Yes, that is the perspective I desire to have- gratitude. Thank you for the reminder. :)

Any less from a Byzantine church would be unheard of, shocking!
Any less from a Roman rite church is disgustingly par for the course, sickening.
(When it comes to liturgy, Roman Catholics just don't get it!)

Man there's so much brain power on this forum! I am humbled and abashed. Just yesterday my 3 year old was singing the alphabet song, and I think I got most of it.

Why rehearse if music for mass is changed at random? How do your singers have any certainty?

That is truly sad. It also presumes that their "favorites" compliment the scriptures for the particular day. My deepest sympathies to the congregation and the organist. I could not work that way.

I don't think it matters which way it cuts. That is not the way to treat a colleague. That should have earned you an apology at least. The one thing that I can't anticipate is surprise. Everyone involved in liturgical music should know exactly which hymn is next. What happens to your ability to work together when something like that happens? We have got to develop a level of trust in order to unite our efforts.

I ALWAYS made a 'choirbook' out of ALL the music included in EVERY liturgy, no matter which one it was; funeral, Sunday Mass, feast day, and everyone had the same book. There was NEVER any deviation from the program. NEVER. Improvs were the ONLY thing not in the book, and were only the concern of myself as organist. Inflexible? No. This is how the liturgy deserves to be treated, thought out and well prepared right from the start, months and/or weeks in advance. If you 'want' something special, send it to me far in advance, thank you.

Francis is absolutely right. I also never walk into a liturgy without knowing exactly what must be done. While it doesn't take me very long to prepare (I assume that it doesn't take Francis that long either) the singers, musicians and other liturgical ministers need to be aware of what is coming so that they can respond properly. I really like the idea of a "choirbook", and I have already stolen...ahem...appropriated the idea and am preparing one for my parish. ; )

My Anglican Use parish uses the same Gloria (when appropriate) and Credo every Sunday. I think it is called the Anglican Folk Mass.

The OF Latin Mass on Sunday evenings (save Easter Sunday) uses Credo and Gloria III, with organ.

My Byzantine (Ruthenian) mission rotates the tones of the Creed, Our Father, and everything else as appropriate to the Byzantine tradition. Speaking of which, I am inviting everyone here to come to it (I am in San Antonio). Keep us in your prayers, if you please, as we discern our future home (our priest believes that it is time that we start standing on our own and start looking for a place to call ours---we have borrowing Roman chapels and parishes for three years now; our priest himself is a biritual Roman Catholic Dominican, convert from Orthodoxy, with a huge interest in early music and art). We are currently meeting at St. Brigid (Roman) Catholic Church on Kitchener Road (a tiny road), off Babcock Road (a major thoroughfare). (Just in case anyone happens to stop in, don't ask for Blaise, as there is already a Blaise at the mission----I am only using this name as a disguise to keep people from suing me if I say anything strange. :))

Anyways, I apologize for getting off topic, but I did notice the sung Credos and things.

One of my colleagues is using iPads for the cantor and organist with success, I'll have to inquire about how they are managing that...

Happy?

(Save the Liturgy, Save the World)

But generally speaking? It's wrong for them to sit mute as a matter of habit and claim "interior participation." We should participate BOTH ways.

If the congregation is singing hymns that one can stomach and can sing the words to in good conscience, then I don't think there's much excuse for refusing to participate. And I do think that we all should do what we can to encourage their participation.

It's nice, from the cantor's stand, to hear the congregants singing on par—might not be everyone—but it's a sizable "choir". To cantor to a congregation where 99% is not singing, can be disheartening, especially to think the role of the cantor is to transform the faithful from attendees to "choir".

But generally speaking? It's wrong for them to sit mute as a matter of habit and claim "interior participation." We should participate BOTH ways.

Is this forum now becoming a police state? Demanding people sing, banning the word _____ and even insisting that ALL MASSES BE SUNG? It's turning into a _______ shame and very confusing to good people who come here and...never post and "actively participate".

Where is it written that if you do not sing at Mass it is a sin? Are mutes permitted an exclusion or are they under the requirement to sign the hymn words while quickly interspersing the letter names for the notes - since they can't just say the words, they also have to sing them.

"Bless me Father, for I have sinned. I didn't sing at Mass three times this week, four times last week and the week before I even missed Mass because they were singing hymns I didn't know (they were in Spanish) and I realized that I had failed in the sight of God, all his angels and nitpicking musicians who have created their own laws for the church.

It's nice, from the cantor's stand, to hear the congregants singing on par

It is not the cantor's job to judge the congregation since it may be the cantor's poor efforts that are causing them not to sing and be disheartening.

It's not the cantors position to feel disheartened.

Priests should not feel disheartened when they preach and then people go out and sin anyhow. They have no control over people...and should not.

The same with cantors. Cantors should be studying the psalms and delivering them and that's all.

The Jewish temple has real cantors and they, being ordained, know what they are to do.

We are faced with folk musicians who only know how to play a few chords and cantors who only know how to sing a melody and suddenly they are "cantors".

Those are not church musicians.

When I attend church services of any kind I rarely sing. Am I _______ed for that? As a choir director I never, ever sing, and am I ________ed for that? Am I not fully participating?

At the choral mass I did not receive communion because I was working...but would receive at the next Mass. As a result there were complaints and concerns because the choir director was not receiving communion. The organist received at every mass, up to 5 on a weekend...

The problem is not a lack of active participation, it's people who choose to judge others when they have no right to do so or reason to do so.

If you are a cantor, organist or choir director and the people are not singing the odds are that there is fault here and the fault is with you in what you expect and are doing or failing to do.

Never blame the people. The people are the church. We are just employees of the pastor.

The feeling among church musicians that they have the right to criticize others always amazes me. They can even get people to delete the word ______ because they feel it does not belong on these sacred pages.

That's wrong. And this is exactly what went on in many churches pre-Vatican II and Vat II was an effort to squelch this mess. It's back and here on these pages.

Get out your pins so we can begin counting angels.

I decided some years ago to choose 25 or so good hymns that would be used often enough for the congregation to get familiar with them. Although my back is to them, I can hear the congregation singing over the organ. No one pressured them or entreated them. They picked this up on their own with cantors, choir and organ leading. I don't even have a cantor at my earliest Sunday mass. The congregation still sings and follows the organ. Making it their choice to sing or not sing has worked out well.

I don't receive communion at the choral mass, either. When I receive it is earlier when things are less hectic. I am also Byzantine and have a different perception as to frequency of communion. If I receive once on Sunday, it is enough, and if I didn't receive at all for some reason, that would be OK as well. Some days I just want to strangle an ill-prepared and inattentive singer, so I am not in any frame of mind to receive at that time. ;-)

The organist received at every mass, up to 5 on a weekend...

In case anyone wonders, current church law permits the faithful to receive the Holy Eucharist at most twice on a day. The second must be at a Mass in which one participates.

source: http://www.ewtn.com/expert/answers/communion_times.htm

NJ, why so angry? Judgmental diatribes are not likely to persuade anyone. We are all entitled to an opinion even if it isn't popular.

Kenstb,

It has been one of the tragic mistakes of the past 50 years to assume that results (audible and visible) are the measure of a "successful" Mass, pep rally, and other gathering. I won't speak for Noel. I found his response a passionate for musicians, pastors, liturgy committees and ordinary PIPs to assume that more prodding is the solution to the perceived problem of "non-participation". Perhaps the number of baptisms, confirmations, weddings and such would be a more effective measure of "active" participation?

I will have to look into that, Chonak. For my own church there is one Divine Liturgy and I believe that is traditional practice. There are other services, but they are Vespers, other hours, and memorials for the dead. There are many jurisdictions in the east and it is quite possible some may do differently.

I see no attempt at a police state. And no one, least of all me, actually said that someone is SINNING by not singing at mass.

Whether not audibly participating in the mass is a sin or not is up to one's conscience, and is between that person and God. If one goes to mass and is just being lazy and knows that he or she isn't really giving their best attention and effort, I think that could be sinful. If, on the other hand, one doesn't sing because they are embarrassed of their voice, or are quite depressed or they just can't muster it for a host of reasons, then obviously that's not sinful.

If the Second Vatican Council (or, more accurately, those who purport to implement it) took "participation" too far (i.e., claims that everyone must be singing and doing everything, at all times,) there are some "traditionalists" who take it too far in the other direction by claiming that participating audibly in the mass isn't important at all.

"Whether not audibly participating in the mass is a sin or not is up to one's conscience." No, it's up to God, and he has not commanded us regarding our responses in liturgy. I do agree it is a bad thing for one to habitually disengage in any way from the liturgy, but SIN? No. We can't even hint at that.

I don't know if we really disagree. I agree with you in that I'm not going to go and call something a sin if I don't know that person's heart, motivations and state of mind.

But I do think that if a person examines their own conscience and admits that perhaps they came to mass physically but didn't want to be there and felt lazy, and therefore sat deliberately unengaged, I think that perhaps that person could conclude reasonably that this was a sin. After all, what does it mean to attend mass? Could you avoid sin by being in the building, but listening to your ipod, totally divorced from everything around you?

In my experience, if the music and prayers are those that truly enhance the liturgy and are of beautiful quality and truly add to the worship of God, the people will participate as far as they are able. If they are not, the people will decline.

The clear follow-on to the notion that people HAVE to participate is this: parishes compete for parishioners by being "hip", "relevant", "up-to-date", and such apparently vacuous buzz words.

Therefore, I urge all to reject the notion that we know the interior disposition of congregants.

"Could you avoid sin by being in the building, but listening to your ipod, totally divorced from everything around you? "

Unless I saw something authoritative that said that was sin, I would not call it such. Not everything wrong or spiritually harmful to one's self is sinful. Sin requires, if I recall correctly, grave matter - that is, the act itself must be wrong. You can't sin by giving money to charity, no matter how much your heart is in the wrong place.

I would need to be convinced that disengagement from the Mass constitutes grave matter before I'd even consider using the s-word on it. It's spiritually harmful, yes. It's rebellious. But I don't think we're the people to decide whether it's a SIN. We ought to be encouraging people to participate actively in the Mass, not so as for them to avoid sin, but because it is the best way for them to attain the graces present in the Mass.

I don't mean to be contentious, for once. I'm just not comfortable with throwing around the word "sin" when that is such a specific category of action. (Like "heresy")

Sin requires, if I recall correctly, grave matter - that is, the act itself must be wrong.

Mortal sin requires grave matter. Venial sin, however trivial, is still sin.

I think we have a moral to this story. Be good to your wife. : )