As I have grown older in my Catholic faith, I have begun to notice in a deeper way the differences in the way Mass is celebrated from church to church. For example, at Notre Dame, I found myself equally inspired by the reverent and dramatic Basilica High Mass and the closer, more comradely Stanford Hall Mass. I think each was appropriate to its place: the Basilica is the centerpiece of the University and should uphold the dignity and authority of the Church; the hall chapel is more evangelical--a service to the students in residence. Also, of course, I have developed negative tastes. For example, my home parish in Bellevue, Washington has a director of music who possesses both an operatic singing voice and penchant for performance. Hence the Mass is often what occurs between her performances of usually contemporary and sadly ugly music. Yet that is a difficult criticism to make, since St. Augustine once famously argued that "to sing well is to pray twice," and that choir director certainly sings well, if not necessarily pleasantly. Is there a right or wrong way to add music to the mass? And if so (on either question), can it be done without forcing smaller churches to put on a grandeur they don't possess or making larger churches get falsely folksy?
There do occur, of course, blatant departures from Canon Law. I personally have seen examples of this--In some parishes the congregation neither stands for the Offeratory nor kneels for the consecration; or instead of saying "lamb of God" three times during the Agnus Dei a church will substitute some other description of Jesus (such as "Bread of Life"), which is incorrect no matter how biblical the other description is; or perhaps the priest will be joined by a parishioner at the altar during the consecration or have a parishioner help him distribute the Eucharist from the altar. Such violations of the Nuovo Ordo undermine the very universality of the Universal Catholic Church (and the churches in question are probably being sadly irreverent along the way). But this is not specifically what I am talking about. Even in a church that worships correctly "by the book," considerable damage may be done to the atmosphere of worship when the music is wrong. And "wrong" in this case could mean "performed" (for it's own sake instead of to enhance the Mass), "irreverent," "theologically unsound," or even simply "meaningless."
In considering this question I owe a considerable debt to the IrishLaw blog (there's a link on the right of this page), whose author argues that "Putting yourself into the place of God in hymns ("I am the Bread of Life" -- well, no we're not, Christ is), applause for the choir during Mass (it's not a performance), [or] using treacly and vapid "teen" music (did I *really* have to sing "Our God is an awesome God" so much in high school?)" (7 July 2007) are some of the major ways the music can diminish the experience of Mass. And while I must disagree with her on the song "I am the Bread of Life," both because I think it beautiful and because I assume parishioners are smart enough to understand that it is not them individually that are the Bread of Life but rather Christ, who they are echoing through the lyrics, I think she has a good point. I would also like to add to her list those stupid and meaningless "Gospel" hymns like "Standing in the need of prayer," since they sometimes technically wrong--"it's not the preacher nor the teacher but it's me, oh Lord, standing in the need of prayer" strikes me as a selfish and unchristian sentiment--and often say very little beyond their one refrain. Church should be a celebration, yes; however celebrations needn't be mindless fun.
I think much of the happy, pop- or gospel-style music that has inundated the contemporary American Mass is due to a well-meant, but actually hurtful intention. Faced with emptier churches and the grand Vatican II mandate of opening the arms of the Church in welcome to the world, many Catholics who provide or direct music for liturgy attempted to make Catholicism more appealing both by dumbing it down and making it more happy and fun. The problem with this should be obvious: the Church should never lower itself to appeal to some "common denominator" (either when constructing the liturgy or promulgating it's teaching on faith or morals), it should rather seek to raise up humanity so that they may see and believe the great promise of Christ. As St. Paul wrote, "It is [Christ] whom we proclaim, admonishing everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom, that we may present everyone perfect in Christ" (Col 1:27-28).
So I offer two criteria for liturgical music. First, since it is the priest who administers the Mass (and the sacrament of the Eucharist), it is only fitting that the music should compliment him instead of overshadowing him. Second, the music should be meaningful and theologically sound, though not necessarily complicated--many of the most beautiful and meaningful hymns are simply re-arranged biblical passages with a very simple theme, like "Blessed are they" or "Here I am, Lord." I'll caveat my opinion by also making clear that while I don't necessarily think broader-appeal songs like "My God is an awesome God" are bad (they may, in fact, be entirely appropriate for certain situations--like a teen mass), they certainly do less to increase our understanding of God's mysteries or ennoble us than many other hymns. And older hymns that have nearly dissappeared, like "Christ the Lord has risen today" and "Eternal Father, strong to save" (look them up--they're probably only recorded by college choirs anymore) can be very powerful even to members of my (or a younger) generation.
We are creatures with a spiritual nature. A crude way of putting this is to say that we have one foot in the physical world and one foot in the spiritual. The sacraments are where we perhaps (if only for an instant) stand in both worlds at the same time, and therefore are the closest to heaven. Liturgical music should compliment this effect by inspiring us--literally, "raising us up" (to loosely quote another popular hymn) to consider the greatest mysteries of God's grace and our own condition. Otherwise, it is simply a distraction--which is, I am sad to say, exactly what much contemporary liturgical music has become.
