It suggests One Bread, One Body and Seed Scattered and Sown as appropriate communion songs.
DOA.

It's not a great text by any means, and certainly not a "hymn". To compare it to the depth of thought of a truly great Eucharistic hymn like Schmücke dich would be the height of absurdity.

One bed, three bodies, ménage à trois...

.

Jackson, to be honest, I'm not surprised - despite the best efforts of Winkworth &c., Lutheran hymnody has not achieved a lasting status in the repertoire, at least on this side of the border. I would wager most of the bishops have never heard it; I've never seen it programmed in Mass even once.

That being said, the number of more well-known English-language hymns in the common repertoire that wipe the floor with their selections in pretty much every conceivable metric is damnably high.

Great, then sing the Propers instead of pop ditties. Welcome to the CMAA by the way.

I'm so pleased to see that the recommendations included several Latin hymns, confirming that they are perfectly appropriate musical fare for mainstream parish use.

Chonak, this brought me joy too.

While I'm usually quick to accuse the USCCB of sitting on their keisters, I'm glad they've made a positive statement for once. One glaring omission, however, is the fact that they've made no reference to the recent scandal. I'd have expected them to also include a footnote that some songs, while "theologically correct" might trigger abuse victims due to their compositional provenance. This, I suppose, would have been a more delicate thing (and perhaps subjective) to navigate.

I agree with you in principle; I'm just observing that if they are going to promulgate a document clarifying which hymns should be admissible to the liturgy, it would have perhaps been not entirely out of place to address that potential qualifier as well. But in general, I agree with you.

This is definitely a step in the right direction. My fear, however, is that the only people who read this document are those who already ignore the disapproved songs. I think that the contemporary churches might keep doing these songs even though the bishops don't want them sung. We will have to see how strict individual bishops are when it comes to enforcement.

The title is Catholic Hymnody at the Service of the Church, which is a much larger topic than Propers of the Mass. A hymn book like The Westminster Hymnal from 100 years ago contained nothing intended for use at Mass. Benediction, Holy Hour, Vespers, Processions, School Assemblies, ..., in England people sang at all these enthusiastically, but not at Mass. In formal liturgical worship the official text is paramount, the loss of Popular Devotions had, IMHO, a key role in our woes post VII.
Like Kathy I would like to see the document.

Hopefully this document has an effect on what is published in Breaking Bread, et al, as that is the way to effect change at the parish level.

It's also publicly posted at the Diocese of Marquette's website:
https://www.dioceseofmarquette.org/images/files/Catholic_Hymnody_at_the_Service_of_the_Church(1).pdf

The conclusion is a little disappointing, after the strong analysis: "guidance". Still, the use of real examples helps make this more convincing, and puts the examples squarely in the crosshairs.

I don't think that music is that important to many bishops.

I don't think that music is that important to many bishops.

I don't believe some get much seminary training in music. They are like everyone else, they know what they like.

Here's a summary of the document:
http://www.chantcafe.com/2020/12/doctrine-committee/
with a link to a full copy, OCR'd to make the text searchable.

Out of clemency, the document does not name any of the authors of the deficient texts, but I found the various works and listed them.

I had a choral professor who used to say of many who had "opinions" on the quality of music that "They don't know what they like, they just like what they know." I think this is often the situation and it is a terribly hard thing to break through.

jcr, this is an old survey that backs you up. "Familiar melody" is the PIPs' most important criterion.

http://www.newliturgicalmovement.org/2007/01/what-makes-people-sing.html?m=1#.X9QnrjNlAwA

Very interesting differences between the choir and the congregation on these matters! Reminds me of an old survey where Protestant ministers were asked for several kinds of input on inclusive language. When the congregants were asked the same questions, their #1 response was, "What's inclusive language?"

This is really, truly a golden moment for this to come out, as hymnals/missalettes have been taken out of pews everywhere for fear of transmitting the virus, and it will be some time before they can be put back.

But, without concrete action, I don’t see what good it does and suspect the Big Three Two will want to go right back to selling hotcakes. I would like to see the following:

1) Resolution by all American bishops to accept this document and jointly, give it the force of law in their dioceses
2) Joint apology of bishops who put their little + in the front of the offending books
3) Public censure of the editors of the offending books, who failed to exercise good judgment (as the doctrines referenced in this paper are not novel, and should obviously have been taken into consideration by anyone making a Catholic hymnal)
4) Require that all worship resources used from X date on entirely conform to this memo and bear an imprimatur, and require publishers of deficient books to supply corrected ones at no cost to parishes, or forfeit imprimatur
5) If Big Two are ruined by 1-4, then in 2022, we can have a press release saying “oh no! The USCCB recognizes a great pastoral need and promulgates The AmCath Hymnal and Kyriale, to fill the need left by the unfortunate bankruptcy of fine Catholic publishers.”

A very nice summary Chonak.

It will be interesting to see how this document will be addressed at the Diocesan level (edit: I also meant to say at the Parish level). Some of the examples of the approved songs could stand a little more scrutiny especially those in the "I" and "You" category.

I find it extremely telling that the document is--apparently--unavailable on the USCCB website itself. Thanks to those who posted it or provided links. Surely this document was significant enough to warrant at least a brief press release.

Many propers would not qualify.

Are you referring to the chopping up of fragments, as in one of this weeks OF Communion antiphons "You have prepared a table before me, and how precious is the chalice that quenches my thirst"? Perhaps you could enlarge on this thesis.
I have just spent several hours reading analysis of the Offertories in the Graduale, suggesting plausibly that the origins of the melodies can be discerned by looking at the source of the texts in different Latin Psalters from before Jerome's work.

Polska Piano,

In effect, the document says "we rule out anything which is clearly, unambiguously ambigious or heretical, but we won't rule out anything else; that's someone else's job".... or "Heck, it's a target rich environment, and we had to start somewhere!"

Schoenbergian, well used hymnals like thecSt. Michael Hymnal are chock full of Lutheran hymnody, and i would program it every week.