A Case for Life-Teen Music: Your Response?

Paul Weber
"...but he problem with his thinking is that all religious experience must occur within the context of the Mass. This, as we all know, is untrue. Pius XII gave the distinction between Sacred-liturgical and Religious-recreational music in his encyclical of 1955, and both are good. It's a matter of using the right tool for the right job. Music destined for the Sacred Rites must be appropriate for them by being derived from them, which is how the music achieves holiness and universality (artfulness is another matter). The nature of art destined for the universal Sacred Rites cannot have as its point of reference the individual. This is the problem with the following justification of Life Teen music's supposed liturgically-appropriate holiness:
"Which means the musicians who are going to be interpreting this composition have to have holiness as the center of their life. The people receiving the music have to have a passion to be holy. Sacred music rises or falls in its sacred dignity on whether or not holiness is at the center. Let it be so, because if you start with a holy seed, you’ll get holy fruit. And as music serves the worship, so will it serve holiness if it starts in holiness and is brought by holiness."
It isn't up to the composer, the performer or the individuals of a congregation to determine whether they feel holiness. For that matter, holiness is hardly a matter of objective feeling (that's piety). Holiness is a quality conferred upon the liturgy by God, and through the liturgy to Sacred Art by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit through Sacred Tradition. What's wrong with using Life Teen music for extra-liturgical prayer (Holy Hours, festivals of praise, retreats, etc.) and maintaining an elevated form of music and art appropriate for a supremely elevated task: the Sacred Liturgy. Religious music, as Pius XII teaches, is uniquely powerful in moments of catechesis and evangelization among the young and within families, but this does not displace the singular expression required for the Mass. Use the right tool for the right job.

http://www.chantcafe.com/2011/05/case-for-life-teen-music-your-response.html#idc-container

Do Women Have a Role in the Liturgy and in the Church?

Posted by Revd Fr Christopher Smith

"...There are thus two different sacred powers associated with two different sacraments which were instituted by Christ for the salvation of souls. But they both are intimately related to the sacrificial offering and priesthood of Christ, although in ways irreducible one to the other. These two distinct powers mark the difference between the ministerial priesthood of Christ the Head conferred by Ordination and the common priesthood of the members of Christ’s Body conferred by Baptism. Just as Christ’s Body and Head are distinct, but cannot live one without the other, so too the priesthood and the laity are distinct and cannot live one without the other.

Note that in none of this discussion has the difference between the two types of priesthood been described in terms of function. The difference is not functional, but sacramental. Furthermore the two are not parallel to each other as adversaries, but mutually complementary to such a degree as to be impossible one without the other. Thus we understand why Blessed John Henry Newman, when asked what he thought of the laity, responded, “We’d look foolish without them!” Just as a head would look foolish without a body.

If the Mass is the sacramental re-presentation of the self-offering of Jesus Christ to the Father, the sacramental distinction between ministerial and common priesthood is logical. But once we begin to see the Mass as a sacrifice of praise given by a community to God, it is hard not to transform our idea of the priesthood from a sacramental one to a functional one. Once the functional trumps the sacramental, the ministerial priest becomes one elected among the assembly of the faithful who presides over them by gathering them together and organizing their common prayer. The common priest is then one who participates in any way in such a common prayer. Then the question arises: if the priesthood (common or ministerial) is merely a question of function, Who decides who fulfills those functions?..."

http://www.chantcafe.com/2011/05/do-women-have-role-in-liturgy-and-in.html

A Great New CD by the St. Gregory's Academy

http://www.digstation.com/AlbumDetails.aspx?albumID=ALB000077535

Simple English Propers

Ricardo Mutti on Church Music

Posted by Jeffrey A. Tucker

From Catholic Culture:

The music director of the Chicago Symphony has thrown his support behind the drive by Pope Benedict XVI to revive the tradition of sacred music.

''The Pope is right when he says it is necessary to bring our great musical heritage back into churches,'' said Ricardo Muti. The Italian conductor said that the revival in church music “cannot happen outside the great traditional path of the past, of Gregorian chants and sacred polyphonic choral music.”

Muti said that he has no objection to the composition of new sacred music, but resents the use of pop tunes. “When I go to church and I hear four strums of a guitar or choruses of senseless, insipid words, I think it's an insult,” he said. Offering mediocre music, when the Church boasts a priceless treasury of compositions, shows “a lack of respect for people’s intelligence,” he said.

Schola June Calendar

At OLPH
Saturday Mass (8:15AM) (Warm - up at 7:40)
June 4

Kyrie XI
Gospel Accl.
Sanctus XVIII
Mysterium Fidei and Amen
Agnus Dei XVIII
Cantate Domino
Regina Caeli


At Resurrection Church
Satruday Mass (9AM) (Warm-up starts at 8:30)
June 11, 25

Kyrie XI
Gospel Accl.
Sanctus XVIII
Mysterium Fidei and Amen
Agnus Dei XVIII
Veni Creator Spiritus (11)
Qui Manducat (25)
Salve Regina


Ascension Thursday at St. William of York

Missa Cantata (Traditional Mass)
June 2nd, 7AM (warm-up at 6:45AM)

Introit: Viri Galilaei

Alleluia I: Ascendit Deus
Alleluia II: Dominus Sina

Offertory:Ascendit Deus

Communio;Psallite Domino

Regina Caeli

(Ordinary parts, Mass setting I, Credo I)


Children's Schola

At OLPH
First Friday Mass, June 3, 8:15 AM (warm up at 7:45 AM)

Regina Caeli(prelude)
Kyrie XVI
Gospel Accl.
Ametur(offertory)
Sanctus XVIII
Mysterium Fidei and Amen
Agnus Dei XVIII
Gustate et Videte(communion)
O Salutaris Hostia (Benediction)

At St. Paul
Wednesday June 1, 8 AM (warm-up at 7:45)

Veni Creator Spritus (prelude)
Kyrie XVI
Gospel Accl.
Sanctus XVIII
Agnus Dei XVIII
Gustate et Videte(communion)
Regina Caeli

Why the Catholic Church needs to be distinctly Catholic

"Because, for one reason, there are people out there making powerful, though flawed, arguments like the ones in the video below. The video reminds viewers that you “don’t need a church to GIVE” and encourages people to “give DIRECTLY to a cause dear to your heart, essential to your community and worthy of your support.” Causes that don’t “manipulate the penitence of their disciples.” The implication in the video is that religion is just an unnecessary type of middleman that gets unfair tax breaks and skims the top off of charitable giving for its own enrichment...."


http://www.ncregister.com/blog/why-the-catholic-church-needs-to-be-distinctly-catholic?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+NCRegisterDailyBlog+National+Catholic+Register#When:13:32:14Z