Tuesday, July 12, 2005

More FooFoo Dust from NAPALM

More from the NAPALM convention last week. Aren't you thrilled?
http://www.archmil.org/news/ShowNews.asp?ID=2321

“We have a choice to embrace this growing cultural diversity or resist,” said Sacred Heart Sr. Mary E. McGann at a workshop for musicians at the National Pastoral Musicians Conference in Milwaukee. Sr. McGann is associate professor of liturgy and music at the Franciscan School of Theology and the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, Calif.

(Snip)

The U.S. bishops are calling the members of the church to embrace the new people and changes that are occurring today, she said. For many, they consider it to be the process of birthing a new church. [A NEW Church? What's the matter with the Catholic Church?]

“The bishops are calling us to embrace these new arrivals of brothers and sisters,” said Sr. McGann. “We are called to a new Catholicity, a new vision of the church, a new way of being church, through a path of conversion, communion and solidarity. [Uh, huh, I guess.]

(Snip)

“Conversion is the ongoing struggle to overcome misunderstandings that stand in the way of new relationships and a new life,” said Sr. McGann. [No it's not. The classic "conversion" is "metanoia," conforming oneself to Christ.]

Conversion invites us to be stretched so that we may become pioneers, ready to embrace the rich varied sounds of the Body of Christ.”

Once conversion is achieved, she explained, communion may enter into the congregation, as deeper communication is reached throughout the cultures.

(Snip)

“Music,” said Sr. McGann. “What better way to build bridges across cultures? Music is not just an artifact of a culture, it is a threshold into the doorway of the history of a culture. And it’s not just about the music. It’s about the message. We are not performers. We are God’s messengers.” [Yes, Sister, sort of. Gregorian Chant and polyphony are the musical culture of the Catholic Church. They are not "doorways," nor "history." I'm sure that's what you meant, right?]

She added that through these messengers, bridges can be built within and across communities in any given archdiocese.

“As we forge our way into a new future, we must tend to those who follow us,” Sr. McGann said. “No doubt through these transformations we will have new insights. Music as a meeting point, a devotion, and a source of solidarity. No doubt that through this path, we will be on our way into singing a new church into being.” [Either music is a source of solidarity, as in the case of Chant, or it's 'singing a new Church' into being. Can't be both.]

Sometimes you wonder if MS Word has a random-intellectualoid-word-generator which actually writes these speeches.

4 comments:

Terrence Berres said...

Contemporary hymns might be multi-cultural in the sense that they're like taking that ring binder from a seminar on the multi-cultural and setting it to music.

Dad29 said...

Yeah. Just as inspired, too.

Anonymous said...

New Church? What's wrong with the "old" one?
Lynn

Dad29 said...

The concept of the Communion of Saints, which is transcendent of time, is null and void to the LiturgyWonk/Wonkette crowd.

They live in a world in which History began approximately at their birthdate.

Thus, the "democracy of the Dead", Tradition (GKC, of course) is no longer operative.