Grassroots Liturgist

“I believe in one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church.”   Have you noticed that the word catholic in the Creed does not have a capital letter?   Have you wondered why not? It’s because ‘catholic’ is being used as an adjective, not a proper noun.   From the early to mid-2 nd Century, when the Church was still in its infancy, the Church Fathers described the church as catholic in the sense of ‘throughout the whole’ or ‘universal.’   So, the Church and the Good News that it teaches is not for a select few from certain countries or demographics, but for every single person in the world.   Our Lord said, “I will build my church” – not ‘churches’ (Mt 16:18).   His vision is that all are in communion in one faith; that we are united in faith with fellow believers that we will never meet.   The next mark of the Church articulates one way in which we are to be united – apostolic .   The birthday of the Church is Pentecost, the day when, fill...

In an  earlier post I observed that the first thing that tends to be thought about when preparing the music for a Sunday parish Mass is what hymns to sing.  However, as the graphic below makes clear, they should not be the priority. There is a hierarchy of five levels and I guess that, rather like Piaget's stages of cognition, you shouldn't really start one level until you have fulfilled the preceding one.  If there is to be singing at the Mass (and, frankly, there should be some singing at every Mass since we are, naturally, musical creatures) then the absolute priority, before anything else, are the Gospel Acclamation and the Eucharistic Acclamations (Sanctus; Memorial Acclamation; Great Amen). Even at a weekday Mass, with no accompaniment, this should present little problem; who doesn't know the triple Alleluia? (though not during Lent, of course.)  And the music for the Eucharistic Acclamations can be found in our Missals.  The (English) Sanctus is base...