Customer Reviews

Why Catholics Can't Sing: The Culture of Catholicism and the Triumph of Bad Taste

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Thomas Day presents a very interesting theory as to why Catholics have become silent during the Mass. His comments at the current state of litugical music (as well as liturgy in general, seeing that the two are closely connected) are explained very thoroughly with very clear examples. While he certainly does not have much love for contemporary "folkish" church music and informal (sloppy) liturgies, he does not feel a 180 degree turn to the Tridentine Mass of old will solve the problem. I found myself laughing out loud as Day would discuss the exact situations present in my parish in a very witty and humorous way. If you think that "They Will Know We Are Christians" or "Here I Am Lord" is the best litugical music out there, then buy this book and open yourself up to 2000 years of Catholic tradition that Thomas Day very cleverly unlocks.

Once upon a time the Nasty Old Church was dominated by gray-haired old men in choir robes who led choirs in renditions of the St. Gregory Hymnal and choral Masses of great insipidity. Then the Fathers of Vatican Council II wisely sat together and, behold, decreed that all the people should sing together in Latin and Gregorian chant should have pride of place. But, said they, in certain mission lands indigenous music and language may be used in some circumstances. Then came fell creatures fresh from six months of classes in Pastoral Music, bearing guitars and microphones and amplified boxes filled with transistors. And, behold, they appealed to the Spirit of Vatican II, who heard their pleas and gave them power over religious women, and men with itching ears. And these cried out to their bishops, saying "away with anything written before 1970, and with organs of metal and wood, and with choruses singing aught unsyncopated, and with any instrument that is not plucked. And they cast all these into the fire, and behold there was such a noisesome sound as had not been heard since the dawn of time. Thomas Day, sometimes with tongue in cheek, but often with pitchfork in hand, skewers the new liturgical music establishment without mercy. He indicts FBI (Foreign Born Irish) priests for imposing a reign of silence and maudlin hymns on generations of American Catholics. But he also impales those who impose unsingable light rock music with insipid lyrics and syncopated melodies. Unfortunately, Day's analysis is not dated in 2001. We are still stuck with the drivel that poured forth from the St. Louis Jesuits in the seventies. Indeed, the new liturgical music reign of terror is worse than the old maudlin hymns ever were. Day doesn't have much hope for change, and, unfortunately, events since publication of this classic have pretty well borne him out. We're now into the third generation of American Catholics who--unless they have lived in Europe or some of the last remaining havens of good music here and there in the U.S.--have never heard Gregorian chant or anything composed prior to 1970.

This is not a book about one particular type of mass versus another, its about achieving practical, meaningful, enjoyable community worship. A few years ago out of curiosity, I attended a tridentine sung mass. I had never been to a high mass in latin before and I found it a much deeper spiritual experience than the post Vatican II mass I was used to. The solemnity, the ritual, and the music combined to let me understand the grave import of the ceremony, and become deeply aware of the special presence of God, what's more it was joyous and enjoyable. However, when I tried to rationalise the experience, figure out exactly why this mass and its "old church" music allowed me to feel so deeply compared to my normal experiece of mass - I couldn't do it, (surely the mass is the mass, whatever the liturgical style, I said to myself). In this book Thomad Day explains why for many people catholic communal worship can be a bland experience, even an irritating chore, devoid for the most part of any sense of the divine, and by referring to catholic tradition he suggests simple, effective, commonsense methods for improving the community worship experience. For any concerned catholic layperson - I thoroughly recommend it.

This is a book I'd been eagerly wanting to read since I first heard about it in the early 1990s and after reading it in 2006 I can say that it is as relevant to the Church as the day it was printed. As a Catholic child growing up in the 1980s, I would look with disdain on those catatonic church-goers who sat defiantly mute while the rest of us did our part and belted out the hymns listed on the board in the front of the church. Even as the specter of hippie guitarists and their soft-pop stylings began to stir up a vague feeling of discomfort and opposition in my young reactionary self, I still bore in mind the maxim of my nun teachers that "Singing is praying twice" and soldiered on through "classics" that sounded more appropriate for a gay wedding shower, all the while wondering what the heck was wrong with the mute holdouts. Were they retarded? Were they bad Catholics? Did they lose their vocal chords in Vietnam? With age, maturity and perspective, I came to realize the problem: most modern Catholic church music is utter garbage. It's ugly, banal, effeminate, desacralized and unsingable for a congregation. Beyond that realization though, I had no idea how to articulate a diagnosis or a treatment. Thomas Day accomplishes both and puts into words what millions of American Catholics are feeling.

Day writes with a verve and wickedly humorous style that one wouldn't expect to find in a book on this kind of subject. His way with a phrase frequently has one laughing out loud as he skewers the people who perpetrated this musical assault on the American Catholic congregation. Surpringly, it started before Vatican II and it started with the Irish. Because the Irish Catholics, who played such an influential role in the American Church, came from a country where persecution forced Catholics to celebrate Mass with utmost secrecy in caves and back rooms and hidden groves, the Irish developed no popular tradition of church music, as did the French, Germans, Poles and other Catholic cultures, and grand, uplifting church music came to be associated with the Protestant oppressors. With such a history, it wasn't surprising that after Catholic emancipation, the Irish had a negative view of church music as a superfluity, as mere entertainment indulged in by Protestants and other lukewarm Christians. Therefore, with Irish immigration to America and Irish dominance of the American Catholic church, the only kind of music they had to fall back on when composing religious hymns were the saloon ditties and sentimental ballads of Irish secular culture. The Irish became the musical puritans of the American Catholic church, frowning on greats such as Mozart and Palestrina while promoting their familiar and maudlin native hymns. With most of the American Church inured to such insipid church music over the course of a few generations, it wasn't a giant leap for the 60s radicals to impose their own brand of theologically questionable and musically awful "folk" and pop music on the Church, which is still with us today.

Day delves into the technical reasons why the music is bad, unsingable by a congregation and even blasphemous in several notable instances. He also explores subjects such as liturgical de-ritualization and contemporary Catholic culture to explain how we are in the current situation. He finishes the book with a list of suggestions at the end which seem reasonable. I know there is a better alternative out there. I have witnessed it at such diverse religious gatherings as an Eastern Rite Catholic Mass and a Bruderhof worship service. At the former, an ancient liturgy was sung in Ukranian and English without instrumental accompaniment by the priest and a small choir who managed to achieve the most beautiful and reverent example of worship I've yet heard. At the latter, I heard an entire community of all ages joyfully sing not only dozens of wonderful religious folk songs but complicated Christmas pieces by Bach out of an obvious love of God and pure appreciation of the beauty of the music. Every Catholic, especially priests and choir members, should read Thomas Day's book. There is a better way to make our worship more dignified, beautiful and appropriate. It will just require ordinary church members to stand up and demand more from our ourselves and our Church for the greater glory of God.

Just as she was ready to expire from dispair during her exile in Babylon, Music saw a glimmer of light in the distance. That light of hope came from Thomas Day who, in my eyes, is a modern day prophet warning the faithful and calling them back. This book is a wake up call for the Church to put into action what it preaches. It corrects the misguided idea of the "spirit" of Vatican II and looks at what the Council really intended to reform. Besides this, the author is also a voice of practicality in what has become an inpractical world - the liturgical practice of the Roman Catholic Church. Fret not ye who loathe the Tridentine days of old. The author is not a romantic for the past, but someone who realizes that the "Brady Bunch" belongs on TV and not in the house of God. Any Catholic who wants to understand the place of music in the Church NEEDS to read this book. I consider it a gift from above.

An intelligent and humorous account of why we Catholics don't sing at the "new" mass, anyone involved in liturgy from Bishop to altar boy (I mean server) should read this book. As an organist and music director in a Roman Catholic parish for many years, I finally feel forgiven for what I have been unable to do sinc ethe late 60's----try to get the parish to sing.

I was born and raised in the post Vatican world, going to Catholic education from grade school through college, so I know how bad the music is first-hand. Sometimes stunningly bad. Day's book just reaffirms from a professional standpoint pretty much what I already knew, that contemporary Catholic music is a mish-mash of bad old Protestant hymns and bad new Catholic hymns - that nobody really sings well or too enthusiastically because there is no real beauty in them.

What I didn't know was how bad the music was before Vatican II, and the influence the Irish culture had on stifling musical development in this country. Interesting theory.

Day's solution - bring back some trace of professionalism - seems to make sense. I recently moved into a parish with a top-notch music program from one with terrible music and mediocre attendance. On Sundays when the whole choir is present and singing classics like Palestrina and de Lassus attentance is packed while on other Sundays it is at best respectable.

I really enjoyed this book. Day is a hoot of a writer: funny, irreverant, sarcastic and dead-on correct.

It's about time that somebody came along and said what Thomas Day says in "Why Catholics Can't Sing". Day has assessed the state of liturgical music in the Church and has found it wanting. He demonstrates that we got to this state when priests and musicians decided to throw out hundreds of years of Catholic classics, and installed sappy and self-congratulatory songs instead.

Particularly amusing is his observation that a well-known "modern" song, used frequently in the liturgy, has the same melody as the theme from "The Brady Bunch."

Yet Day doesn't simply complain. In fact, I don't think he complains at all. He reports. Then he offers a number of helpful suggestions that are so commonsensical that no one could find solid grounds on which to argue them.

Day's book gives voice to the many faithful Catholics who wonder, in silence, what happened to the awesome beauty of the Mass of their youth. When priests and musicians become more concerned with praising God and less concerned with entertaining the people, Catholics will begin to sing again.

I never for a moment suspected I would ever read a book on the Roman Catholic Liturgy that would make me laugh out loud, but this one did--I was, unfortunately, reading it on a plane too. The hilarity comes from the author's desciptions of some of the horrifying liturgical results of Vatican II. But he truly understands what the liturgy is all about. It is in fact a very serious book, maybe one of the most relevant for modern Catholics and other Christians, though there are probably very few people who are ready for it.

Get one and give one away! Hilarious and true. Sharp opinions backed by a solid musical background. I thought Day was reporting on my own parish! If you're afraid you're the only one appalled by music at Mass that turns the Sacrament into a "LOOK AT ME!" show, read this book. Day is trying to get our Church back. I hope he writes an updated version soon.