Being a member of the National Association of Pastoral Musicians for the past 29 years, I had received an interesting email with the "lineup" of musical selections for all of the papal liturgies while B16 is here in the U.S. I was very impressed by the selections chosen by the people in the Archdiocese of Washington, D.C., but I was not at all impressed by the choices for the liturgies in New York.
In Washington, it was clear that the planners wanted lots of congregational participation, in ALL of the languages of the liturgy. We saw and heard the results of that at the wonderful Mass in the stadium on Thursday. EVERYBODY SANG! ALL SORTS OF LANGUAGES WERE SUNG! ALL SORTS OF MUSIC WERE UTILIZED TO HELP ALL TO SING THE LITURGY!
Unfortunately, the planning folks in New York didn't get the memo about "full, conscious and active participation of ALL of the faithful" in the liturgies. I found the music chosen for the New York liturgies to be way too "highbrow" and "elitist" and "unaccessible" to the everyday pew-dweller to even begin to sing.
I'm very dissapointed with the Archdiocese of New York, and their planning team.
Once again, they've proven to the rest of the American Church to be snooty, and out of touch with real-life with the average American Catholic experience. They value performance over participation. It's very clear.
I'm glad I live in New Jersey, and I always will!
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