I hope the topic is not too redunant for people here who already know and experiened well enough. And I'm sure there are lots of good articles about it. But I wanted to share some wonderful experience I witnessed in our parish, and hope others will add some more too here.

Our small schola has been singing simple Gregorian chants on Saturday morning mass for about a year. At first, even our pastor, who gave a permission to do so, seemed to be concerned that people cannot sing along, and put limits on what we can sing.

Today, he announced to the people that we will be singing simple latin Ordinary parts on Sunday masses from next week, and he is glad we are prepared to do so through singing them on Saturdays. Although it's just Kyrie and Agnus Dei, you cannot imagine what this means to our church who never heard latin on Sundays. Also it's not just the fact that we are going to sing latin, but what he said was significant and made me cry. He said to people that this tradition will help us to be more reverent and prayerful. When I heard that, I realized this is what I've been waitng to hear in our parish.

Also one of our schola member after the mass told me today that he was sorry, because he really couldn't sing, because the chant was so powerful. He had tears and all. I said it's ok, and it's good that he is experiencing this overwhelming power of God and the joy of experiencing it.

Gregorian chant has been with our Church all the time, and its power will never fail to strengthen our faith even in modern times. The experience of the Universe, the universe of God and knowing that you are in it through this music is just so powerful, and cannot be descibed with words.

The homily was also perfect. It was on Noah, how he was ridiculed by people when he started to build his ark when the sun is high and no sign of rain. Faith from not seeing everything and not knowing everything, but acting on that little knowledge and making a committment for the call was so appropriate for what we are doing. Somehow, since I started to sing chants, all the scripture readings and prayers and homlies make so much sense to me than ever before. The faith is not just knowledge, it's the experience of that knowledge, and singing chants made that possible for me.

Our schola and I experienced so much grace today, and we were just overwhelmed by it. (Although many of us were choking and had a big lump in our throat from this beautiful feeing, we were able to finish the last chant safely by helping each other.) I pray that we can share this beautiful experience with others as much as we can in our parish.

I don't know my big title matches with our small experience, but I wanted to share it with others here. (Singing chants also helps me with courage too. ;-)
Thanks.