Also see Sing to The Lord, nos. 110-114, and the footnotes thereto.

Where does this "Progressive Solemnity" phrase/ concept originate? Is this something that your average American priest would be familiar with? I suppose not, looking at the original post....

At High Mass, everything was sung. All of it.
Also, rubrics which require a deacon and sub-deacon (and, I think, acolytes and/or additional servers).

In the EF, there is a difference between a Solemn High Mass ("Missa Solemnis") and a High Mass ("MIssa Cantata") regarding the ordained ministers, but the music and duties of the singers is the same for each.

The notion of "progressive solemnity" may have originated with the GILOTH, but it's been given greater credibility (in some circles, anyway) by its use and recommended application in SttL beginning at paragraph 110 et seq.

I have long maintained (and taught to students) that "progressive solemnity" is loosely based on the three degrees of participation codified in Musicam sacram, but in their re-application some things have been stood on their head. For example, I agree whole-heartedly that the dialogues between priest and people should be sung at every Mass where there is to be singing. This includes weekday AND weekend celebrations. The reason for this, in my opinion, is that by doing so the Faithful are more fully and authentically drawn into the action of the priest at the altar. By extension, I also assert that the remainder of those elements described in the first degree of participation in MS ought to be sung at every Mass:

- The dialogue before and after the proclamation of the Gospel (for the benefit of those who may not be familiar with these terms, what was called the "gospel acclamation" in the EF is now more aptly referred to as a dialogue, while the "gospel acclamation" as we now have it replaced the "alleluia" or "tract"; in the case of daily Mass, as there is only one reading before the Gospel, the GIRM clearly provides for its elimination if not sung - a practice that I find is often ignored, and the priest often chants the "alleluia" and the verse himself, which is not appropriate);

- The Sanctus, and by extension the "memorial acclamation" and "amen" [N.B. there is no "great" descriptor that belongs to this particular iteration of the "amen", that was an addition made by the progressives, so please stop referring to it as such!]

- The Lord's Prayer

The assertion in SttL that the "responsorial psalm" should be always sung, and that the processional chants at entrance and communion should also be sung greatly distorts the difference between degrees of solemnity, degrees of participation and how the various members of the Mystical Body rightly and appropriately participate in the Liturgy. If a parish has the luxury of a properly-trained cantor available to chant the responsorial psalm at daily Mass, then by all means do it. Similarly, if a parish has a cantor or group of singers capable of chanting the Introit and Communion (say, from the SEP, for example?), then more's the better. However, I also believe (albeit without documented support for my argument) that the daily Mass more properly resembles Missa recitiva while the Sunday Mass ought to resemble the Missa cantata, and that the degrees of solemnity are actually embodied in the levels and complexities of the ceremonials and NOT the music.

What I've experienced more often than not is that the daily Mass is a modified "four hymn sandwich" wherein those elements prescribed for the first degree (to be applied any time there is singing) are often completely eliminated, while those elements belonging to the third degree (which are elements properly sung by a schola, not by the whole assembly) are placed in the position of always sung, but replaced with hymnody (the fourth option out of four, but always the default).

Ultimately, there is a logic to the degrees of progressive participation set forth in MS, a logic that was pulled apart and recast as progressive solemnity, which to my mind has no logic to it - it's just a confused noise.

It was once asserted at a "breakout session" on the anniversary of MS (at an NPM convention) that because MS was written with a view to the EF (as the OF had not yet been invented from whole cloth by the ever-manipulative "concilium") that it is irrelevant and has neither discernible meaning nor binding force. This assertion was made by several noted "scholars" and "experts" in the field and it's an assertion I find lacking in intellectual honesty. With little effort, the principles set forth in MS can be applied to the OF by those who wish to maintain as much of an organic development of the liturgy as possible, thus rendering the non-binding and poorly-crafted "guidelines" of SttL the document that is irrelevant.

I see nothing wrong with progressive solemnity. Salieri, what you are describing is not progressive solemnity, that's somebody's made up whims pretending to be progressive solemnity. Progressive solemnity as required in musicam sacram is a very good thing.

When you have the chance, if you encounter these odd implementations of supposed progressive solemnity, I would suggest asking them what the church documents say about their practice, and when they can't back up their silly views in any way, show them musicam sacram. That's true progressive solemnity: starting with the most important things: the prayers of the Mass itself.

One variation on progressive solemnity as I've read some newer priests write about it is thinking of it in terms of the different liturgies of the same liturgical day. (The music-free early morning Mass, then varying degrees of music thereafter.) While not entirely foreign to the idea of progressive solemnity, it misses the mark: it's a progressive solemnity that would only be noticed by the ministers who are participating in multiple liturgies of the same day. Most American parishes are really a co-existing alliance of sub-parishes that tend to worship at regular times, with some variations due to variations in peoples' schedules. Anyway, your average pewsitter is not experiencing progressive solemnity when it's mostly about variations between liturgies of the same liturgical day. As opposed to what the documents mostly appear to be contemplating, which is variation of liturigies of different liturgical days and seasons.

Is there a better phrase we can use for this rather than 'Progressive Solemnity'?

"Singing the important things before you bother with the rest...?"
But I agree with Ben, the term suits.

that conjures up an image of priests in Bermuda shorts wearing polyester overlay stoles.

Well yeah, on the memorial of Blessed DJ Jazzy Jeff, maybe.

(Save the Liturgy, Save the World)

Progressive

So
Sol
Sole
Solemn
Solemnity

This?

Yes, the ability to sing should be a requirement for ordination. (But it isn't.)

And this requirement should actually have been made a few hundred years ago. (But it wasn't.)

And low Masses should never have been permitted. (But they were.)

And, yes, "the Orthodox will not ordain a man who can't, or won't, sing." (Even though I have met more than a few who can't, or won't.)

And, Pope Francis, who can't or won't sing, should never have been elected supreme pontiff. (But he was.)

And everything should be sung at every Mass, especially at the chief Mass of the day and all solemnities, as proposed by MJO. (But it isn't.)

And there should be no such thing as particular law in the Catholic Church. (But there is.)

And, yes, MJO, so much in life the Roman Catholic Church is, as you term it, a "travesty." But, lest you forget, you freely signed onto this ship of fools. So LIVE WITH IT.

It is what it is and I didn't say I like it that way. I have mentioned before that no one on this forum has the authority to either change laws or enforce them. So let's change the name of the church to Travesties R' Us! ;-)

Yes, the ability to sing should be a requirement for ordination.

Fr K,

I know this has been a joking matter in the past, but I'm dead serious when I say that recto to no is always an option. The amount of priests who couldn't sing reasonablly recto tono if they really wanted to and had practice is much smaller than you might think. One does not need to use the specific melodies of the preface and other dialogs if they are a burdon.

My pastor follows the requirements of musicam dacram, and although he doesn't use the preface tone in the missal, he chants it to a simpler one, because he realizes the importance of obedience.

And yes, he chants the dialogs with the people at daily Mass. There's nothing absurd about that.

Thanks for the comments, everyone. This is also my understanding of the concept as presented in Musicam Sacram.

Maybe this is isolated to my area of the country (Heartland), but it sounds like it is present in New England as well.

Allow me to explain: it seems that for many years, probably in the seminaries, an idea of "progressive solemnity" was advanced that ignores MS completely. In application, this means that a priest who is observing the principles of progressive solemnity would speak everything on weekdays and Sundays of Ordinary Time. He perhaps would sing the preface on the Sundays of Advent. The preface and Lord's Prayer would be sung during Lent. Nearly everything would be sung on Christmas Eve, Easter Vigil, and Pentecost.

Has anyone else encountered this? It's a sort of progressive solemnity that applies more to the liturgical year/season than to any one individual Mass. I can see the logic of this position, but I think it is inadequate and only serves to make the congregation sing their responses badly since they only do it 3-5 times per year.

Of course, then the priest thinks that the congregation does a terrible job on their responses and must not like to sing them, so he'll just dispense with it altogether. I believe this is a very prevalent idea of "progressive solemnity" in my area.

It is a travesty that priests are not required to be able to sing the mass as a condition of ordination.

And, MJO, when you become pope and acquire the authority to impose such a condition, I will support you. I will also support anyone else who becomes pope and wishes to impose that condition. (But I will not support Ben's lessening of the condition and permitting recto-tono-ing instead.)

The point I was trying to make at 4:15 PM is that there are things in the Church and in her liturgy which each of us wishes were different, but they are not. For some matters, we are able to offer our contributions to making things better. For others, we have no standing.

When we have no say, we thank God and sing "Alleluia" anyway.

One need not be the pope in order to advance what the Church asks of us, nor is not being the pope an excuse for ignoring what the Church asks of us.

I represent your remarks, DA, and I stand for them on every account. We should all ascribe to strive for the best and not 'settle for less' than what God deserves. Things would be MUCH different, despite who the present pope happens to be. We need not wait nor look to any pope or prelate to be our best. God alone is looking to each of us, however, for OUR best.

Dear Fr Krisman -
I will thank you, Father, for your support should I be elected pope. I and many others hope dearly that such a fate would not befall the Church. There could be no man less qualified or worthy. Seriously, though, it doesn't exactly speak well of the Church as a whole, nor of its members individually, that we do something meritorious only because it has been legislated by a pope or some other 'competent authority'. We should do what is the the best because it alone is appropriate and because we love the One to Whom it is offered, not because it has been legislated by a Church which is often more concerned with legislation than with love or what is, objectively, most fitting. It is, in fact, an historical aberration to say the mass not with chant and song but in a spoken voice; many are the historical witnesses to the fact that from the very beginning ALL was sung and not a word was uttered in the spoken voice (Simeon of Thessolonica, et al.). Legislation didn't enter into the equation. Singing was what one did when worshiping the All Holy. Singing, chanting, or cantillating worship is all but universal in humankind's historical experience of the sacred. That law should be needed would be a sure sign of liturgical corruption from what is humanly, and divinely, normative.

As for obedience to legislation and competent authority: is there any higher authority than the express will of successive popes and of the IInd Vatican Council, all of whom admonished that the faithful throughout the world should know the mass in Latin, that Gregorian chant and the Church's heritage of sacred music be preserved, and that choirs be assiduously cultivated? Yet how many bishops and priests could we name who disobediently PRESUME WITH GROUNDLESS AUTHORITY to forbid these things either in their parishes or dioceses!? Speak of disobedience!!! Yet these very disobedient churchmen love nothing on this earth more than obedience to themselves. How can one speak of legislation and obedience when such shameless effrontery is evidenced by incompetent and inauthentic authority. To use your term, Father, such bishops and priests actually have 'no standing' to 'forbid' the things they do. They just do it, and, amazingly, no one higher up says 'no' to them. (This is, one amusingly observes, actually rather Anglican: legislation and admonitions are couched in language which can be read any number of ways, and WILL be read any number of ways by those of diametrically opposed views. This is how Catholic minded and Protestant minded folk got along with each other in the Anglican Church for 500 years - an accomodation that has been fast unravelling.)

I know of bishops and priests who 'forbid' chant and good music who are fearfully obeyed. But it doesn't work the other way: I know of one cardinal-archbishop who loves sung liturgy and wishes for all to sing it, yet who said that he would have a rebellion if he required his priests to chant the mass. I know of priests who wanted chant and a little bit of Latin, whose people all but tarred and feathered them. Our beloved pope emeritus set examples that he wished to be taken up, and for his trouble he became a laughing stock to many. Many of his bishops didn't mind telling him in no uncertain terms that they wouldn't do this and that. Obedience? What does that mean? It certainly isn't a universal. It certainly doesn't apply to all, and it doesn't work both ways. It is highly selective. Do you know the formula?

(And... a parting shot... recto tono is better any day than no-tono.)

(And another one... so far as has been revealed to us, Holy Father Francis' lack of singing is due entirely to his having but one lung, not to preference.)

When I was a child, a person criticized my attempts at composition so cruelly that I was tempted to stop writing music. Thankfully, a great old priest told me "an ignorant person with more power than you can destroy in one minute what took you years to build. Build great things anyway." It doesn't matter who the pope or our priest is, or whether they can sing. In the end they won't be with me when I have to give an account of my stewardship to God, who gave me this talent. We are obligated to try to leave the celebration of the mass in our parishes more sacred than we found it.

As Our Lord said to Catherine of Siena, "Listen, Daughter, I am He Who Is, you are that which is not. Patience, patience, patience. Think on me and I will think on you. I do not ask of you a perfect work, but infinite desire."

"In his absence"??? I'm not sure that's accurate.

"Holy Father Francis' lack of singing is due entirely to his having but one lung, not to preference"

This is not true. He had a small portion of one lung removed as a child, which does not affect his present-day breathing ability.

He has stated openly that he does not sing at liturgy because he doesn't feel confident in it - same reason any other priest will give.

The idea that Musicam sacram tried to convey with its plan of three degrees was not about progressive solemnity: it was about a stepwise implementation of a fully sung liturgy, which was and remains the goal presented to us. So a term like that would have a sound basis.

The "backwards" appearance of MS's schema is only in comparison to the typical music of the Roman Rite in most US parishes, in which Alleluia and its proper verse are sung, but even basic dialogues of the priest and people are often spoken.

You're right about the way some people speak of a notion they call "progressive solemnity", as if the Church wanted a Mass bloated with extra music on major feasts and really didn't want the full liturgy sung daily. To that mindset the sanctoral and weekday chants don't exist.

I readily conceded the "big deal" point as valid in that we don't do polyphonic ordinaries on Christmas, Easter, Ascension, Pentecost &c. The answer was the 'pastoral' consideration towards visiting Sunday giggers starved for musica sacra: when better to take the Sanctus away from the 'people' but at a mass where the choir (nearly) outnumbers them?

Seems in no particular order, actually, and I have to doubt whether Musicam sacrum spells out the first part. At least, I don't yet plan on taking my cue from a spoken greeting from the visiting bishop and turning off the organ blower and sending the choir to the pews, secure in the knowledge I was carrying out "what the church wants" according to the internet.

No one is advocating that, Richard. What we are saying is that singing the dialogs of the Mass first is the most important, and that when we are given the chance, we should be working toward that. Also, this isn't some idea by some random person on the internet, it's from the church's document on music, Musicam Sacram.

Doesn't it? If we apply Sanrosanctum Concilium to the Novus Ordo, why wouldn't we apply Musicam Sacram? It's actually a more recent document.