Sydney
14 July 2002
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Sing? Yes! Sing-along syndrome? No!
John Jacobs, of Casimir Catholic College, Marrickville, ran a workshop on encouraging secondary students to participate more fully in liturgy
By Marilyn Kerjean
“In many parishes there are silent congregations and presiders who never chant or sing.
“Yet the same people will sing Happy Birthday at a birthday party.
“Some people say it isn’t in the Australian character (to sing together), but we would be as vocal as those at the World Cup soccer if we were there, wouldn’t we?”
So said Dr Veronica Rosier, keynote speaker at the Religious Education Music Conference 2002: Celebrating Community, held by the Catholic Education Office, Sydney, at the Liverpool Catholic Club.
The two-day conference drew primary and secondary educators, parishioners and presenters from 13 dioceses including Brisbane, Wagga, Lismore, Sale and Canberra/Goulburn to hear Sr Veronica’s address, Setting the table for the celebrating community, and Monica Brown’s Creative celebration for non-Eucharistic liturgy.
Dr Rosier, who has a doctorate in liturgical studies from the Catholic University of America, is from the Australian Catholic University’s School of Theology and is also a member of the National Liturgical Commission of the Australian Bishops.
Monica Brown is founding director of Emmaus Productions in Thornleigh, which provides resources for liturgies and rituals for schools, parishes and communities here and overseas.
Peter Kearney, Fr Kevin Bates and Trish Watts were some of the Catholic religious educators, singers, songwriters and musicians who conducted workshops covering the challenging mix of children and teenagers, music and song, liturgy and prayer, religious education and spiritual formation.
In her address, Dr Rosier acknowledged all the effort that teachers put into their school liturgies which are part of an already crowded educational curriculum, but challenged them on how they might measure the ‘success’ of a liturgy.
Symbols such as ritual music, text, silence, sacred objects and choreography should facilitate “full, conscious and active participation” in the liturgy, the challenge set by Vatican II in its Constitution on Sacred Liturgy, she said.
While she stressed the importance of ritual singing as something that unites the assembly, expresses people’s beliefs and reveals the presence of God, Dr Rosier also spoke against what she called the “sing-along syndrome”, congregations urged to sing along “at any cost, any song”.
“Ritual music forms us in the liturgy in one of the most powerful and formative ways,” she said.
It should promote a “living and authentic celebration” through which the Body of Christ can glorify God and intercede for the needs of the modern world.
“Music is an intrinsic element of liturgical celebration,” she said.
“Chants, psalms and liturgical songs allow us
to experience communion with our entire minds, hearts, voices so that they can reveal the saving presence of God,” she said.
The tradition of making music, said Leonie Crotty, head of religious education for the Catholic Education Office, Sydney, is “almost a tradition of being human”.
“It is one of the oldest traditions and also one of those which is most inclusive when done well and most possible in terms of human emotion and lived experience,” she added.
John Burland, project officer of music and liturgy for the Catholic Education Office, Sydney, said it was the first time the conference had been opened up to other dioceses and that it may be extended beyond Sydney again next year.