This article from today’s Boston Globe Archdiocese takes steps to retool parishes raises interesting questions about the future. Considering that the priest shortage, declining attendance, and fiscal challenges extend beyond the Northeast, I’m wondering how such reorganization will impact church music in this country. Will the Catholic church musician be travelling each weekend from one town to another? Will he or she make more money, or less? Will musicians have less control over the choice of liturgical music, i.e., will there be a shift even more toward mandate by committee?
If clustering is indeed the future, how do you envision the implications for the church musician? Will it impact the goals and operations of CMAA? If so, how?
Merging and clustering demands you become primarily an administrator. That makes musicians crazier than they already are. (Humming "They're coming to take me away, ha ha.")
The horses are out of the barn. Let's spend time and energy redesigning the barn now to reflect that we have fewer horses to feed and less income due to the fewer number of horses that create income for us.
No time, energy spent or even interest in going out and getting the horses back in the barn? No admission that the massive changes that the church has permitted have caused the current situation?
The advertisements for musical jobs in these combined parishes have not painted a promising picture.
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