How to respond?
  • ViolaViola
    Posts: 404
    I recently learned that First Holy Communions here are taking place on Corpus Christi. I had already planned music for Corpus Christi but have been told by the children's catechist 'of course everything must be child friendly'. Implying (I suspect) 'Give me joy in my heart' 'Bind us together' etc etc.
    I don't want to do this. I survived my own First Communion without any of this stuff.
    What do other people do for First Communions?
  • Liam
    Posts: 5,048
    What hymns would the children likely have already become familiar with?
  • NihilNominisNihilNominis
    Posts: 1,008
    Does the catechist sign your check? Run this by the pastor, and come back with his stamp of approval. I cantored a lectionary psalm at age 7 for my First Holy Communion. Child-friendly is relative.
    Thanked by 2cesarfranck Viola
  • TCJ
    Posts: 980
    Children take to true sacred music. Don't try stooping down to a level they don't need.

    For our First Communion, we have a special Mass, but we use the same type of music as any other Mass (lots of chant).
  • SalieriSalieri
    Posts: 3,177
    "Child-friendly" is really a contrived way of say "condescending in a cute sort of way". (Incidentally, this is also a problem with childrens' choruses--at least in the U.S.: In Germany and England children get to sing the Matthew Passion and Papae Marcelli, here they get "This little light of mine".)

    Give them something substantial and of true and lasting value that will follow them for the rest of their lives. At first communions in my place we alternate between the Franck 'Panis' and 'Deck thyself, my soul, with gladness', for the 'Anthem', plus whatever the propers are for that Sunday (always on Mothers' Day) with standard traditional hymns and Mass movements from Mass VIII and Willan's 'St. Teresa'. I have never had a complaint: the common response is about how beautiful and holy(!) everything is, especially from outsiders coming in for one day.
  • irishtenoririshtenor
    Posts: 1,313
    The catechist does not determine music. That's the end of it. You didn't ask for her opinion, so feel free to stuff it in the round-file.
  • CharlesW
    Posts: 11,965
    We had first communion a couple or three weeks ago. It was all Easter music, planned two months in advance, and no changes were made for first communion. That's the way I operate and the pastor backs me up. All said it was a lovely mass and first communion.
  • Ken of Sarum
    Posts: 406
    ALL music should be planned a minimum of a year in advance and approved by the pastor. PERIOD! That way, no one else appearing on the scene at the last minute can change things according to their likes or dislikes. Of course there are extremely rare situations, but that's it - EXTREMELY RARE SITUATIONS! Also, it should be a matter of established set in stone fact and policy between the pastor and music director from day one, as to the mission statement of the music program of the parish. No one else must be allowed to interfere. This policy and mission statement must be set down as part of any contract between the pastor, parish and music director. Otherwise, one becomes a victim of the day to day whims of whatever storm that might blow!

    Finally, anyone who supports a "child friendly" modernist mentality towards music in sacred situations must be immediately dealt with and put in their place. Many a music program of an historic nature and persons of great skill and ability, have been destroyed by this evil of stupidity and malicious cancer. It is akin to someone coming in on the scene after a great and beautiful gothic cathedral has burned and wanting to rebuild and remold it into some gastly and hediously deformed modernist mockery of what once was. So, plan well ahead, set things as much as possible in stone with the pastor's total approval and build!
  • a_f_hawkins
    Posts: 3,443
    If I am right in thinking that there is a diocesan schools music policy/person, I would guess that it would be their call.
    Thanked by 1Viola
  • ViolaViola
    Posts: 404
    Thanks for suggestions and advice. It occurs to me that we are catering for the needs of the parents too, and they are not best served by 'This is the day' etc.
    i'll go with what we had originally planned for Corpus Christi, which includes plainchant and also Franck's Panis Angelicus as mentioned by Salieri. If the catechist complains I can say truthfully that we are doing what the choir originally rehearsed for Corpus Christi; too late to change it now.
    We do have a recently appointed diocesan schools person, who is working to combat this sort of mentality and doing well, but it's early days.
    Thanked by 2irishtenor CHGiffen
  • a_f_hawkins
    Posts: 3,443
    Actually, I would not be averse to using This is the day as the recessional in our very small church on an occasion like this, YMMV. The sentiment is wholesome, one repeated every day of the Easter Octave, and it displaces none of the Propers.
    Thanked by 2Carol Viola
  • Carol
    Posts: 856
    I was taught "On This Day Oh Beautiful Mother" for my First Holy Communion Day which seems schmaltzy to me now, but I it loved as a child and still feel nostalgic when I sing it. I just cringe at the "lisping prayer" lyric. The nun who taught us wore a floor length habit and only her face showed out of her veil and wimple(?) As a child I thought she had a white box around her face.
  • Viola,

    You can't win an argument and you'll be lucky to have a civil conversation with a DRE (or even just a First Communion teacher) who thinks that everything is all about the children.
    Thanked by 2irishtenor Viola
  • bdh
    Posts: 4
    Agreeing with afhawkins, it seems to me that the recessional is a good place for compromise. I don't know about the Roman rite, but in the Ambrosian rite, the recessional is not actually part of the liturgy. We almost always have it and most people would not want to finish the mass in silence, but it is not specifically required by the liturgy. So, in my personal opinion, that is a good place for the requested child-friendly, upbeat hymn.
    Having said that, it is unfortunate that many of our pastors and youth leaders think that children need to be fed only children's music. When are they going to learn "grown-ups' music" if they are not exposed regularly to it and taught to sing it? I think there is a place for children's "Bible songs" which I love very much and always taught in religion class at school. But school, catechism, summer camp, picnics and such are the place for that music.
    Religious music should be part of our everyday lives outside the church, whereas liturgical music should be inside the church, in the liturgy and, like the mass, a "culmen et fons" for that everyday (Christian) life outside. The recessional can be an effective link between the two.
    Thanked by 3Carol CHGiffen Viola
  • Caleferink
    Posts: 432
    When you try to make something "child-friendly" in the sort of manner many think of that, it tells children that faith/religion/Mass/whatever is a childish thing. Then as they grow up they say they don't need such childish things, and we never see them again. Children are fascinated by things like chant and incense. In terms of scripture and prayer, their parents, as their first teachers, must help their children in comprehending whatever may seem difficult - and it means a ton of such parents need said catechesis! To put it bluntly, kids ain't dumb, so we shouldn't treat them as such.
  • SponsaChristi
    Posts: 395
    FWIW:
    As a young child, I always preferred the chants (the Litany of the Saints sung at Baptism, the priest’s chanted parts of the Mass, which I used to sing with him, much to my parents’ disliking). I never really liked “kid friendly” church songs that they made us sing at our First Communion (His Banner Over Us is Love, Bloom Where You’re Planted, etc).
    Thanked by 2Viola Carol
  • canadashcanadash
    Posts: 1,501
    We sang "Jesus My Lord My God My All" post communion
    Everything else were Easter Hymns.
  • CharlesW
    Posts: 11,965
    We only do first communions for the CCW children - I think that is what it is called. These are the kids who go to public schools. The parochial school's management has been divided among 3 or 4 parishes, so we don't have that financial burden by ourselves any more. The communions are handled elsewhere. However - and the Lord must be watching over me - the DRE is an immigrant from England with definite High Church tendencies. We get along great and she is delighted with good music.
  • PaxMelodious
    Posts: 435
    What do we do? The school runs the whole show - right down to having the event during the week, not on Sunday. I have no say in what they do - but do make sure they know they're welcome to use the equipment.

    What would I do in your situation? I'd have quite a detailed conversation with the catechist about what they believe "child friendly" means in this context. I'd explain that of course there's already a plan for the day, but that you're happy to review it. I'd listen to find out what exactly the children know - and I'd try to verify that with some of them, not just the teacher. I'd make no promises, but say that I'd investigate what's possible. Most likely after that, I'd make minimal change to the existing plan. But I'd
    1) have been open to possibilities, and
    2) have left the door open for future conversations in way that saying "nope" immediately doens't do.

    Does the FC preparation programme include any music - how can you contribute to this, to help the childers and their parents get exposure to church music before The Big Day. If it does have music, but then you do something totally different on the day, it can be very confusing and alienating for the kids.
    Thanked by 3Carol Viola bdh
  • Viola,

    One piece of advice: don't begin the attempt to head off a collision while you're in the middle of the collision. Start the work in June or August, or something like that, when you're inquiring how things might be done differently.
  • Jeffrey Quick
    Posts: 2,077
    ALL music should be planned a minimum of a year in advance and approved by the pastor. PERIOD! That way, no one else appearing on the scene at the last minute can change things according to their likes or dislikes.


    It's a wonderful thing to have a program running at such a high level of consistency that one can do that. I don't know who I'll have from week to week sometimes, let alone next year, or what positive opportunities will come up.
  • ViolaViola
    Posts: 404
    I identify with the last post. Today we have had to withdraw from doing 'Jesu Joy of MD' because of a lack of tenors (one away to a funeral, one working off-shore, one hadn't practised it, one a student gone home for the weekend and the other one just didn't show up.) One of our basses volunteered to try tenor but found the part way too high.
    Sigh
    Thanked by 2CHGiffen Carol