Singing in Latin

"Many of these chants became all but forgotten by two generations of Catholics who were swept up in well-meaning but sometimes overzealous efforts in past decades to require constant innovation in liturgy."

Yep. That's what it says in the parish newsletter. I went to the evening Mass at St. Stephen's tonight because they are starting to do the Mass setting in Latin using the traditional Gregorian chants (or at least the updated chants as they appear in the Worship III hymnal). They're adding another section every Sunday....tonight they did the Gloria, Sanctus, and Agnus Dei. They plan to add the Kyrie and......the Credo!

Everything was a capella tonight, including the hymns. The morning cantoress was there tonight, so with her strong singing, she actually got people to sing heartily for the processional (Forest Green "Your hands, O Lord in days of old" (tune reminded me of Christmas)) and recessional (Thaxted "O God beyond all praising") hymns. The offertory (Sharpthorne "What does the Lord require") was another matter. Two or three people sang that I could hear, but the whispery noises they were making I would hardly call tuneful. And the communion marching music ("God, Your glory we have seen in Your Christ") was so not sung by the congregation that you could hear crickets.

The psalm antiphon was a setting by Leo Nestor and for the memorial acclamation and great amen they used the Proulx A Community Mass setting.

Msgr. Filardi celebrated and preached. He had a guest concelebrant with him today who's a priest from the West Bank of Israel. There was a second collection tonight, and no announcement of its purpose, so I'm going to guess it was going to the visiting priest's ministries.

It will be interesting to see how the Sunday evening Mass proceeds. I think they're planning to put together some kind of chant choir to support the Mass, and that could be interesting.