On Antiphons and Music in Mass

Jenni Groft

This was a difficult article to write. I have felt the pull to write it for quite a while, but I’ve been hoping that someone else would say these things so I wouldn’t have to.

I wish to make clear from the get-go here that I support the Catholic Church, my priest, and bishop in their ministry, I trust in their knowledge and guidance, and I am doing my best to adapt to the changes. My purpose is not to revolt against the new translation of the General Instruction on the Roman Missal and the implementation of sung Propers.

However, the changes are difficult for many people, myself included. My purpose is to discuss the feelings and difficulties of some of those in the congregation.

Over the last couple years our parish has begun a series of changes in the music. They began slowly, eliminating drums and eventually guitars as well. People grumbled about it, some left the parish, but overall the people moved on and kept singing.

The next step seemed to be a combination of weeding out some of the cheesier (but well loved) songs and introducing more hymns. The hymns were changed out very quickly to correspond with the Sunday readings and liturgical seasons, so it was difficult to learn the new songs, even though the words were beautiful.

The responsorial psalms were changed as well, from songs of the psalms that could be sung even apart from a responsorial to a sung psalm and response usually in the Gelineau format. (Sample of Gelineau Psalm 23) The organ was used more and the pace of the music slowed. People grumbled, some more left the parish, and again the uproar died down.

Then came the Antiphons.

Oh Antiphons, the trouble you’ve caused.

As of Advent 2011 the new translation of the GIRM took effect, specifying, or rather clarifying what music could and should be used in Mass, and bringing back the Propers of the Mass. The Propers are five chants that are proper, or specific, to each Mass, varying by date.

And here’s where this article may indulge in a little bit of criticism. With the introductions of the Propers /Antiphons: entrance, responsorial, offertory, and communion, our parish dropped nearly all the rest of the music, except maybe one hymn, and possibly one choral piece sung only by the choir.

Our priest had done a bit to prepare the people for the change. He spent all of Advent teaching on the music of the church and the place it holds in mass, he encouraged us to go back and read Bishop Olmsted’s four part series on music in liturgy. Singing the Mass: Part 1Part 2Part 3Part 4.

Father tried his best to tell us what it was about and why the changes were happening. He explained to us that there are four hierarchical options for music in the mass. Hierarchical meaning that the first one was ideal, and the 4th one was somehow resorting to a last ditch effort.

So our parish has gone full steam ahead for #1, and a lot of people left the parish feeling abandoned and broken. That should tell us right there that this subject is very, very important.

It is important in two ways. First, the church understands that music is an important part of the human experience. Music has the capability to move beyond our rational minds and impact our very soul – for good or for bad. Second, because of this we have adopted the songs we have known as a spiritual language; a step towards knowing what prayer is.

In reading some different articles and posts around the internet, there seems to be an open disdain among music ministers for people who are dragging their feet about the changing of music. There is not any empathy towards the people’s attachment to what they have known or why it might be important to them. There is an underlying current of thought that says the people who don’t like the Antiphons or other changes in music are just not trying hard enough, and if they had any faith or taste then they would understand and love this.

What was my part in this? I’m just a mom, a pew sitter. But I had a bit of an inside view of what was happening because my husband is a cantor and deeply involved in the choir. So I had a very early look at what was coming and had been able to prepare myself as best I could. Still it has been difficult.

Why would a simple change in music be so difficult?

The songs we sing are a part of us. These songs that we had sung in mass from our early years had become, in a sense, our language of prayer. For many, these songs had been our first experience with what prayer is. Suddenly, it seemed, they had been yanked away, and I know people who actually floundered in their faith because of it.

Since these praise and worship songs feel like a part of us, and they are no longer allowed at mass, it is natural to feel that the spirituality we had experienced in the past, even our relationship with God, was inferior or superficial. The antiphons and new-to-us hymns were difficult to sing. They were not in the musical form we were used to listening to and singing with. The meter was different, the tunes were unpredictable. And because they were different every week, they were impossible to learn.

Being close to the music ministry (but not in it) meant that I got an earful every place I went. Every conversation I had with people who were in any way connected to our parish was either filled with complaints or anger about the changes.

Some wanted me to tell them what was happening and why, but mostly people just wanted to vent. One friend said, “I appreciate the musical abilities of the choir and music director, but I feel ostracized for my lack of abilities.” I had close friends who left the parish at this time, devastated that the mass no longer felt like they remembered.

For my part, I felt the pain of it too. I tried to focus on the positive and the inevitability of change. But for a while Mass just wasn’t a happy time for me. It was work, not joy. I was frustrated for my children – that the songs in mass wouldn’t be ones they could sing in a time of fear at night or while going about their day.

These antiphons weren’t songs that you could carry with you in your heart, and that made me so sad. It was hard to see my friends who were also doing their best to, if not embrace, at least tolerate the changes. All of us were struggling; there was a heaviness to the whole experience.

But it was not all bad.

There is a point in the faith, when you have to take a step from what you want in order to do to what is right. A point where you experience the drudgery of pure obedience. Strangely, there is grace to be found there.

One friend commented that it has, “sharpened her sense of reverence and awe.”

I had been sad that my children would not have those songs to buoy them along their faith journey – that the antiphons were not how they would pray musically as they went through their day.

Until they did.

A school friend had given my five year old daughter a teeny tiny bible — really just a little booklet with some key verses in it. One day, I found her reading them, singing them, in the style of the antiphons. And I realized: this is what they know. This will be what they grow up with. This will not be as difficult for them unless we, as their parents, make it so.

I’m still struggling with the changes. But here are some things I am trying to do to move forward and keep my faith strong in the midst of this.

1. Add more faith filled music elsewhere. It is my job to fill my children’s hearts and my heart with musical prayer. This can be done at many times during the week, it doesn’t have to stem from mass. I purchased some more music, listened to it in the car with the kids, listened to it on my own while working around the house. Those songs are still there, even if we are not singing them in mass.

2. Enrich my language of prayer. I have leaned on the music in mass as an easy part of my prayer; but now it is time to pray in other forms as well. Through rote prayers, through the words of the psalms, through quiet, through work. I miss praying those songs during mass, but that was only one way to communicate with God and feel Him deeply.

3. Focus on why I am at mass. Was my purpose at mass to hear the songs I liked? I confess that sometimes it was. There was a time when I would glance at the worship aid and if I didn’t see any songs I liked I would get a little chip on my shoulder. But really, what is the ONE reason that we go to mass? Jesus. And that, friends, will never change. When I feel like I don’t matter here, I remember that this is not about me.

4. Ignore the music. When the mass feels like a funeral for all the slowness and minor sounding keys, let it be a quiet mass to you. Read the antiphons, connect them with the other readings. Contemplate the words and pray silently. The irony of this, much like obedience, is that once I completely let go of the music in mass idea, the music was able to speak to me in a completely different way. But to get there I had to block it out and take some time to separate myself and my ideas of what liturgical music was.

5. Learn about the changes. Take time to read the links above – Bishop Olmsted’s 4 part series and Dramatic Changes in Music Rubrics for New Missal. There is much more out there to learn.

For those of us who are feeling like our kids are missing out, who are having trouble watching them wrestle with the changes as well, and who are even feeling tempted by the “fun programs” in the local protestant churches, I challenge you to read this: 10 Surprising Reasons Our Kids Leave Church, and work to remedy those in your own heart and family. (I certainly have a lot of work to do there!)

I know this is a confusing time, and we are grieving a little, but this is not the time to abandon our faith in God or in the Church He gave us. Think of how confusing that would be to our children!

As usual, C.S. Lewis can see to the root of the problem with laser sharpness. This quote is long, but every word here is important.

There are two musical situations on which I think we can be confident that a blessing rests. One is where a priest or an organist, himself a man of trained and delicate taste, humbly and charitably sacrifices his own (aesthetically right) desires and gives the people humbler and coarser fare than he would wish, in a belief (even, as it may be, an erroneous belief) that he can thus bring them to God. The other is where the stupid and unmusical layman humbly and patiently, and above all silently, listens to music which he cannot, or cannot fully, appreciate, in the belief that it somehow glorifies God, and that if it does not edify him it must be his own defect. Neither such a High Brow nor such a Low Brow can be far out of the way. To both, church music will have been a means of grace: not the music they have liked, but the music they have disliked. They have both offered, sacrificed, their taste in the fullest sense.

But where the opposite situation arises, where the musician is filled with the pride of skill or the virus of emulation and looks with contempt on the unappreciative congregation, or where the unmusical, complacently entrenched in the their own ignorance and conservatism, look with the restless and resentful hostility of an inferiority complex on all who would try to improve their taste – there, we may be sure, all that both offer is unblessed and the spirit that moves through them is not the Holy Ghost.

These highly general reflections will not, I fear, be of much practical use to any priest or organist in devising a working compromise for a particular church. The most they can hope to do is to suggest that the problem is never merely a musical one. Where both the choir and the congregation are spiritually on the right road no insurmountable difficulties will occur. Discrepancies of taste and capacity will, indeed, provide matter for mutual charity and humility.

-C.S. Lewis, Christian Reflections, “On Church Music”

What we, the people who are struggling, need from the Church is humility and gentleness. Know that if we are still there, in mass, participating in the community, we are trying. This is a difficult and emotional change for some of us. We are being asked to revise how we see ourselves as a part of the Church. It feels like we are losing a bit of ourselves, and losing a way that we were comfortable talking to God.

It is okay to take some time to adjust to this change. For those who are still struggling, I feel your pain. I’m not over it; I’m still wrestling with it as well. I’m praying for all of us.

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21 thoughts on “On Antiphons and Music in Mass”

  1. Pingback: Feeling The Power of Sacred Music + Genuflect

  2. Thank you for writing this, Jenni, and God bless you for staying faithful. I do wonder if there’s anyone in the parish reassuring those who feel alienated or ostracized that they should not fear, and that their talents and abilities are transferable– some more-traditional-leaning folk who start up Gregorian chant choirs open them to everyone and anyone who can carry a tune and who just want to learn. The point is to show them that they can. Sometimes (maybe it’s our “performance” mentality…), we forget that this sort of music that the changes are re-introducing is learned over time and with patience, care, and yes, repetition. But that’s true of any area of the spiritual life, anyway, as I think your piece rather nicely illustrates.

    our parish dropped nearly all the rest of the music, except maybe one
    hymn, and possibly one choral piece sung only by the choir.

    …the Ordinaries, too?! Man, I hope not. Aren’t the people in the pews are supposed to sing the ordinaries? For one, the Ordinaries are the parts of the Mass that don’t change. The musical settings of those texts might change according to liturgical season, but even many EF-only parishes only tackle around two settings, which the congregation learns simply by repetition. The people in the pews also nail it all before too, too long. We might say that the Ordinaries to some extent anchor the Mass, so the people in the pews have a substantial role to play. In the Ordinaries, we’re looking at one of the basic rhythmic backbones of the Mass.

    Your point #1 interestingly conveys something else, too: due to a lack of a Catholic subculture, we tend to squish being Catholic into one hour a week, which constricts what we understand by “Church.” The Church is the Mystical Body of Christ. The Church is not a mere “institution,” even if an institutional, visible, hierarchical structure exists due to the Incarnational nature of Catholicism. The Church is also not just the four walls of the parish building where Mass is celebrated. I think we have good reasons for saying that there’s room for all kinds of music– like pop music– in the Church, but that we can legitimately question if Mass is “that” place. So we needn’t see “singing one’s favorite songs elsewhere” as some sort of compensation. It’s simply that different kinds of music have different purposes and therefore different structures and modes of composition.

    You are absolutely right to say that we go to Mass for Jesus, and your citation of Marc Yoder’s piece also suggests very strongly that we should also be asking ourselves more deeply what Mass is– and isn’t. At Mass, Christ’s Sacrifice on Calvary is re-presented in our now. We are at the foot of the Cross at Mass, and we look forward to coming of the Risen Christ in the East. The angels and saints are also present at Mass with us, since we attend the Heavenly Liturgy.

    We might ask ourselves if the way we approach Mass in our attitude, dress, and in our musical expression convey that this is what we are aware of that’s taking place. Might this be the primary reason why the Church already provides us with the music that we need, and why she accords Gregorian chant first place in the liturgy (not every parish will have the ideal, but knowing that chant sets the standard does inform our sensibilities in the music that we choose)? Liturgical music isn’t about “taste” or about any speculation about what God would prefer to hear. It’s about what we profess to believe about Who He is, not just in the words, but the very structure of that music that convey those words. We also grow up in a culture whose “Christian” puts Jesus’s name on every bit of paraphernalia. But this is still a culture that has very real problems with belief in the Incarnation. Moreover, does our limited sense of what Mass is and why we go hamper our ability to evangelize, because the music and much else don’t give us what we need to draw on for not tying into everything else we say we love about being Catholic? There are so many ways in which I can point out that the Church’s musical tradition actually makes what we read about when it comes to theology, the Catechism, prayer, and Catholic spiritual practice simply come alive.

    Catholic pilgrim’s point about Masses being canceled in the Middle East is a salient one, which Yoder’s piece actually hints at and ties into nicely. People risk their lives in the Middle East and elsewhere to go to Mass. These days, they might even get killed at Mass. Moreover, priest holes exist due to belief in the Real Presence, not because Christians are dying to “have fun.” Because others literally give their lives to come to Mass, squabbles over music and such make us forget that Mass is Mass– if it’s a valid Mass, that’s still a valid Eucharist. And yet, for the very same reason that Mass is Mass, and that is Jesus, it seems rather juvenile, self-indulgent, and disrespectful of us here in America and much of the West to try to turn Mass into some affable social gathering or meal that diminishes any sense of Mass a sacrifice. We don’t just come to Mass for Jesus; we come to Mass to be conformed to Jesus.

  3. Why does it have to be all or none? Why can’t a parish offer the ordinary form for some masses and more traditional forms for others?
    I have a parish that does that with modest success.
    Or is it a case where the leadership believes that all or none is the only way?

    1. Jeff, I tried to get my EF only parish to do this and the opposition, including the priest, were afraid that the two groups would not form a cohesive parish – they would not get along. I think this is wrong and shows no regard for what people are capable of with the proper leadership.

    2. Hi Howard, you might know of Fr. Christopher Smith in North Carolina, who actually celebrates both EF and OF. …and what happened is that those who were “EF only” started to appreciate attending a reverently celebrated OF, and those who swore they would never attend the Latin Mass started attending. The parish of St. John Cantius in Chicago also celebrates both reverently.

      Mutual enrichment and cross-pollination can in fact happen.

    3. Much depends on the priest and the bishop to do this. There is little support for the EF Mass here from them. For this reason and others, I have moved on to the Cathedral which is staffed (and owned I am told) by Franciscans. The rector is respected throughout the diocese and celebrates the EF form often. He also preaches and teaches it’s value.

    4. Or is it a case where the leadership believes that all or none is the only way?

      It would seem that the “Spirit” of Vatican II produced a lot of confusion and misunderstanding, and encouraged not a few false dichotomies. False dichotomies just ruin so much for everyone. So much for both-and, whose case isn’t helped whenever we have any hysteria that amounts to “EF = ‘taking Vatican II away,'” or “regressing” from Vatican II, and unfounded fears of imposing this, that, or the other thing on everyone.

      As Howard indicates, there are indeed some clergy and laypeople who not only aren’t supportive of the EF, but even dislike the EF and anything that reminds them of it. But that’s just the worst of it. At best, it’s probably mostly due to ignorance. Fears of divisiveness might well stem from simply not knowing the EF very well, to say nothing of how it relates to the OF. I’m pretty much one of the few people who love the EF in both of the two parishes I frequent. A lot of people do love that we can talk about the Catholic faith together, but I see confusion or that “not gonna go there” look of caution appear on many people’s faces as soon as I mention that so much of the ability to join the dots of the faith comes from knowing and being at home in both the EF and the OF. A lot of people fear “getting lost” at Mass, and some may even balk at ad orientem. Once the latter is explained, however, most tend to warm to it, and those who are gonna grumble are gonna grumble.

    5. There is also another cause
      that will separate EF and OF parishioners. The parish I spoke of is
      between a medium and small city, mostly rural area drawing people from
      those cities and many miles away even beyond those cities. An ideal
      central location to serve the greatest number but not conducive to a close
      parish life because of the distances involved. Also, there is an active and
      very vocal Pius 10 group who have attended Mass there. They have their own
      priest and two private chapels in separate locations to serve them but have
      been in the past a contentious force. For those with limited knowledge of
      Church history and only know the Mass or those who are not exposed to the differences
      that have caused a fracture, these competing factions will not inhibit their
      acceptance of the EF.

  4. Jenni, the people you describe lamenting the chanted Propers remind me of kids raised on over-salted fast food who now find their exposure to healthy food dull and boring.

    For over forty years, I (and now, my teenage grandsons) have winced in pain at the songs we sing at Mass. Some of them remind me of John Denver pieces or Gene Autry’s “Back in the Saddle”.

    The Catholic Church has a rich musical tradition that goes back centuries. We shouldn’t have to apologize for that. We shouldn’t have to limit ourselves to songs, written in the 1970’s that (at least for older parishioners) evoke the mood of the cocktail lounge.

    Many of us can identify with the lamenters in your article. We know what it’s like to suffer from the music sung at Mass. We know what it’s like to make it a sacrifice and offer it up. The seniors among us have done it for forty years. My hope is that the lamenters will eventually get over their addiction to the fast food, and come to enjoy the real thing. I will pray for that. (And sing an “Ave, verum”.) 🙂

    Marsh Fightlin

    1. Clever analogy, but it falls way short. While crappy fast food is actually harmful (even deadly, over long periods) to your well-being & body’s health, the music from the Novus Ordo Mass is not actually spiritually harmful. It might be spiritually inferior to Extraordinary Mass music but it’s not actually spiritually harmful (at least most of it is not, there are a few exceptions).

    2. I wonder…as we pray, so we believe, as we sing so we pray, so as we sing so we believe. And some of the “let’s adore ourselves now in song” pablum could lead to moral death. As so can happy-clappy applauding/worhsipping people instead of being on our knees worshipping the one true God. Guy McClung, San Antonio

    3. I dunno. I would posit that songs that convey the impression that religious faith and belief should have little to do with using our brains are pretty darn spiritually harmful. I’ve been noticing that way too many American Catholics in suburban parishes pretty much assume– like the larger culture– that faith and reason don’t mix. Despite what their Church’s Magisterium actually teaches. Moreover, I would think that incoherence at the very source and summit of the Christian life is harmful, too.

  5. Good article with good suggestions. But Jenni, seriously? I can sorta try to empathize with your fellow parishioners, but really? We have Eastern Catholic parishioners in Syria & Iraq who are having sleepless nights over the future of their Catholic families under Islamic crazies & even brave Eastern Catholics who have bravely decided they’d rather stay in their home countries (Iraq/Syria) & faithfully face a real possible martyrdom for Christ (rather than flee to Europe/America like several secularist-leaning Eastern Catholics have already done instead). And here we have spoiled, suburban American Catholic parishioners leaving the Church over some music? Seriously? In some Iraqi towns, Catholic Mass has been CANCELED because of the Islamic State taking over. That’s a real crisis. We Americans are spoiled & self-centered beyond belief. I’m not saying music is not important, but your fellow parishioners (who left the Catholic Church over this) have a seriously limited perspective.

  6. I want to add my heartfelt ‘thank you’ to all the others given for this post! I appreciate, as well, the comments being shared. As a member of a more ‘praise and worship’ type choir, who also enjoys the traditional musical forms, this post and thread is both balm for the soul and food for thought. Key is the idea that music becomes another language for prayer — we know this from the adage that ‘he who sings [praise of God with love] prays twice’ (cf: CCC 1156) but we sometimes forget it, allowing music to be merely the background to ‘what’s really happening’ — it’s ALL about Jesus.

  7. While I am a great fan of the Gregorian Latin propers, and sing in an Extraordinary Form chant schola every Sunday as well as an Ordinary Form choir, and while I hate the way the entire chant tradition was dumped by the Church after Vatican II and welcome the newfound availability of English chant propers for the Ordinary Form, I do question the wisdom of doing away entirely with hymns in the English mass. It is certainly licit to not sing all of the propers at every sung mass — a resounding entrance hymn would be nice on occasion. And moreover, it is always possible to sing the entrance, offertory or communion antiphon and then sing a hymn as well, especially at Communion if there is a lot of time to fill up while the people are taking communion. And one can always sing a hymn at the recessional. I am very much against propers only or hymns only approach in the Ordinary Form. Of course personally I prefer the older Catholic and Protestant English hymns to the more Seventies “contemporary” ones, but YMMV.

  8. Pingback: Experience the Eternal City from Above - BigPulpit.com

  9. Birgit Atherton Jones

    All I could think of, when I read this piece, was how it mirrored how I felt as a child – when Vatican II came along and changed everything all at once. I actually envy your diocese as we are still struggling with the obedience of implementing the reform of the reform here in the Bible Belt.

    What was thrust upon us, so many years ago, is being partially restored and for that I am grateful. I love a bit of holy silence and less busyness at Mass – time for reflection and meditation.

    Isn’t it funny how we are all creatures of habit? You are doing your best to adapt to that for which I am yearning.

    All in all, it is good that we focus fully on #3 – the reason we attend Mass. After all, whether or not the music speaks to us in our favored way, it’s the same Jesus Whom we are coming to worship.

  10. ” A point where you experience the drudgery of pure obedience. ”

    What a beautiful sagacious quote you have wrought. Who would think tinkering with music could cause someone to leave a parish. Living near a city where organ music reigns supreme, where
    organs are behemoths with 8000 + pipes and AGO musicians from all over the world come to dance on the ivory, playing some of the holiest and loftiest compositions in history, I am able to relate to the spiritual power in music. Let me give you just a minute taste of what grace filled scores are out there
    Leo Sowerby – Meditation on a communion hymn.
    Cesar Franck -Priere
    Henri Mulet -Tue s Petra (You are Peter)
    Peter Berton – Sanctuary Doves
    Carol Fay – Postlude pour l’office de Complies
    Daniel Pinkham – Collects ( for Signs, Evening prayer. the Armor of Light.
    Anton Heiller – Ecce Lignum Crucis
    Engelberg – When in our Music God is Glorified.
    Dan Locklair – The peace may be exchanged
    Charles Tournemire – Improvisation on Te Deum
    Gerre Hancock – Improvisation on St. Clement (this last performed by his wife on the 1st
    anniversary of his death. Most of these are about 7 minutes long and are meant for meditation
    and to certainly provide nourishment for the balance so obviously needed.

  11. Dear Jenni-What a humble and understanding approach and faith-filled approach you have to all this. So different from some of my [and others] approaches to things we disagree with. Your honesty and tone are refreshing and a good example. I’ll bet CS Lewis’s choir and musicians were not “on stage” but were behind the congregation; and I will bet there was never or almost never applause at his services. Guy McClung, San Antonio

  12. Jenni this is very well written and a necessary observation.

    As I was reading through it about halfway I said to myself that this could have been written sometime in the late 60s or 70s about the changes that came about after Vat2.

    I am also a convert, from the Episcopal church, but my memories of church music go way before Vat2 because I dropped out altogether. I sit at Mass today in some Catholic churches and the musical atmosphere brings back boyhood memories of those Episcopal services and I think; just as we are now seeing African priests preaching to us (a reversal of roles), perhaps the same has happened to the music with protestant sources.

    Music has a strong effect on us all. I tend to favor a traditional music with organ and Gregorian chant and attend those services when available.

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