by Fred Moleck
Catholic Air
This past week a small book describing the activities and philosophy of a very Roman Catholic institution passed over my desk.
Among the activities listed was participation in the choir which performed Gregorian chant and sixteenth-century choral polyphony at liturgies in the chapel. A spin-off experience of their sung participation was the continuing of Catholic culture at these liturgies.
The book claims that those in attendance could “breathe Catholic air.”
I had never encountered the term. I knew some chant aficionados maintain that when one sings chant, one sings the sublime song of the church.
I know other listeners who use chant as an avenue to meditation. For liturgical music scholars, this repertory provides a highly effective means to understanding how we got where we are now.
But to “breathe Catholic air” was brand new to me. I never knew there was such a thing as sectarian air.
Worrying a bit on the term, I wondered what the ecumenical fallout would be if non-Romans would “breathe Catholic air,” or worse yet, if they would sing chant and polyphony while not being a Catholic.
What I have in mind was a concert of choral music during my first year in college. All the students in the music department were required to attend so many concerts in the course of the semester.
I thought that was reasonable since, after all, we were music students.
My choice was to travel into Pittsburgh to hear a Lutheran choir sing in concert in a recital hall. Besides, students with proper ID would receive a free ticket.
The program provided for me my first exposure to Palestrina, Josquin, and Orlando di Lasso. These were names I had encountered for the first time in Music History the week before.
One of the items the Lutheran choir sang under the direction of their Lutheran conductor, who was the head of the music department of their Lutheran school, was Palestrina’s “Tu es Petrus.”
To refresh the music history part of your memory, Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina was Catholic. He was not Lutheran. He had a big role in the Council of Trent.
The choir’s performance of “Tu es Petrus” was overwhelming. I had never heard a motet of such ravishing beauty. I transcended.
Now that I know about “Catholic air,” I just wonder if I had committed sacrilege when I listened to a Lutheran choir sing one of “our” motets under the direction of a Lutheran choir director who taught at a Lutheran school.
I wondered if what they did was a sacrilege for even daring to sing Catholic generated music. But since the concert was in a hall, not a church, they and I probably avoided the occasion of sin.
Then, I thought What happens to the air at Mass when a Catholic congregation led by a Catholic organist in a Catholic church sings something like “A Mighty Fortress Is Our God”—“Ein feste Burg ist unser Gott?”
Or when the choir stumbles through “Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring?”
Do we breathe “Lutheran air?”
At what point in the chorale does the Lutheran presence become dominant and we Catholics find ourselves in a “confusion of cults?”
Suppose a Buddhist is present—what kind of air is he or she breathing?
Do you see how absurd this can become?
No doubt the writer of the promo for this institution thought to “breathe Catholic air” a great metaphor for knowing and feeling what it means to be a Catholic. One is submerged in breathing “Catholic air.”
If that’s all it takes, then let’s find an oxygen supply company and construct a paraliturgy of blessing and exorcising the oxygen tanks. The company can claim full rights of circulation and inhalation.
It could be named “OrthoOxygen.”
On the tanks the company inscribes its motto: “Breathe easy. It’s Catholic.” That should allay any fears on the part of
Catholics who think were going Protestant.
On a plate attached to the oxygen tank under the company’s motto are the directions: “Take three deep breaths daily.
Assure your orthodoxy. Breathe Catholic.”
You can reach Fred Moleck via email at fmoleck@earthlink.net