we earth-bound human beings use to measure such a thing. Every life is worth living because it means a soul has a chance to enter Heaven and to exist for eternity in communion with God.

Holy Innocents

Once a soul has been conceived, parents are duty-bound to protect it and do everything within their power to help that soul get to Heaven. Killing an unborn baby takes away that soul’s chance for Heaven, even though we have assurance that the soul will be happy and without any suffering (see "Second Thoughts on Infants Who Die Without Baptism"). A newborn baby should be baptized as soon as possible to ensure entrance into Heaven should death befall the child in the early years of his life.


Had Emily Rapp aborted her son Ronan, she would have robbed him of his rightful chance for his place in Heaven. And just as a mother wants to prevent her child from suffering, so also does she hope for and strive to provide the very best for him. To that end, I hope Emily Rapp has had her son baptized. Then at his death, after she has watched him suffer in ways that she could not alleviate, she may rest assured that little Ronan’s soul is in Heaven, in the arms of God, and feeling no pain or suffering whatsoever. Denys the Carthusian describes Heaven like this:

My soul, how great and what priceless happiness will it be for you to see the God of infinite beauty face to face, and to be a partaker with Him in the depths of his sweetness. What will it be to possess forever, the All-High God, our only and changeless good! In Him, happily to hold and to possess, in overflowing measure, the fullness of all beauty, and of all that can be wished: yea, and safe in eternity to have your heart's wish; ah! Think what it will be! To taste a peace that is of God and made by Him: to plumb the depths of the sweetness of his love! What will it be, o my soul, to be caught up by the love of your Creator, to be made a partaker in the Godhead – how thrilling – how much to be longed after! And then, to be close locked in God's most loving arms, so that no one shall nor ever can tear you away from before the glowing gaze of his joyous countenance, nor from the embrace of his love!

There is no gift that surpasses that.


But…it’s not just the conceived souls about whom we must be concerned. There are also the souls who exist in the mind of God, and whose conception awaits a couple who will say “yes” to God’s invitation to give that thought life. The contraceptive mentality of our society has prevented untold numbers of these souls from coming into existence, all because we put our own selfish desires and concupiscences ahead of God’s plan for life, all because we “aren’t ready” or “we can’t afford another child” or whatever other reason we come up with that we think trumps God’s perfect will.

Pius XII, in his Address to Newlyweds (March 1941) said:

It will depend on you whether those innocent souls, whom the embrace of Infinite Love desires to call from nothing, shall come to the threshold of life, in order to make of them one day His chosen companions in the eternal happiness of Heaven. But alas! If they remain merely magnificent images in the mind of God when they could have been rays of sun that illuminate every man who comes into this world (John 1:9), they will remain forever nothing but lights extinguished by the cowardice and selfishness of man!

Openness to life means more than being anti-abortion.

It also means more than being anti-contraception.

It even means more than being pro-NFP.

It means…being open…truly open…to life. It means seeking God’s will in everything – especially in the conception and birth of children.

I’ll have more to say on this issue, but haven’t yet molded my thoughts into an essay; if you’re interested, keep checking back!  In the meantime, listen to this sermon by a priest who touched my conscience with his comments about NFP, the duty of motherhood, and the souls that are lost due to the contraceptive mentality of the world today.