So this is a very interesting point.

Honestly, Kathy, I don't think it is so much an attachment to hymns that is a "problem." The problem has been the absence of settings of propers that are compelling and accessible for parishes. Unless you came to musicasacra.com, you could shop for weeks and never find anything. Propers dropped from Catholic consciousness. Not surprising in retrospect. In the preconciliar days, people were happy for Low Mass where propers were spoken by the priests, which enabled the choir and people to sing whatever they wanted so long as it was NOT the proper of the Mass - which is a very strange thing. High Mass mostly meant Psalm tones.

Plenty of evidence suggests that remedying this situation was one of the driving forces behind the liturgical reform. But look what happened. Everything was put in English and there were no sung settings of English propers. For a very long time, it's been hymns vs. the Graduale Romanum - a book that 1 in 2000 Catholic musicians even knows exists. So of course hymns swept absolutely everything.

But look: we are making progress toward fixing this situation. The scraps here and there are being assembled now into books, and we have already two full published books of sung propers in English. The SEP in particular points to the Gregorian ideal.

If we can come to look at propers as ESSENTIAL to the liturgical structure, NEVER to be overlooked or replaced, and see hymns as edifying musical elaborations or tropes on the theme of the Mass, hymns can take an exalted and beautiful role in liturgy. Everything is more wonderful when it is placed properly and used correctly.

Oh certainly! But it is a necessary first step. If there aren't any resources, it is hardly surprising that it is neglected.

Keep doing what we're doing now for the next 20 years. ;-)

Here are different situations that I would rank in descending order of their receptivity to propers:

1. EF or EF/OF Parishes (staffed by FSSP, etc., or occasionally by diocesan priests)
2. Individual parish Masses led by CMAA-trained musicians, perhaps at an off-hour on a Sunday (early morning or 1 pm)
3. The "high" parish Mass at a cathedral or other parish where both the DM and the pastor have a similar orientation towards and interest in sacred music
4. Other parish Masses under similar circumstances
5. Masses in large suburban parishes where the pastor and DM have differing priorities re: sacred music
6. Masses in large suburban parishes where neither the pastor nor the DM are interested in sacred music as such

I agree with gregp--20 years seems about right. On an optimistic day I think 15 years.

Except that average music directors aren't going to wake up one morning, look at the SEP, and say, "Oh wow! I can finally do the propers that I've wanted to do for the past 20+ years."

For a very long time, it's been hymns vs. the Graduale Romanum - a book that 1 in 2000 Catholic musicians even knows exists. So of course hymns swept absolutely everything.

Indeed, perhaps only one in a hundred "average music directors" even knows enough about the existence of the propers in chant form to be able to have that "Oh wow!" perspective.

There is one aspect of this distraction by hymns which perhaps has not been fully appreciated: namely, that especially here in the United States ours is a melting-pot culture that is, even today, still in the process of homogenization from very heterogeneous elements. This is at least as true for the Catholic church in America as it is in just about any other area. The church culture in America today isn't "Italian" or "Irish" or "German" or "English" or "Spanish" or "Polish" or "whatever" ... nor has it been for decades - any more than secular culture in America is "Italian" or "Irish" or "German" or "English" or "Spanish" or "Polish" or "whatever" ... and we have been influenced as much by the catholic cultures of those thrown into the melting-pot just as much as our secular world has been.

American religious culture, including Catholicism, has been also influenced by the way in which hymns (including hymn writing and hymn singing) took root in a still youthful, expanding America and flourished, albeit largely through Protestant subcultures (Wesleyan and Anglican hymns, German chorales, etc.). Even German Catholicism has been influenced by the Lutheran chorale tradition.

Do we really expect that, when we attend a Roman Catholic Mass in the United States, then suddenly we are supposed to be transported into a carbon copy of exactly what everyone else is supposed to be doing? Is that really what the Church and we ourselves want? Vatican II came and went - and forever changed the landscape for good or for bad - but so did "1984" (a long time ago).

Dare I be blasphemous enough to suggest that hymns can be and are such a distraction because some of them are actually good, noble, uplifting, theologically and devotionally sound, ... and in some ways appropriate?

Good timing from my POV, as we celebrate our 150th anniversary tonight (finally!) which provides the opportunity to "showcase" what Jeffrey describes and what many of us have been furtively folding into normative expectations, aka Mahrt's "Stuffed Mass." (Though RollingRon dubs me Mr. Circumambulation) I've yet to convince my pastor to begin the Ministerial Entrance from the sanctuary/sacristy door at Sunday Mass, tonight we'll have a sequential procession of vested concelebrants from throughout the diocese, the introit of the celebrant and pastor, with the retired bishop of Monterrey in choir immediately behind. I say "showcase" because, finally, we can chant the Introit upon the celebrant's entrance and procession so the people can continue to watch the ceremony of the procession from concelebrants (joining in the antiphon if they wish) and as the celebrant and ministers reach the sanctuary to venerate the altar we seamlessly transition to a hymn. We rehearsed it last night with our MC and pastor, deacons and acolytes and I think my guy finally gets "it." It's in a word: catholic!
Neither Jeffrey nor many of us can actually prove that propers were "unlearned" after VII, but I'm equally unwilling to validate Todd F's assertion that they are random remnants of scripture cobbled together for people to "mark" moments at daily or "quiet" Sunday Masses. Having sung through the cycle over the last four years, it's simply obvious that the textual content of proper processional antiphons (we're likely not going to ever approach the gradual/melis. alleluia/tract) is an inextricable, integral element of the Liturgy of the Word. I'm also not sure that both "left and right" of the litwar brigades accepts propers as integral, as Kathy states. However, if there's an elephant in the room about this issue I believe it to be that recovering the normative expression of propers, just as hardly anyone rejects the lectionary cycle as a primary element of catholic liturgical praxis, restores a cultural identity we should own distinctively, that is "This is 'CATHOLIC.'" This might be seen as a prideful thing by ecumenists, but I don't buy that. The hallmark of Christian identity is humility, submission of ego to Christ and His Church. Well, like it or not, church fathers and their advisors articulated and continue to clarify the elements of liturgy. And we, all of us!, should LISTEN to the voice of authority that we can knowingly accept what it says, or reject it in the light of day, not just in the dark of buildings confining or the hiding place of the blogs. We are CATHOLIC and this is how we are do this, get over it.
I believe there's only a few of us who can actually assist in performing liturgy as we would, as the faithful, want to experience as a congregant. So we will continue to balance propers/hymns/songs in various forms and styles, mensurate or chant, strophic or otherwise. But to simply "give up" to the relentless mantra that 99% of everybody "chooses" option four every Sunday should be resisted militantly.
We must meet liturgy's needs locally and in the moment. If we have reached a threshold, as JT mentioned over at the Cafe, where English chant is a terminus for a while, then fine-that's where some of us will dwell. If others providentially are enabled to move towards a Latin NO/EF experience as normative, most excellent! If others still use majestic, solid strophic hymnody to mark the processionals, and render the ordinary and other propers in a sacred, universal and beautiful manner, huzzah!
But, if any parish music leadership opts for status quo, or "missalette liturgy" like an infant "opts" for pablum, or a nest of goslings for the regurgitated nourishment from the hen, they are recalcitrant, timid stewards like the servant who buried the treasure in the field rather than to risk a greater benefit.
Thus endeth the rant.

So I don't mind saying that I just had a wonderful phone conversation with Kathy about all these matters. We both agree that there needs to be MUCH more thought put into strategies for parish reform of music. This is tricky stuff and very exciting!

(Though RollingRon dubs me Mr. Circumambulation)

Hey, Charles! I thought whatever happens in New Orleans stays in New Orleans.

We must meet liturgy's needs locally and in the moment.

We as the current "bricklayers", while heeding that advice, cannot succumb "to the relentless mantra that 99% of everybody 'chooses' option four every Sunday." Jon provides another blueprint to the architectural design.

I cannot rebut the assertions of my hymn-loving, praise and worship co-parishioners that Col 3:16 "…sing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs…." not only validates but practically mandates that GIA and OCP be the sole liturgical music resources we use at our parish.
I am no musician - but is there a rebuttal you can suggest that I say to those who hate chant and have never heard of a proper?

I (like) Jeffrey's comment. Forward!

psst... bow ties are better (and no, I'm not JT in disguise).

:PX

Man sticking out his tongue, wearing a bow tie.

I am not distracted by hymns, but like them and use them - good ones, that is. My congregation sings them because we have a core of known traditional hymns, and don't throw something new at them every week. I use propers too. Propers, however, are choir and cantor pieces and are not music the congregation can sing. I suspect that may be a key reason they have disappeared in many places.

1. In many parishes only a few people may sing just about anything, but many will sing traditional hymns they have known or (if they are a bit younger) when they hear everyone else singing these hymns.

Yes, I agree with this....when we choose a hymn that they grew up with, the entire room comes alive.

3. The other hymns they "love" include some of protestant provenance (but these include quite a number that are theologically sound and widely accepted in Catholic practice, e.g. "Come down, O Love divine" and other hymns of Anglican origin, several of Wesley's hymns, and a goodly number of hymns/chorales of German origin), as well as a core of traditional Catholic favorites ... maybe you just don't program these?

These are hymns that I use...but are rarely sung in too many parishes.

Good hymns that combine good text and good music are rarely sung in many parishes.

Who's distracted?

Liam ... I agree.

FNJ ... You are so way off base about Catholic Elevator Music and hymns being "just time fillers" - it shows that you really don't understand the value and purpose of hymns - not as a replacement for the Propers, which is a red herring you're trying to drag across the trail. That hymns are cut short is the fault of narrow-mindedness, either on the part of the music director or of the presiding priest (or both).

Hymns tell a story and it stops the story dead to quit before the end. Saying that, however, we used to have an associate pastor we called "Last Verse O'Neil." After the mass had run over its alloted time, and folks were lining up outside for the next mass, you guessed it. Old "Last Verse" would still be lingering at the altar at the 7th verse of an 8-verse recessional hymn. Sometimes you do have to adapt the hymn to the realities of time.

Psalms tell a story, too, and we don't scruple about ending them before the last verse.

Yes, they are.

I can't help but think the reason discussions center on hymns so much is because on a sub-conscious level people know that in this country, in this day and age, if Catholics don't hear hymns at Mass they won't hear them anywhere else and if Catholics don't sing hymns at Mass, they won't sing the anywhere else.