The Heritage Missal

Melancholicus satisfied his first Sunday obligation of the new liturgical year at the parish of St. Charles Borromeo in Tacoma, Washington. The church itself is nothing to write home about (it is an unbeautiful modern edifice dating from the late 1950s), but the resident clergy are orthodox, the liturgy is generally tasteful, and the preaching is good. One particular difference Melancholicus has noticed between churches over here and in Ireland is that there are generally no hymnals or liturgy-books in the pews of Irish churches, whereas in the United States these things abound. Whether such is a good thing is quite another matter; studying the printed materials provided in each pew (the “Gather” hymnal and suchlike), Melancholicus is less than impressed, and has often wished that American Catholics cared more for the modern equivalent of Low Mass (Irish style). This because the fare to be found in these books seldom rises above the level of tawdry mediocrity, and the pathetic little ditties often employed in American churches in lieu of sacred music serve only to make one cringe.

Since last week the pews have been filled with brand-spanking-new copies of a paperback volume called “Heritage Missal”. This is published afresh for each liturgical year, and contains the Mass ordinary and the propers, including readings, for each day. This in itself is a useful function, as it obviates the need for those wretched missalettes which litter the floors and porches of churches in Ireland. But because the propers are set out day by day according to the civil calendar, the missal is good for one year only, is out of date the following year, and must be replaced by the next current edition. Accordingly, there is an annual turnover of these cheap paperback missals, which no doubt generates tremendous revenue for the publisher. Hence the reason it is re-issued every year. One can only conclude that the American Church has too much money if it can afford to fritter it away on such disposable resources.

The “Heritage Missal”—which Melancholicus can only declare is a misnomer, since there’s precious little heritage in it—is published by an organisation named OCP, or Oregon Catholic Press. This organisation makes a tidy profit churning out these throwaway missals year after year; every church Melancholicus has visited in Tacoma has sported them. A visit to the OCP website reveals that this organisation is a vehicle of the liturgical revolution. OCP publishes the musical compositions of people such as Michael Joncas, Dan Schutte, David Haas, Paul Inwood, Marty Haugen et al—a veritable Who’s Who of songsters that Traditional Catholics love to hate (not without reason). Wikipedia gives us the sobering information that the products of OCP are used in two-thirds of all Catholic churches in the U.S. The result of this near monopoly is a tyranny of the mediocre, since the “Heritage Missal” contains not only the Mass propers, but all the music composed for those propers by third-rate artistes. Thus we get jolly little ditties pitched at grade school level; weak paraphrases of the psalms; jarring modern ‘hymns’ with a pop beat; anthropocentric ‘feel-good’ clap-trap, and other obscenities. There is the occasional kernel of wheat among the chaff; last Sunday’s Mass featured the traditional Advent hymn Creator Alme Siderum in a decent English translation, and to the same melody familiar to users of the Liber Usualis, but overall, the musical contents of the “Heritage Missal” must be judged inadequate for the holy sacrifice of the Mass.

This is tremendously frustrating for those faithful who abhor the triumph of bad taste, not only because of the poor quality of these compositions in themselves, but because of their perpetuity; by printing an annual missal in which such musical settings are included, OCP maintains a stranglehold on Catholic liturgy in the U.S. At present, there is small hope that the depressed state of the liturgy will be relieved; the domination of musical arrangements by the mafia of the mediocre is too firmly entrenched. The forthcoming revised translation of the Roman Missal may have some impact, but owing to the looseness of contemporary liturgical law, in which musical compositions need not follow the authorized text of the Mass verbatim, there is no reason why the same old ’seventies folk-songs (together with ’seventies ICEL) will not continue to irritate Mass-goers yearning for a little solemnity for a generation or more to come.

We might ask: who owns OCP? Is it a private concern? Is it answerable to the bishops? In either case, there must be some way of compelling it to forget about the spirit of Vatican II and conform instead to the principles of the Benedictine reform. If OCP is a private concern, perhaps the dioceses of the United States could cease purchasing its products, and turn instead to a more orthodox, Catholic-minded publisher who would be only too delighted to assist in the reform of the reform, and make a good living in the process. But if it is an organ of the conciliar church, it will doubtless continue to exercise its baleful influence long after Joncas, Haugen, Haas, Inwood et al are all dead.

Small wonder hardly anybody joins in the singing at Mass; most are probably as embarrassed by it as Melancholicus.

The spirit of Vatican II rages against the dying of the light. We might have landed the troops in Normandy (liturgically speaking), but there is a long and bitter fight ahead of us before we stand finally at the gates of Berlin. In the meantime, OCP will continue to churn out volume after volume of the so-called “Heritage Missal” until either legitimate authority or market forces compel them to stop. At present there is no indication that either source of relief will be forthcoming.

The prospects are gloomy.

Restoring Tradition: Pope Benedict's initiative on sacred music

News from Sandro Magister’s Chiesa:

Melancholicus remembers with a vivid clarity that momentous day of the 19th April 2005, when he saw Cardinal Jorge Medina Estevez appear on the balcony of St. Peter’s basilica to announce to the world that the 266th successor of St. Peter had been elected to succeed the late John Paul II. He remembers the unbearable tension before his eminence named the new pope; he remembers the tremendous shout of his fellow seminarists as the community leapt to their feet as one man, cheering and applauding, and he remembers afterwards weeping with a mixture of joy and relief. The results of the conclave might have been very different, but almighty God had not forgotten his Church, which for forty years had suffered unremittingly from the torments of the devils unleashed at the council.

He has been only two years in office, but already there is a sense of a change in the air. A glimmer of light can be seen in the east, and we wonder in hope if it might be the light of dawn, at long last, after forty years of night—and what a night it has been, impenetrable and inky black. When the name of the new pope-elect had been announced, we were all delighted: Benedict XVI. A traditional name. A pre-conciliar name. Many of us privately thanked God that he had not called himself John, or Paul, or John Paul. Before the conclave Melancholicus was resigned, without much hope, to the gloomy reign of a John Paul III, one which would be every bit as much business as usual, and every bit as damaging to the Church as the previous pontificate. He muttered as much, in a spirit of sour discontent, to his brethren in the days leading up to the election of the new pope. He was never so blissfully happy—nor so tremendously relieved—when the Holy Ghost proved him wrong.

The Holy Father has been slowly, painstakingly and with great care trying to repair some of the damage done to Christ’s holy Church over the previous four pontificates. Melancholicus is relieved that at last we have a pope who understands the liturgy — a subject of which his predecessor apparently was ignorant — and who appreciates how important to the inculcation of the faith is right order and praxis in the celebration of the liturgy.

How encouraging have been the Holy Father’s first steps in reforming the mess that is the post-conciliar Mass! A new translation of the Roman Missal is currently in preparation, a translation faithful to the Latin original and correcting the errors of the 1970 ICELese foisted by the liturgical revolution upon English-speaking Catholics throughout the world. We hope too that this new translation, when it appears, will be beautiful, especially since the current translation of the Mass is so pedestrian and banal.

Furthermore, what words of ours can possibly do justice to the Holy Father’s generosity in his motu proprio Summorum Pontificum, in which he gave to the Church an inestimable gift, namely the restoration of the traditional Roman rite of the Mass, which, in the face of so much opposition from corrupt and worldly episcopates throughout the world, demonstrates his tremendous pastoral concern for the spiritual welfare of those who love the Church?

Now the Holy Father seeks to restore the majestic musical heritage of holy Church to its proper place. The Roman curia will have a new office with authority in the field of sacred music, and the choir of the Sistine Chapel will receive a new director, to foster the rebirth of sacred music:

The first of these events took place on Monday, October 8. On that morning, Benedict XVI held an audience with the "chapter" of Saint Peter's basilica – meaning the bishops and priests who, together with the archpriest of the basilica, Angelo Comastri, celebrate Mass and solemn Vespers each Sunday in the most famous church in the Christian world.

The pope reminded them that "it is necessary that, beside the tomb of Peter, there be a stable community of prayer to guarantee continuity with tradition."

This tradition goes back "to the time of Saint Gregory the Great," the pope whose name was given to the liturgical chant characteristic of the Latin Church, Gregorian chant.

One example the pope gave to the chapter of St. Peter's was the celebration of the liturgy at the abbey of Heiligenkreutz, the flourishing monastery he had visited just a few weeks earlier in Austria.

In effect, since just over a year ago, Gregorian chant has been restored as the primary form of singing for Mass and solemn Vespers in Saint Peter's basilica.

The rebirth of Gregorian chant at St. Peter's coincided with the appointment of a new choir director, who was chosen by the basilica chapter in February of 2006.

The new director, Pierre Paul, a Canadian and an Oblate of the Virgin Mary, has made a clean break with the practice established during the pontificate of John Paul II – and reaffirmed by the previous director, Pablo Colino – of bringing to sing at the Masses in St. Peter's the most disparate choirs, drawn from all over the world, very uneven in quality and often inadequate.

Fr. Paul put the gradual and the antiphonal back into the hands of his singers, and taught them to sing Mass and Vespers in pure Gregorian chant. The faithful are also provided with booklets with the Gregorian notation for Kyrie, Gloria, Credo, Sanctus, Agnus Dei, and the translation of the texts in Italian, English, and Spanish. The results are liturgically exemplary celebrations, with increasing participation from a growing number of faithful from many nations.

There's still much to do to bring back to life in St. Peter's what was, in ancient times, the Cappella Giulia – the choir specifically founded for the basilica – and to revive the splendors of the Roman musical style, a style in which the sacred polyphony pioneered by Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina and Gregorian chant, also sung in the Roman manner (virile and strong, not like the monastic models inspired by Solesmes), alternate and enrich each other.

But there has been a new beginning. And Benedict XVI wanted to tell the chapter that this is the right path.

Deo Gratias. Ad multos annos, Most Holy Father!

St. Cecilia's Choral Guild

Melancholicus wishes to announce that the gregorian schola of St. Cecilia will meet at 5.45 this evening for rehearsal in the Tea Room of the Blessed Sacrament Chapel on Batchelor’s Walk, Dublin city centre.

Any persons, male or female, interested in joining said schola or in learning the rudiments of gregorian chant are invited to attend. Rehearsals are held every second Wednesday. Ask for Thomas Murphy, Gareth O’Flaherty or Niall Brady.

Palestrina: Adoramus Te

This performance, from a group of lads at a Mennonite (!) college in the United States, is absolutely charming:



What is most amazing is that they don’t have either a conductor or sheet music, yet their delivery is flawless. It brings a tear to the eye.