Thursday, May 14, 2009

HEY!!! WHERE'D MY CHURCH GO???

After attending the MEF (see previous posts) on Easter of this year, and then attending a different local parish (for schedule and logistical reasons) in the intervening weeks, I returned to my home parish for mass the past two Sundays. And what did I discover???

SOMEONE STOLE MY PARISH!!!

What was once the most dependably conservative and musically unpretentious Catholic parish in my city has been replaced by a "new and improved" version. Thanks to these reforms 11:00 AM Sunday mass now includes "canned" music and a Cantor-cum-semaphore operator up on the altar!!! Now I get to hear pre-recorded orchestral accompaniment to not only the hymns, but other parts too.
So this 100+ year old church, small and beautiful, and now featuring 101 strings style accompaniment for our singing!!!

I have been stewing over this for over a week, and the though that keeps coming to mind is WHO THE HELL THOUGH THIS WAS A GOOD IDEA?

And aesthetics aside, isn't there a rule against prerecorded music in the mass?

The whole liturgical world is changing, reconnecting with the good aour ancestors lived and died for, but apparently there are some who havent noticed the writing on the wall - or simply ignore it.