Ah, the Catholic liturgy.

This morning at Mass, our music minister was evidently on vacation. The music was provided by two different groups. Providing the offertory, one of the communion hymns and something else in an odd place (too long to explain) was a nice schola of 9 men whom I’ve seen and heard around – I think they float between parishes, providing music whenever they’re needed or permitted. Chant, other Latin pieces, mostly, although one other time, they did a Byzantine piece. They’re very good.

And in this corner, a piano, guitar and vocalist (although I believe, from past experience, the vocalist and pianist were the same person – I couldn’t see this time, however. I recognized the voice) who, not because of their intruments, but because of the style in which they used them and the music chosen, gave a nice evocation of 6:30 at the Holiday Inn Lounge.

It was many things. It was a good demonstration of the extremes of what’s possible to encounter in a Catholic Mass these days. Not good news, either. And part of the bad news is that the Chant/Latin guys were relegated to a "performance" role – perhaps it’s one that they want. Perhaps that’s the role they see their group playing. But in this area, we’re not yet seeing any efforts like Those which the St. Cecilia Schola is attempting to inspire and assist with.

The Recovering Choir Director gives some attention to recent remarks by Fr. Michael Joncas at the NPM convention (read through to the comments, as well)

Don’t forget the survey – if you’ve not yet participated

What the experience emphasized for me was, once again, the violence done , not to taste or aesthetics, but to the integrity of the liturgy as prayer. Not, again, by having sensibilities disturbed by poor "performance" or lousy "songs," but by the total effect of the liturgy being a bunch of words tied together or transitioned through by a bunch of discrete "songs" and "Mass parts" of varying styles (radically different in this case). I’ve blogged on this before, and it’s of course one of the things that really differentiates the experience of the contemporary Latin Rite from the Eastern Rite. The former, as it’s practiced in most parishes, gives a fragmented effect, rather than that of unity – a single prayer prayed, in voice and silence, by God’s people.