Wednesday, August 7, 2013

Trusting the Church

The New Liturgical Movement's Peter Kwasniewski writes an excellent article on Gregorian chant, and why it is important to trust the Church's guidance in such matters. From the article:

It is indeed an act of trust when a Catholic layman or religious, priest or bishop, can say: “I do not know why Gregorian chant is so important, I really don’t see how it’s going to work in practice—but I believe what the Church of Jesus Christ teaches me, and I submit my intellect and my will to it. Credo. I trust that the Church’s judgment is better and wiser than my own, and I refuse to set myself up as an alternative magisterium. I will do all that I can, with patience and persistence, to follow her norms and recommendations.”
And this:

Second Vatican Ecumenical Council in 1963:
[S]teps should be taken so that the faithful may also be able to say or to sing together in Latin those parts of the Ordinary of the Mass which pertain to them. … The Church acknowledges Gregorian chant as specially suited to the Roman liturgy: therefore, other things being equal, it should be given pride of place in liturgical services. (Sacrosanctum Concilium 54; 116)