November 12, 2024 // Diocese

The Power of Music as Prayer

Clare Hildebrandt

Reporter

Catholics Share How Sacred Music Can Lead Us to God

In our culture today, we are surrounded by nearly unceasing noise – cellphones ringing, notifications chirping, podcasts playing, TikTok songs getting stuck in our heads. Often, this cacophony overwhelms our minds and our spirits.

But there is an antidote to the noise of the world. For hundreds of years, sacred music, resounding off of church walls, has rejuvenated souls and led those who listen to it to greater union with God.

In honor of the November 22 feast day of St. Cecilia, patron of musicians, Today’s Catholic spoke with leaders from across the Diocese of Fort Wayne-South Bend who are invested in the area of sacred music. These experts spoke on how sacred music has the power to soothe the soul, stir the imagination, and counteract the noises of the world.

J.J. Wright, the director of the University of Notre Dame Folk Choir, leads students in performing sacred music, pulling from both the traditional choral repertoire and also contemporary compositions.

The choir sings at Masses in the Basilica of the Sacred Heart, vesper services, and a variety of other events on Notre Dame’s campus.

The nature of music, Wright said, is mysterious, operating with an “incredible power to reach us through our physicality, our embodiedness.” When listening to musical pieces, Wright said, the notes move through our bodies, not necessarily our minds. For example, a young child will instinctively sway back and forth when listening to a particular song without thought, Wright added.

“The harmonies, the melodies, the rhythms make us sway together, and it’s so hard to put your finger on exactly why,” Wright told Today’s Catholic.

Music also touches the heart, bringing forth emotion from the depths, said Wright, who added that “music evokes memories, feelings, and relationships rather than ideas in the mind.”

This power of music, combined with the practice of the faith, has the ability to bring true unity to the worshippers, voices that sing as one, Wright said.

“In the ideal world, the Mass is the highest participation in God’s life in the world,” Wright said. “Music [in the Mass] has this ability, not to take us out of ourselves as in being less present, but to make us more of ourselves; not just as individuals, but who we are in the big group of people praising God in the Mass. We all know that feeling of wholeness in the presence of others, and that’s the opportunity we have in Mass.”

Wright said he also looks to Pope Francis for wisdom on the subject of sacred music.

“I remember Pope Francis saying something like, ‘Music should make our hearts burn for God and make the desire for God irresistible.’”

In his position at Notre Dame, Wright said he aims to cultivate this “irresistible desire” in his students.

Father Royce Gregerson, pastor of Our Lady of Good Hope Catholic Church in Fort Wayne, emphasizes the powerful effect music can have during worship.

“Music is meant to move us to prayer beyond words,” Father Gregerson said. With this in mind, he believes there are certain types of sacred music that raise the soul to God more than others – particularly, Gregorian chant, sacred polyphony, and the organ.

“We can see [this music in] … Tradition we’ve received through centuries and through the Church, which is our loving mother and the body of Christ itself.”

Father Gregerson said sacred music originated before the time of Christ and in the worship style of the Jewish people.

“The Jews have this tradition of chanting the psalms, and so that’s the beginning of the Church’s musical worship,” Father Gregerson said. “The psalms accompany the celebration of Eucharist, just as the psalms accompanied the Jewish cycle of worship as well. “

For Father Gregerson, the power of sacred music is found within the medium itself, as “the medium is the message,” he said, adding that, for him, the best music for prayer does not try to imitate the music in modern culture.

“If the packaging in which [the music] comes still beats with the rhythms of the world, what we’re really giving people is the world. What we’re really forming their hearts to love is the world, because music is that powerful.”

Father Gregerson emphasized the depth that Catholic doctrine adds to music as well.

“When we put the most orthodox Catholic lyrics that very wonderfully articulate the doctrine of transubstantiation and the effects of the Eucharist to music, we get a beautiful effect,” Father Gregerson said.

Jeremy Hoy, who is the director of liturgy and music at St. Pius X Catholic Church in Granger, takes a different, more wide-ranging approach to his music ministry.

“Here at St. Pius, I take music from all genres to elevate beauty at Mass,” Hoy told Today’s Catholic. “Oftentimes, you’ll go to parishes and they say, ‘OK, this Mass will be the chant … this Mass will be the contemporary.’ We didn’t want to designate a Mass to a particular style. We have integrated all styles into all our Masses, with the only differences being instruments.”

Hoy said he finds a variety of instruments leads to greater prayer in Mass.

“Instruments add to the grandness of the Mass – flutes, brass instruments, handbell choirs – and adult choirs do so, too,” he said.

Hoy strives to sync the beauty found within the church itself and the music being sung and played by drawing inspiration for the song choices from the art found on the walls of St. Pius’ church.

“We wanted St. Pius to be a teaching church, so we incorporate the saints on our walls to the litanies. We make music in our church that relates to the art on the walls, and we want people to make those connections.”

Hoy said before his choir sings at Mass, the members pray for the intercession of St. Cecilia, who is filled with a multitude of musical wisdom. He also offered advice to the faithful, saying he believes the congregation should both participate in the music being offered at Mass as well as simply listen to it and appreciate it as they worship.

“There are times when people should sing and also times when people should step back and just … [pray] and listen.”

Clare Hildebrandt is a reporter for Today’s Catholic.