Monday, April 30, 2007

The all-powerful director of music

Jeffrey Tucker over at NLM posted a typical scenario of the liturgical tyranny imposed by lay directors of music at most Novus Ordo parishes today. Here's a snapshot of a conversation between a man planning for his wedding music and the parish music director.

The naive young man clarified with some firmness: "We really do want a traditional Catholic wedding, so we really want traditional Catholic music." He didn't have anything specific in mind. Indeed, what the young man called "traditional Catholic" is just a code for something meaningful and important, something holy and transcendent, something momentous and prayerful, something right and true and integral to our heritage -- something other than what this woman is capable of providing. The voice of the director of music firmed up to the point of scolding: "Well, we must keep in mind that the people of God have very diverse tastes, so we must use music that appeals to everyone, not just those who agree with you."

Oh yeah! Diversity! Appeals to everyone except to Him and the ones who truly matters. The typical buzzwords. I'd say this is a call to arms to get rid of such 1970s backwardness for the common good. OK, the Clown Mess picture below is not the music director's ideas...but we all know how circus-like the Church has been turned into, and music played a major role.

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