This is delicate. I have understood and have been told numbers of times from the past that the reasons for not allowing women to serve or perform roles in the sanctuary refers to women's natural and periodic effusion of blood. I find this to be an incredibly archaic, cruel, and paranoid hold over from at least Denisovan times. The downright pagan irrationality of these attitudes and laws seem as hilarious as barring men from the sanctuary because, now and then, we pee.

(This, however, is no advocacy for priestesses - that is another matter entirely, a matter which several recent popes have said is closed. Ditto servers, etc.)

Are people advocating that polyphonic propers could only be sung by men and boys?

I don't think so. Because I think that is different.
I know that sounds odd, but go back and listen to the way the Requiem Mass was done that I mentioned (Officer Talley, Denver Cathedral Basilica). Anything that was *only* chanted, was chanted by *only* men. Everything else was fair game.

As for

the Propers are such a minor part of the Mass they could be dropped or even hymns substituted for them. No harm would be done.

I can't even remotely agree. I can see where you might argue something about rubrics, but why should things be removed from Mass?
There are so many extra places that hymns and motets can go.
It's frustrating that people think the Novus Ordo was needed because of readings, etc., when they're more than willing to remove the propers, which contain a lot of psalms and other scripture references.

hymns substituted for them. No harm would be done.

No! not unless the Church had authorised those hymns through a rigourous centralised vetting procedure.

ut legem supplicandi lex statuat credendi
so that the law of praying establishes the law of believing
Prosper of Aquitane

While I do not see the (minor) propers as generally contributing much to the prayer (little or nothing on most ferias), there are significant and memorable exceptions. Generally we would be better off returning to the idea of relevant psalms, contextualised with selected antiphons. I expect a hard time justifying that!

Boys sound different from girls (and women) and the esprit de corps is, unavoidably, different.

It should be noted that the first part of that statement is not borne out in blind auditions.

Much as it sticks in my craw to admit it, I have observed, with Richard, that there is negligible (negligible, but still evident in terms of timbre and breath) but present difference between the singing voices of boys and girls. The key to the magical sound is prepubescence. It is this factor that is responsible for the unmatched crystaline timbre of these trebles. A quality that the adult woman cannot match no matter how well she tries. There is always that dead give away degree of heaviness, breathiness, uncontrollable, even if it's miniscule, bit of vibrato. If one listens very carefully to groups like the Tallis Scholars this will become evident. There is even a tendency for the women to obscure the clarity of the lower voices - a thing which does not happen when the trebles are boys and or girls.

Ladies! Do not take this as a diatribe against you incomparable voices. I could not begin adequately to express the heavenly delight I have had in directing fabulous women's voices in my choirs or as soloists - so it's really a matter of both in his and her sphere, not one over the other. Each has a repertory that only he or she excels at to a higher degree than the other.

Boys and girls could not sing like adults if they tried.
Neither should adult women fool themselves into thinking that they can sound like boys. Many do and come close, but it's physically impossible for them to make it all the way.

Then, there is the matter of the castrato, into which we shan't venture too much. There, it can seem, is a prepubescent voice with the power of an adult male - a unique phenomenon. I'm glad that they stopped doing that barbaric savagery to people. It is really sad, astonishing, that at recently as the early XXth century these men were treasured fixtures at the Vatican.

The curtained audition gauntlet was thrown in the 1980's and the gambit widely declined. A few seconds with google turns up a 2011 study as well as some 2003 blustering. I'm not sure where a 2019 suit against the Berlin State and Cathedral Choir stands right now.

The propers are mostly random bits of scripture out of context and having little relation to what is going on in the liturgy. You may like the music, which I think for chant lovers is their greatest appeal, anyway. If they were not there would it take away from the liturgy? Probably not. If you want to argue points on removing things from the mass, how about getting rid of the chopped up versions of psalms and propers and restoring what they were originally. Strange that hardly anyone advocates that. I know, it would make the mass too long.

I've been told that even Bugnini believed that removing the propers was a bad idea. He hated doubling, so he mostly removed propers from the missal, and then by the time a reordered Gradual was issued, chant was mostly dead.

The propers more or less fit together in a way that is greater than the sum of their parts, as propers are repeated, were not always on the exact same Sunday in antiquity, etc.

To restore the propers fully would be archaeologism. We don't really know what this looked like though I'd like the schola to occasionally repeat the Gradual as a true responsory on days without a Tract or Alleluia (T and Th of Lent, Advent feria).

If you accept McKinnon's thesis in The Advent Project, half of them had been hastily cobbled together in 7th century. What we have had since then is an unfinished product!

. Given the differences between the old and new rites, they didn't fit the OF at times during the year and gave the impression of being cobbled together.

But the NO lectionary is already cobbled together. The general cursus, or at least the themes, of the epistles are the same for the Sundays of the year, yet the lectionary group only paired the Gospels and OT readings…

Louis Bouyer, who was involved in the Consilium, describes the devisers of the Calendar as "a trio of maniacs" and "these three hotheads", he continues (Memoirs p233)

because the Pope wanted to finish up quickly to avoid the chaos getting out of hand, their project, however insane, was accepted!

P.S. I've been watching the livestream of Holy Week liturgy at St. Nicolas du Chardonnet in Paris, and they have a small schola of priests and clerics in the sanctuary who sing the propers at their principal masses. They also have a mixed schola who sing at other masses, so that's really an excellent paradigm, I think. Nice to have so many priests available in a parish. Amazing.

Last night at the Easter Vigil, they baptized ten young men!

I don't claim to know who organized that Mass, but I think there are some relevant questions. Why weren't there any women singing? The fact that they were excluded should make us wonder why. Is it a practical, aesthetical or ideological reason?Were they excluded on this one occasion, or are they always excluded? I don't claim to know the answer, but I think it's a relevant and fair question.

I can't endorse questioning the music decisions made for a Mass, barring at least some information to indicate that the music is bad, unfitting for divine worship, or otherwise against the law of the Church. It is damaging enough to speak poorly of a Catholic Mass, musician, or clergyman when there is known cause to speak poorly, and the benefits and circumstances must be carefully weighed, but where there is no obvious cause for complaint? I admit that I did not watch the video of the Requiem, but by all accounts it was sung beautifully and in accordance with the rubrics for the Latin Mass, and edified and evangelized a great many due to the wide broadcast it received.

I spoke earlier of the smell of sulphur, and I regret that it has returned.

if the rubrics are the controlling law of the 1962 Missale Romanum (as verified by Universae Ecclesiae), and Rubric 272 of the 1962 Missale Romanum cites De Musica Sacra as THE document to be followed concerning participation, why is this still an issue in Latin Mass communities?

RGMR 272 says, "Of its nature the Mass demands that all those present take part in it, after the manner proper to them. A choice must be made, however, among the various ways in which the faithful may take part actively in the most holy sacrifice of the Mass, in such a way that any danger of abuse may be removed, and the special aim of the participation may be realized, namely a fuller measure of worship offered to God and of edification obtained for the faithful."

It is precisely this choice which prevents us from using DMS 25 and 26 as a mandate to force a particular style of participation on a local community.

Someone mentioned above that at the Requiem Mass for Officer Talley the chanting was done only by men. I don't claim to know who organized that Mass, but I think there are some relevant questions. Why weren't there any women singing?

@JulieColl
This is the problem of the internet we can watch ONE service and see things but are they the norm? At my parish over the last week, if you had been to all the services you will have heard male cantors, female cantors, male choirs (greek choir), female choirs latin choir), you may have also heard the children singing with us. We also had 3, 4 and 5 part polyphony. But if you had come to Tenebrae on Wednesday you will have seen a group of men on the Sanctuary singing everything and no female choir members in sight or even in the church.

I would not see a problem if Parish A, had an all male schola that sang every Mass in choir, as long as the Parish down the road had a female schola, or even a mixed schola singing from the choir loft. The first chant schola I sang with was run by a woman, but she just conducted, it was the men that sang the chant. When my mother took over, this continued for a few years until the younger men went off to the newly opened traditional community, and the older members entered the eternal choir.

In my Parish we sing Polyphonic ordinaries with Credo, we also sing the full cycle polyphonic Propers. But we also have days when we sing Chant Propers and Chant Ordinaries, so we provide a mixture of the treasures of Church music. But it is not wrong for a church choir to just sing chant, or for another church just to have polyphonic ordinaries, or for another place only to sing polyphonic cycles of propers.

It would be wrong for the Church to ban women from singing chant but I don't see the problem if one parish only has a male schola.

2) women in the group may have presented a temptation to activities not consonant with the 6th or 9th Commandments. (There are PLENTY of examples of that which emerged during my lifetime, by the way, and the women were not even in the sanctuary.)

Really? Could you please provide me with some modern examples? This has not been my experience. On the contrary, my presence in the schola put an almost complete end to the immodest speech and issues of double entendres in the Latin text that some of the men struggled with (which, according to a priest from the FSSP is also an issue with seminarians at their OLG seminary, which is an all-male facility). There is the odd slip up, but quickly followed by an apology to me. Men need to learn how to work and interact with women appropriately. That’s not to say that relationships might not form. My grandmother was the parish organist and met my grandfather in the choir/schola. Nothing wrong with that.

One of the reasons why I offered to join my choir’s, at the time, male schola, was because I was discerning religious life and wanted to learn how to sing chant so that a)I’d be more able to adjust to singing the Divine Office in Latin, and in chant if I entered into a community that has a strong custom and practice of Latin and Gregorian Chant, b) if I entered into a community that wasn’t already doing this, I would have something to bring with me and, one day, introduce it to the community, and c) I had the extra time before Mass for chant practice and had nothing better to do with my time.

The women who sing soprano and alto in our choir do not get the same level of learning to sing chant that the schola gets, which is unfortunate. It makes no sense to me why parishes don’t teach their women how to sing the chant propers. You’re not always going to have enough men to sing the propers. Funerals usually happen during the day during the work week, which is when most men are working, and stay at home mothers are more available to be at the church during the day, same with special feast days. Not to mention women also get called to religious vocations.

On the contrary, my presence in the schola put an almost complete end to the immodest speech and issues of double entendres [...] There is the odd slip up, but quickly followed by an apology to me. Men need to learn how to work and interact with women appropriately.

Exactly same experience, that's why I generally don't like all-male environments.

BTW we have to be aware that for a small but significant percentage of the population, temptation concerning the 6th Commandment comes from the same sex; these people have no protection at all against their 'weakness of the flesh' from male/female segregation. (I had one such encounter, rather innocent but totally unaware that I might be the temptation, in the army.)

Really? Could you please provide me with some modern examples?

You want me to name names? Sorry, THAT won't happen. But there are examples:

One well-known choral director in the Western US had at least 2 children by different female members of the chorus. In my home town, the choral director of a large city-wide faith-based group had to leave town (with his gal-pal) after they were discovered in flagrante....

Both within my lifetime.

There are other similar stories with which I am personally aware which did not make the newspapers or 'common knowledge,' but it's far more common than you think--and it IS one of the stated reasons that women were not part of church choirs until the 1950's--and then only under duress due to the lack of trained boys. That was Pius XII, 1956 IIRC.

YMMV

The most beautiful sound that was ever sung in praise of God was the sound of our Blessed Lady singing her Magnificat and, in due course, singing the Lord’s praises to her little baby, the Word incarnate, as she cradled him in her arms. She is the Queen of the Angels, and Queen of the Seraphim with whom we sing in the sacred liturgy.

That has to mean something. I find it difficult to understand the position of those who would take objection to the daughters of our Blessed Lady having a role in a schola.

At the same time, there is no evidence of which I am aware that suggests the Jewish Temple Virgins sang in the Temple liturgy: the Temple choir comprised 12 Levite men and boys (Mishnah Arukhin 2:6). And then I seem to remember my liturgical history books describing a close connection between the deacon and the music of the Mass (which would be a natural enough progression in view of the foregoing) which eventually widened beyond clerics to choirs of men and boys. How much significance we should draw from that is hard to say: it is natural that liturgical chant in a Cathedral, say, would historically be associated with the educated clerics who would singing chant all the time and able to remember it. Yet that also potentially speaks of the profound proximity of liturgical music to the essentially masculine liturgical action in the sanctuary.

Again, these sorts of considerations are not readily cast aside as insignificant.

So whilst my own little choir (when it meets from time to time) is mixed (and thank heavens for the ladies in it) I think it is important to respect the choices of choir directors who might, say, restrict the propers to the men. For my part, my inclination is to see all of the chants (both Ordinaries and Propers) as the song of the bride to her bridegroom, such that it makes little sense to limit the song to men: but that said, where a Proper is relaying something like “The Lord said...” (eg Dominus dixit ad me) I prefer to keep that to the men if numbers will allow.

dad29,
As we all know, improper (6th Commandment) behavior of directors/superiors isn't restricted to be against females. I think this kind of consideration has 0% relevance to what women should or shouldn't sing in liturgy.

Women are half of humanity, so it seems to me the misogynists need to learn how to deal with them appropriately.

This is a major issue.
The fact that people (generally, males, most often white males, and even more often white "Christian" males) are constantly called misogynists, racists, _____ists/phobes as a go-to smack-down is so beyond ridiculous.

Why weren't there any women singing? The fact that they were excluded should make us wonder why. Is it a practical, aesthetical or ideological reason?Were they excluded on this one occasion, or are they always excluded? I don't claim to know the answer, but I think it's a relevant and fair question.

I disagree. As I said, the women sang everything that wasn't chanted. And there was a lot that wasn't chanted. But, even so, must we automatically think, "oh, those/we poor, oppressed women!?"
It was sung at an American diocese's cathedral basilica. I highly doubt the norm there is to not let women sing chant, but even so, given the men's wonderful ability to do so, and the vast amount of polyphony that still went into a Requiem, during Holy Week, really wouldn't make one think that we poor darlings, as a sex, are subjugated to listening to men skillfully chant the few Mass propers that aren't sung in polyphony.

I don't mean to come across as ranting, but honestly, in my experience it's hard enough for men to get anything to themselves without constantly being assailed by feminist activists who either attack their desire for brotherhood as being too insecure to have women around, too masculine to allow women around, or too stuck "in the past" to let "things change" to an acceptable point of women running every single thing and making every decision that could ever possibly affect any female at any time in the future, because otherwise it's a sexist environment.

Am I exaggerating a little bit? Sure...

We hosted a pro-life, preemptive meeting because Planned Parenthood has posted job openings in our city (which is, thankfully, an "abortion desert"). My co-chair's husband was going to give a short "pro-life history throughout the ages" story before introducing us, but when the news decided to show up, he figured he probably couldn't, because the story would be spun to suggest that "a local, male professor had the audacity to allow and introduce his pregnant wife to speak at a local church... (1C14:34, anyone? Those hypocrites!)"

eminds me of my priest friend who was a former Benedictine monk who said the Introit was supposed to be an entrance song sung by the whole congregation. This was also the case with the Communion antiphon.

This seems to be twentieth-century wishful thinking.

It would be wrong for the Church to ban women from singing chant

Why? I can't see why it would be against divine or natural law, but it's certainly imprudent, and it's totally out of the question today.

I believe that would be the fault of the director since he was in a position of power over the two females. He shouldn’t have (I’m assuming) hooked up with them. How does that even happen? Sounds to me like all three parties have issues with living a virtuous life. It’s one thing for a choir director and a choir member enter into a mutual desired relationship to discern marriage in a proper Catholic courtship. Hooking up is entirely different. Do people not have self control? My mind is blown.

I'm really unconvinced by the argument that the director was in a "position of power" over the two women ("females" or "males" as a noun is extremely grating except in police dispatches), particularly knowing choral culture for what it is… which is the one bone that I'll throw: Catholics are the only remaining tradition with any sort of choral tradition that refuses any sort of other arrangement besides the enduring union of a man and a woman.

In any case, I'm also really unconvinced that all-male environments need to be abolished due to the presence of people who joke about unchastity. Women are not primarily tools for the education of men, and the priest, schola director, or other singers, that is, other men, need to hold the bad ones accountable. The mere presence of a woman need not be necessary to get people into shape.


Tl; dr: abusus non tollit usum. We would do well to remember that.

In many places, our individual music lobby may not have enough people to be that picky. We take what we can get.

Schoenbergian,

Perhaps a temporary moratorium on these mostly flaccid terms?

I know of men who refuse to work with women and that seems to me not right

I can see that being the case, both in general and from prior experience.
How many times are we supposed to repeat/try something before we are considered insane?

I also tend to work and socialize better with men than women.
As a female, that can create quite a conundrum.

I'm really unconvinced by the argument that the director was in a "position of power" over the two women

As someone in a parish leadership position, the onus is on him to keep appropriate boundaries. Parishes have policies on these things for employees and volunteers.

improper (6th Commandment) behavior of directors/superiors isn't restricted to be against females

Let me get this straight: you acknowledge that sin is entirely possible if not likely, so therefore, let's set up the circumstances for sin.

Sure. That makes sense.

FYI, all the choirs which I directed and sang in were mixed male/female. The objection I noted was that used prior to 1956 (IIRC). Unfortunate that you didn't ask the right question before you commented.

As to homosexual improprieties: you may be more familiar with that than I. Never saw it going on--but then, there were some parties to which I was not invited.