Previous Parish Priest hired me. His words were "Please come and fix the music in my church, it is a complete disaster - I will pay you!"

Pastors move too. New ones like to prove they're making a difference.

Our dear Noel has a great point about being an outsider: I worked for a parish recently where I was definitely that, although I was appreciated by the majority of musicians (at least it seemed that way), there were some fairly influential parishioners who didn't like my "traditional" brand of music and musicianship (we did 4 hymns per Mass, restricted repertoire list due to congregational participation concerns from the Pastor, such hymns as "Joyful, Joyful" and "The King of Love My Shepherd Is," and Mass of Renewal for the Ordinary) and I'm very sure they were at the Pastor's door frequently. At my current parish, I have been teaching for 5 years now in the school, and if I were to take over the music program, I'd probably have an easier go at it because I'm already part of the establishment.

May I ask what brought on this topic?

I work within the church music industry and as a result see many situations of musicians being treated poorly and being fired

What brought this on is not an isolated incident.

What brought this on is, however, due to the fact that this happens predominantly in Catholic churches.

Prior to Vat II, this was not the case. A Catholic church job then was like a Christian Science job, you got the job, you did it, were almost totally unnoticed by anyone and interacted only with choir members, and that interaction was with men or with women, as choirs were rarely, if ever, mixed.

Vat II changed that.

Musicians were are also expected to work for small salaries and were are often saddled with other jobs to make ends meet.

Fixed.

It's the amount of pressure that people can put on a priest. People that were out in the pews up until this time. Now lay people are "needed" to be lectors, cantors and "ministers" so they develop a relationship with the priest that ends up with them having an undue amount of influence. This relationship towers over the hired musicians...

A priest has to work hard to maintain a relationship harder than we do!

I was under the impression that before vII the vast majority of musicians in the church were unpaid unless it was a big place like a Cathedral. Does snyone know? I was also under the impression that the situation has really improved since them. But we can still complain....hey we're artists!

I was hired by everyone, not sure how it's done at other churches but at the one I work for they basically vote on who gets the job-pastor, deacons, music director, etc. Members of the congregation can and do complain, but unless they are directly involved in the larger circle of decision makers their complaints go largely ignored, and with good reason. There seem to be two groups: the oldies that hate change of any kind and compare every new person to someone that accompanied there fifty years ago, and the know-nothings that think they can tell us what to do and how to do it because it's what they want to hear. Don't like traditional hymns? Go down to the rock band church, we simply will.not.ever. have a praise band. Don't like my choice of preludes/offertories/etc? Go to music school for seven years and spend three of those torturing every waking moment with writing a thesis on how music should/may have been/will be used in sacred settings. It's church, not a recital. No, I don't care if "the last person" played Joplin rags or was more "flashy". That isn't me, never will be, not the time or place. Well, now I'm ranting LOL...As far as job security goes I am lucky to have a small army of people who chose me and who also know that I am one of the only people alive who is patient enough to work with their music director, all the while maintaining high standards and professionalism.

Fiscal matters always means "we do not like your choice of music (and possibly you) so we prefer to lie and tell you we are out of money."

Especially when they fill your job with volunteers! That helps them cover their tracks.

they didn't like the music (or how it was done) and used THAT to cover their fisc short.

This happened to me at a Catholic school, my first job out of college.

@bhcordova I think part of it is you're more likely to hear the horror stories on this forum as people running into problems at the church they work for/volunteer at vent here and ask advice. That said, I share your sentiment.

Some people think their opinions matter too much.

Whoever fired me, may heaven help them on judgement day, because it was over the faith, not the music (although the two are directly related to be sure) and God was certainly watching the charade.

Here's who hired me and a bit of what happened. Only (sort of) fired once, by #3.

1. A co-pastor (there was a clerical triumvirate) who later confided that we did not have to follow copyright law because "all the composers are nuns and priests anyway". I lasted one year, left and went to #2.
2. A first year assistant whose qualification was that he liked to sing. After five years, when the first child was born and I needed to make more money I went to #3.
3. By the pastor who, after one year, told me I should become an insurance salesman and not a church musician. This was because I did such a good job convincing the congregation that they needed to replace an ailing organ. He did not want to take the heat for that. At the end of the year, he maneuvered me out of there - sort of soft fired me. Luckily I landed at #4
4. By the prefect (this odd church was not a parish and they called the priest who ran the place the prefect) who hired me over the phone. I was at one of the last NPM conventions that I have attended and got the job from my hotel room. This was good for me, but crazy none the less. I stayed 13 years. Until..
5. The most thorough process I have been through. (And the way more hiring should be done.) First a ton of paperwork and recordings. Then interviews with worship committee, archdiocesan worship office director, 20 member search committee and finally by the pastor who had the last word. A great place and I stayed 12 years until my children were out of the house. Then we moved closer to family and I went to #6
6. By the pastor whom I had known from #4 time. Very congenial, supportive and kind.
We now have a new pastor who is also great to work with. I am still there.

So only 5 and 6 were hirings by someone who knew something. What a world!

The moment lay people, aside from Altar boys, enter the sanctuary, the role of the priest is diminished and the amount of influence untrained-in-anything laypeople have over him and his decisions.

I have no problem with people insisting on receiving for a priest. I found it amazing and distressing that high school kids were distributing communion at a high school mass. Surely enough priests in a town large enough to have a high school are available to assist. If...they want to do their jobs.

Well, in the OF, there's an express preference for the non-Gospel readings to be read by a minister other than the celebrant (see GIRM 59), with the priest only doing so in the absence of a suitable minister. The psalm - if read, would fall under that, too, and, if sung, would be entrusted first to a psalmist or schola. And the celebrant would not be singing both parts of the dialogue when a congregation is present.

As for the substantive roles of being a music director/organist, a sacristan, a parish secretary, if the parish has a surfeit of priests perhaps they can afford to let priests do those functions. That would be relatively rare in much of the USA.

I don't know what kind of Catholic parish some of come from but in our parish we have 6 cantors, some who help are from neighboring parishes. We have one MD plus various other musicians all of whom come to help to make the Mass as beautiful musically speaking as can be. The cantors are in no way trying to cut the legs off or do end run-around of our MD and certainly aren't not elitist.

Hired by pastor, fired by new pastor.

It is unfortunate to inherit a new pastor. I was hired by the priest who was pastor at my current parish 22 years ago. I've seen 4 more since then, and have only had difficulty with the current one. The issue I have seen is that each individual has his own style and abilities, and they all have egos. At times, it is necessary to just do the job and leave, rather than risk unemployment by pressing for the most liturgical or musical goals for the schola. It is most distressing to see that the faithful are often denied the very best that we can offer in praise of Christ because we have to placate pastors who are generally unqualified to supervise us. Fortunately, most of the pastors I have worked with have been generous in that they have allowed me to speak with them about the liturgy, and have worked together with me to create the best liturgy we can. This is not currently the case, and I have been forced to deal with very poor management of late.

Hired by pastor, fired by new pastor.


Is this a recent happening?

I was fired summer of 2013 though my son was retained as organist (paid). I was allowed to remain as a volunteer along with my two other teens to select the music and sing the propers (we used SEP) each Sunday. This past fall a new "choir director" was hired and, by the pastor's decree, singing of the propers banished.

I know about a similar case of an organ builder. He accepted the order from a pastor friend of him, who left the parish for a curial office position. The new parish vicar has a modernist formation and agenda, and put some of parishioners to support his decision of not receiving the organ anymore. He established some lawyers to rescind the contract, so the organ does not currently have a definite place for it, waiting at an advanced stage of construction for a new place to be finished. Sad history.