I wish the Lutherans didn't divide it between "liturgical" and "contemporary".

One nice thing about Catholic worship is that musical style doesn't tend to affect the centrality of the Eucharistic liturgy to the Sunday assembly. In LCMS circles, the cues taken from contemporvant low church evangelicals are not onlyvmusical, but pertain to the order of worship.

Unfortunately, I think, in Catholic churches, at least, the BIG driver with church attendance is the personality of the celebrant. I live in a rural-ish area populated by obsolete and crumbling mills. We have too many churches for the number of people (which has dropped off remarkably everywhere since COViD--people are NOT coming back--anywhere), and there have been retirements and new appointments, so even though technically people are supposed to go to their territorial parish, everyone church shops to find the priest they like.

The "worship styles" (a phrase I detest with every fibre of my being) of the parishes here range from the (and I'm not making this up) contemporary parish with its 'Youth Band' made up of 90-year-old women with walkers, to the average Gather Comprehensive 'Beige' things, to the Choral and Floral where I am : by-in-large people couldn't care less whether the choir sings Palestrina or Peter, Paul, & Mary; if it looks like a traditional church or a warehouse--if they like the personality of the priest they will stay, if he leaves, so will they.

I could say that I blame the versus populum Novus Ordo and its focus on the priest and his ego, but I won't.

since COViD--people are NOT coming back--anywhere)

Based on what I saw Sunday at my parish, that is not true. Of course, that was at one Mass, mid-morning; but I've been at that Mass a few times during The Panic and there were definitely more people there this time.

This Sunday was the first on which our Archdiocese (apparently) dropped all its panic protocols. We even had holy water in the fonts!!

" . . . so even though technically people are supposed to go to their territorial parish,"

Well, the 1983 Code of Canon Law eliminated that as an obligation; people are free to go where they will to worship, though their territorial parish remains their canonical domicile, which is relevant in certain situations.

Salieri, it is the considered opinion of all Flyover Country people that there are NO 'conservatives' in Massachusetts, period. You might want to re-assess your assessment.

I've seen parishes with thriving cultures centered around multiple worship styles, so I don't believe that the particular style of worship is the driving factor.

It's probably safe to say that most everyone on the Forum has seen the same thing, which begs the question which culture you want to build. If the music is mostly about the religious experience of the individuals in the worshipping community (for example), then that is the kind of culture you will be building.

I just think that there is a much broader spectrum of functional worship styles than is commonly recognized on this message board.

You'll notice that in her documents the Church never speaks of music "styles," let alone their functionality. It does, however, speak of music that is integral and proper to the liturgy.

If there is a "function" at all, it's best summed up in the well-known phrase from Sacrosanctum Concilium, to "add delight to prayer, foster unity of minds, or confer greater solemnity upon the sacred rites." And it has also laid out which music best serves these ends (insofar as music can be "instrumentalized" in this way).

" it is the considered opinion of all Flyover Country people that there are NO 'conservatives' in Massachusetts, period."

Which shows that Flyover Country People can be just as ignorant as Coastal Elites Country People.

Because humans.

“I've seen with my own eyes the traditional parishes (and individual TLM's) that are bursting at the seams—sometimes in stark contrast to the same church's normal N.O. attendance. Where TLM's are, young people abound. “

Not just the EF, there’s plenty of draw to an OF parish that do their masses with the due reverence and solemn beauty that the Council exhorts. One such nearby OF parish is “bursting at the seems” to the point that until last week (when all remaining Covid capacity restrictions in our archdiocese were relaxed) they still required signups for confessions and Sunday masses due to so much demand, when most parishes abandoned that regimen last summer. There are several other legacy OF parishes around with similar stories. This, in a metro area with a half dozen parishes that offer at least one EF mass every Sunday.

“People take it seriously, and they act like it, and like attracts like”

Ditto

Which shows that Flyover Country People can be just as ignorant as Coastal Elites Country People.

No. It demonstrates beyond doubt that pixels do not relay flippant humor at all.

Jclangfo mentioned cornering a "niche product in a market".
Well that's exactly what most EF (or reverent OF ) parishes do.

Well, I think most Catholics in the post-Vatican II world would see the EF Mass as a niche market product, considering that not all dioceses have even one EF Mass available.
I realize that discussing the liturgy in these business marketing terms is disrespectful and lacks dignity.

Karu,

That most Catholics in the Post-Vatican II world would see the EF Mass as a niche market product, marketing vocabulary and all, tells us a great deal about the state of the Church at this point in time.

Charles,

I object to the manipulation of numbers, [parenthetical comment] so I understand and agree with your point that manipulation is bad. I've never been a fan of the argument "numbers don't lie".

On the other hand, if we put actual context on those numbers, authentic and true, the following picture emerges:

"Inspite of the dreadful, unCatholic behavior of many bishops and execrable catechesis for at least two generations, to say nothing of the example of Catholics in public life who claim to be Catholic but aren't, and a toxic culture in the country as a whole, slightly less than a quarter of all Catholics attend Mass regularly in the United States of America, or did before they were prevented, and then encouraged not to attend, and told other things were more important than the destination of their own immortal soul and growing in the life of virtue."

"An orchestrated campaign of stigmatization notwithstanding, more and more Catholics of all ages are turning to a form of worship which doesn't focus on them."

Mark,

If those two percent of Catholics are driving every week an hour each way, and are in other ways going out of their way to be faithful Catholics, this tells us more than merely the 2% number.

Considering how hard various bishops for multiple decades have worked to blot out the Traditional form, and stigmatize it, and (flat out) lie about it, the 2% number is impressive. Speaking only from personal experience, when I began attending the traditional form family openly worried that I was leaving the Church. This didn't happen out of malice, merely ignorance.

Some of the TLM folks ...

This comment can be made of nearly any group, surely?

When I was growing up everyone just knew what was meant by 'good music' - even if they didn't listen to it or understand it they respected it and those who performed it and respected the cultural role it played in society and civilisation. Ditto 'church music' - everyone just knew what was and wasn't church music, what belonged in church and what didn't. Likewise, a church musician (at least in Catholic or Episcopal churches - and maybe Lutheran churches) would not be approached about music which stylistically referenced patently secular genres.

Now, in this Age of Relativism 'good music' isn't an objective category but is whatever any one likes, and church music, likewise, is not an objective category but is whatever appeals to the given tastes of this or that favoured group. There are no, absolutely no, genres of music that are thought to be 'sacred' at the expense of others which a given speaker may prefer for purely personal tastes - without so much as a nod towards historically rooted 'church music'.

When I was growing up some people were even slightly embarrassed to admit that they didn't listen to Beethoven and would never have admitted out loud that he or she didn't like Beethoven at all. Not so these days - those who don't like 'good music' are quite defiant about their lack of appreciation of the same, yea, even boastfully proud of it. We have had a French Revolution and a French Reign of Terror in the Church, and it's ugly marks will likely be with us for generations of unrepentant iconoclasts.

Polls may indeed show that in this place or that place target group A or Z prefers this or that music, loved whatever it was that they learnt at summer camp, at university chapel, or such, but these polls will ever reflect the preferences only of those who took the poll - of the 'target' group. Anyone who takes a poll or is excited about what he or she taught group A or Z and drew the conclusion that their preferences were the ones which appealed to 'youth', 'children', 'people', and so on are suffering from a bad case of hubris and are standing on egg shells. Polls reveal only the likes and dislikes of those who participated in them - even if those who take them are thought to be a representative 'cross section' of a given stratum of society or church people.

Indeed, we live in an age in which scads of priests and bishops presume, in defiance of the recent council, to forbid Latin and other musics of our heritage in their parishes and their entire dioceses. On the other hand, has anyone heard of priests and bishops who, in obedience to the recent council, required of their parishes and diocese that Latin and our musical heritage find a place in the liturgical life of said parishes and dioceses? And what does 'Rome' or 'the Vatican' say??? Nothing! Silence!

This is not a pretty picture. It is a very sad picture. It is one that I wish were rosier and referenced a more sane or altruistic and less subjective state of affairs, but, sadly, it is the relativistic world we live in.

Considering that EF went from being not allowed without permission to being allowed without needing permission only 14 years ago, basically any growth is an 'explosion'. Once the novelty wears off, I think we will see an ebb in the number of EF parishes and services.

Once the novelty wears off, I think we will see an ebb in the number of EF parishes and services.

14 years is a long honeymoon period. I don't think TLMs are going away anytime soon, even if PF tries to clamp down on them. The cat is out of the bag, especially for people under 30.

I think that people will still continue to flock to them, and if they are administratively hampered, I suspect the SSPX will see even more attendees than they did during the pandemic when all the other churches shut down.

To BHCordova's point:

When our second child was born, we saw a 100% increase in the number of children we had, and when his little brother (next in line) was born, the increase was only 50% ... from three boys to two boys, but 50% growth is still substantial, even if the figure is misleading.

To the point he glosses over: this form of the Mass had held pride of place in the Roman Church for centuries, so even though the Dominicans and Franciscans (and the Sarum rite) had their own privileges, the Roman Rite suffered a catastrophic loss in 1969, from which (if some persons had had their way) it would never have recovered. It did, however, recover, not because it changed its essence but because unjust prohibitions were removed and the media campaign began to collapse.

"Novelty" is a funny word to use. People go to a TLM once out of curiosity.

Bad music, and badly sung/played good music both have the capacity to repulse us, and there are (or were) parishes where the best music is still sung/played badly.

The "Mass of all Ages" is more hype than reality. The so called "Roman Rite" changed after Rome fell and the culture collapsed. It was again altered during the time of Charlemagne. Even the mass after Trent incorporated changes and practices in use for the last 300 or so years. We have had some changes in the eastern rites, too, but less dramatic and more minor. All things change over time.

Current changes? Again, who knows? Persons with something to gain often interpret what they thought "bishops" said and then the bishops deny having said it. I would be interested in revisiting all this a year from now and looking at what, if anything, actually happened. If things actually do change, I wonder how some will cope with those changes and what adjustments they might make.

I worked in the Novus Ordo for 20 years. I handled that by attempting to do the best music I could and follow the rubrics as closely as possible. If the NO was a bad situation, I made the most of it. I suspect a number of musicians would do the same if the EF were curtailed.

The pastor of that parish for 38 years once said to me, "we are strong when we are persecuted. In good times, we become weak." He had a good point.

As to whether of not the

bunch of pointy-headed "experts" wanted to re-create the first-century liturgical Utopia in their image

actually succeeded, I think they did not. I don't believe those experts had any real understanding of the liturgical state during the first century any more than they had at any other time. Their focus was, as we are seeing in other areas in our current time, more akin to social engineering than to liturgical practice. The liturgy was a tool to accomplish a social and political agenda.

Whether organic or not, change is change whether good or bad.

As for myself, I have retired and have left the liturgy wars behind. At my age, I would not likely go back to dealing with any of it. The head of the government agency where I worked for 25 years or so had a cartoon in his office. It depicted a little man crouched in a fetal position with the caption, "people are no damn good." I could go along with that sentiment at times, especially in terms of working with them, especially in a church setting.

There are people who drive 1 hour each way to an EF Mass, and there are people who drive 30 minutes each way to a well-celebrated OF Mass (my spouse and I among them.) Either Rite is fine.

But then, this morning we drove 1 hour for a graduation Mass. We were subjected to a variety of musical noises: Nashville lite, Disney, and (failed) middle-school garage-band. Time off from Purgatory!

Who knows since figures can be hard to come by. But again, a full TLM mass in one church in a region is small in comparison to multiple parishes in the region that don't do the TLM.

The fact that in many areas, people have to travel long distances to get to a TLM means that were there more ready access, numbers would go up considerably.

Common things with TLMs:

1. Worst part of town
2. Building in disrepair (thank you diocese)
3. Mass at 3:00 PM or 5:30 AM.
4. In the most remote location in the diocese.

And yet, it keeps growing.

I think there may be a limit to the number of folks who find the TLM appealing. Even if all those attend the local TLM, what happens when the kids grow up? My experience with kids is they often do the opposite of what the parents would have desired.

My objection to some of the broad claims about attendance and future projections is that nothing is really certain and anything can happen.

Common things with TLMs:

1. Worst part of town
2. Building in disrepair (thank you diocese)
3. Mass at 3:00 PM or 5:30 AM.
4. In the most remote location in the diocese.

None of that is true in my area.