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The importance of Gregorian chant in the renewal of the liturgy.
The crisis in liturgical music is not something separate from the crisis of the liturgy and the crisis of faith, for they are inseparably linked.
Blessed Ivan Merz, a young layman and professor of liturgy in Croatia in the first half of the 20th century, said, “The prayers and gestures of the liturgy, its melodies and fragrances, are the projection of heaven onto earth and a snapshot of God’s inner life.”
Everything God has done, He has done according to order, beauty, and harmony. So this must be the criterion for sacred music. The more united one is with God, the more beautiful, just, and true is his work. For God’s honor, this should be the golden rule in all things that belong to divine worship. This is the right perspective, especially for liturgical music.
In the Orthodox Church, a bishop’s approval a quasi-imprimatur is required for artworks to be displayed before the faithful. In the Old Testament, God gave very detailed instructions regarding the art used for the house of God.
In his Motu Proprio, Tra le Sollecitudini, Pope Pius X mentions the qualities of sacred music and numbers among them universality that is, a given artwork must almost spontaneously be recognized by all as sacred.
Pope Pius XII taught in his encyclical Mediator Dei: When in prayer, the voice repeats those hymns written under the inspiration of the Holy Ghost and extols God’s infinite perfections, it is necessary that the interior sentiment of our souls should accompany the voice, so as to make those sentiments our own, in which we are elevated to heaven, adoring and giving due praise and thanks to the Blessed Trinity. Let us chant in choir, that mind and voice may accord together, says Saint Benedict.
It is not merely a question of recitation or of singing, which, however perfect according to the norms of music and the sacred rites, only reaches the ear but it is especially a question of the ascent of the mind and heart to God, so that, united with Christ, we may completely dedicate ourselves and all our actions to Him.
According to Pius XII, the Church has been very wise in entrusting to a group of faithful schola cantorum, or choir the responsibility of singing, so as to give others the opportunity to listen.
Let us recall what the Church teaches us through Pope Pius X about authentic liturgical music: It must be holy. Liturgical music must, therefore, exclude all profanity not only in itself, but in the manner in which it is presented by those who execute it. It must be true art, for otherwise, it will be impossible for it to exercise on the minds of those who listen to it that efficacy which the Church aims to obtain in admitting into her liturgy the art of musical sounds.
But it must, at the same time, be universal in the sense that while every nation is permitted to admit into its ecclesiastical compositions those special forms which may be said to constitute its native music, still, these forms must be subordinated in such a manner to the general characteristics of sacred music that nobody of any nation may receive an impression other than good on hearing them. So Pius the 10th in a draft proposal for the relevant canon during session 22 of the Council of Trent the following criteria for sacred music were established, quotation in masses where music and the organ are accustomed to be used In a measured way, nothing profane should be mixed in, but only hymns and divine praise. The whole manner of singing in the musical modes should be calculated not to offer vain joy to the ear, but so that the words can be understood by all and so that the hearts of the listeners may be ceased with the desire for heavenly harmonies and the contemplation of The joys of the blessed end of quotation.
Today, the state of sacred music in the liturgy is characterized by an almost general anarchy, worldly entertainment, Music, Pop music and folk have invaded churches and exercises a strong influence over liturgical celebrations. Pope John Paul the second pointed out this danger with great clarity when he said quotation, it is necessary to discover and to live constantly the beauty of prayer and the liturgy. We must pray to God with theologically correct formulas, and also in a beautiIn a respectful and dignified way, the Christian community must make an examination of conscience so that the beauty of music and hymnody will return once again to the liturgy. Worship should be purified from ugliness of style, from distasteful forms of expression, and from uninspired musical texts that are not worthy of the great act being celebrated.
Pope John Paul II spoke about this in a general audience on February 26, 2003.
Furthermore, the same Pope addressed the Church’s perennial teaching on sacred music: In continuity with the teachings of Saint Pius X and the Second Vatican Council, it is necessary, first of all, to emphasize that music destined for sacred rites must have holiness as its reference point. Indeed, sacred music increases in holiness to the degree that it is intimately linked with liturgical action. For this very reason, not all, without distinction, that is outside the temple the profane is fit to cross its threshold.
My venerable predecessor, Paul VI, wisely said commenting on a decree of the Council of Trent that if music, instrumental and vocal, does not possess at the same time the sense of prayer, dignity, and beauty, it precludes entry into the sphere of the sacred and the religious.
Today, moreover, the meaning of the category sacred music has been broadened to include repertoires that cannot be part of the celebration without violating the spirit and norms of the liturgy itself, end of quotation. Pope John Paul II, Chirograph for the Centenary of Tra le Sollecitudini, November 22, 2003.
Some years ago, a great expert on sacred music, Professor Giacomo Baroffio who served as Dean of the Pontifical Institute of Sacred Music from 1982 to 1995 invented an address that Pope John Paul II might have written for the Feast of Saint Cecilia in 2003, to mark the centenary of Tra le Sollecitudini.
It is worth quoting a few lines from this imaginary address, which are still so relevant today. This is an address that a future Pope should one day actually deliver, given the obvious widespread anarchy in liturgical music in the Church today.
Professor Baroffio says the following in this imaginary papal address: Beloved brothers in the episcopate, dear believers in the Blessed Jesus Christ, Several times over the span of my long pontificate, I have felt the urgent need to ask forgiveness for the sins that have stained the Church over the centuries. In the field of music, in recent decades and also during my pontificate I have witnessed a phenomenon that is harmful to the whole Church. I too have been astonished, and for these, today I ask God’s forgiveness and your clemency.
Motivated by the secular mentality that lurks in so many pockets of ecclesial life, I have let the fashions of the world enter God’s temple through proposals driven by a fear of not having followers and prompted by a need for immediate and reassuring results.
I have favored, in everything, the fashion for banality, allowing a flood of bizarre noises to suffocate the Gregorian melodies, which are prayer even before they are sung.
Among other things, I have allowed Gregorian chant to be jettisoned from the liturgy. I have favored the spread of loud and sappy songs which, quite apart from their artistic inconsistency, are incapable of directing hearts to God, offering only fine words of praise.
In doing so, I have contributed to a theft one I hope is not irreparable. I have robbed the People of God of a gold that had been given to them by the Spirit through the mission and labors of so many poets and cantors who, over the centuries, have built this monument to God in the name of beauty.
This is also why, so I am told, so many celebrations are moments of alienation, boredom, and bleakness a legalistic praxis unable to redeem them.
A word for you, young people from all over the world, whom I hold close to my heart. I think with sadness of the euphoria that pervaded so many of our massive encounters, which have often been like soap bubbles disappearing into thin air, leaving only bitter tears of burning disappointment.
Finally, I would like to urge pastors to reiterate strongly the centrality of our liturgical life and its sacred music in the Christian life. Indifference toward sacred music is all the more reprehensible because such an attitude, in fact, conceals a total lack of interest in the liturgy itself. I say liturgy and sacred music, not their nefarious substitutes. The authenticity of a liturgical experience is not confirmed by enthusiastic reception in the moment or by a crowd thronging around the elderly Pope.
The liturgy is shown to be true by the charity that is at work in holiness and nourished by the silence of adoration the silence from which Gregorian chant was born more than a thousand years ago. The silence that, even today, is the only vital space in which the new chant for tomorrow’s liturgy can take shape. Forgive me, my brothers and my children.
May God grant me the filial boldness to turn to Him, sustained also by the chant of your assemblies. In the fear and trembling of adoration, seek to find ways of recovering Gregorian chant. End of quotation. The Second Vatican Council insisted that Gregorian chant should be given chief place in liturgical services. The Catholic Church possesses a unique musical treasure as Benoit Neiss, a contemporary specialist in sacred music, rightly observes, quotation, we must be careful not to forget to mention again the unparalleled richness of the body of music assembled by the Church for all the circumstances of official prayer and above all the gift given to all mankind of a sound universe unlike any other. It is the culmination of all the findings made by the ancient Greeks, and rethought matured in the light of centuries of work, fruitful inventions, all enriched by regional or foreign repertoires, Ambrosian, Milanese, Hispanicalic and Mozarabic, etc, perfectly integrated into the common substrate and forming an organic whole which cannot be aroused in exhaustible wonderment. So the quotation of Benoit Neiss.
An ancient codex of liturgical music entitled Institutapatrum de Modo Psalendi Sive Cantandi, written in the 12th century for the abbey of Sangal in Switzerland, Sankt Gallen, tells us what listening to sacred music should compel, accomplish, quotation. The form of chant and psalmody should be pleasing to our sacrifice of praise and acceptable and pleasing to the angels. It should edify all men who watch and listen to the sun, provoking devotion and compunction, arousing the soul to investigate the meaning of Sacred Scripture and raising the mind to the contemplation of things above, to divine and heavenly realities. So the Institutapatrum.
Gregorian chant has that unique quality of being Catholic in the truest sense of the word, since all Catholic peoples recognize themselves in it and regard it as their own. Countless missionaries in various countries and cultures have borne witness to this. We have the following valuable and moving testimony of Cardinal Francis Xavier Nguyen Van Tuohn, who spent 13 years in a communist prison in Vietnam. I quote him.
I also love to pray with the whole of God’s word, with the liturgical prayers, the Psalms, the canticles. I greatly love Gregorian chant, which in large part I recall from memory thanks to my seminary formation. These liturgical songs entered deep into my heart.
Then there are the prayers of my native language, so moving that my whole family prayed together every evening in our family chapel, which reminded me of my childhood. Above all, there are the three Hail Marys and the Memorare that my mother taught me to recite morning and evening. As I have said, I spent nine years in solitary confinement, having contact with only two guards to avoid illnesses like arthritis or danger because I was never allowed to leave myself.
I would walk back and forth all day, massage my muscles, do physical exercises, while praying with songs like the Miserere, Te Deum, Veni Creator, and the Hymn of the Marty Sanctorum Meditis. These hymns of the Church, inspired by God’s word, provided me with a great deal of courage to follow Jesus. To come to truly value these beautiful prayers, it was necessary to experience the obscurity of prison and to become aware that our sufferings can be offered for the Church’s fidelity.
I sensed this intention, which I directed to Jesus in communion with the Holy Father and the whole Church in an irresistible way when I repeated it throughout the day, through him, with him, in him, per Ipsum Et cum ipso et in ipso. Cardinal Francis Xavier Nguyen Van Tuohn continues to witness the following moving facts. Quotation.
During that time, I heard that a group of 20 young members of the secret police were studying Latin with a former catechist in order to be able to understand ecclesiastical documents. One of my gods belonged to the group, and one day, he asked me if I would teach him a song in Latin.
There are many Latin hymns, and oh so beautiful. I responded, Well, you sing them for me, and I will choose one. He said. So I sang the Salve Regina, Veni Creator, Ave Maris Stella.
Can you imagine which hymn he chose? The Veni Creator. I cannot say how truly moving it was to hear this young Communist police officer going down the wooden staircase at seven every morning for calisthenics and then returning to his room to shower while singing the Veni Creator there in the prison. End of quotation of Cardinal Nguyen Van Tuohn.
St Thomas Aquinas said that devout listening to liturgical chant does not require intellectual analysis and knowledge of every word. Quotation. Even if some hearers understand not what is sung, yet they understand why it is sung, namely for God’s glory, and this is enough to arouse their devotion. So Thomas Aquinas.
Over the course of history, listening to truly sacred music, to prayers sung during the liturgy, has been shown to possess a supernatural power to spiritually transform, that is to truly convert a soul to God.
One famous example is that of Paul Claudel, a French poet and playwright and a fervent Catholic who converted on December 25, 1886, while listening to the Magnificat Vespers in Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris. Paul Claudel describes it as follows, quotation.
In an instant, my heart was touched, and I believed. I believed, with such a strength of adherence, with such an uplifting of my entire being, with such powerful conviction, with such a certainty, leaving no room for any kind of doubt, that since then all the books, all the arguments, all the incidents and accidents of a busy life have been unable to shake my faith, nor indeed to affect it in any way. End of quotation. Paul Claudel gave a moving personal testimony about the influence that the Church liturgy, and in particular Gregorian chant, had on his conversion, on his rebirth to true spiritual life. He wrote, quotation: The great book that opened itself to me and where I did my schooling was the Church, forever be praised, this great majestic mother at whose knees I learned everything. I spent all my Sundays at Notre Dame, and went there as often as possible during the week. I was then about as ignorant of my religion as one can be of Buddhism, and lo, there was the sacred drama unfolding before me with some magnificence that surpassed all my imaginations. It was no longer the poor language of devotional books. It was the most profound and grandiose poetry, the most august gestures that have ever been entrusted to human beings. I could not get enough of the spectacle of the Holy Mass and every movement of the priest was deeply engraved in my mind and in my heart. The recitation of the Office of the Dead, the Christmas office, the spectacle of the days of Holy Week, the sublime chant of the Exulted, beside which the most intoxicating accents of Sophocles and Pindar seemed to me insignificant. All of these overwhelmed me with respect and joy, with gratitude, repentance and adoration. So Paul Claudel.
To the objection that the people would not appreciate the chant, Cardinal Giuseppe Sarto, who later became Pope Pius the Tenth, had an answer in his pastoral letter on sacred music from 1895 where he pleaded for the true Gregorian chant and a stricter form of polyphony, quotation: Spoiled taste also rises up as an enemy of sacred music, since undeniably worldly music, because it is easily understood, and above all easily grasped from a rhythmical standpoint, is all the more pleasing the less the hearer has had the benefit of a good musical education. But without pointing out especially that mere pleasure never furnishes a true critical judgment in holy things, and that one should not give in to the people in things that are not good but should teach and educate the people. Say that the misuse of the word people is exercised too much for in reality they give evidence of being more devout and serious than one usually thinks. So the words of Cardinal Sarto from 1895.
There can be no true renewal of the liturgy in our day without the restoration of the Gregorian chant with an obligatory character and on a regular basis in all cathedrals, bigger shrines, in all monasteries and seminaries, and also in all bigger parishes in the entire Catholic world. In fact, Gregorian chant is a sermon full of life and eloquence because the religion, the Church that was capable of inspiring such a chant could be none other than divine.