A Critique of Some Elements of Contemporary Christian Music & Culture
A version of this was originally posted in The Remnant Newspaper in 2020
I seek here to articulate a few issues that I see in what is popularly called “praise and worship.” This piece should be read in conjunction with its sister piece, my article praising certain elements of CCM (here). I write all of this as someone who listens to (certain pieces of music within) this genre of music probably every single day. In his “De Musica” (“On Music”), St. Augustine called music sound that moves the soul well. Indeed, many CCM pieces do move the soul well.
The musical-spiritual movement of “praise and worship” can be identified as a (large) wing of the CCM (Christian contemporary music) movement. (There is some CCM that is designed for personal listening and entertainment, but not for the act of worship per say.) Of course, for a Catholic, the highest forms of “praise” and “worship” can be found in the Catholic Mass.
P&W is in many ways very visually, musically and conceptually similar to Christian pop and rock concert culture. Pope Benedict XVI called rock music a “symptom of contemporary western cultural decline.” He was aware of Plato and Aristotle’s division of music into two fundamental types: 1) Apollonian music that subdues the five senses to the human spirit and in this way brings the human person to a certain state of wholeness, and 2) Dionysian music that does the opposite, subjecting the human spirit to the senses.
B16 identified rock music as Dionysian - “the expression of elemental passions.” He stated that “at rock festivals, [rock music] assumes a cultic character, a form of worship, in fact, in opposition to Christian worship.” In these settings, he said, “people are, so to speak, released from themselves by the experience of being part of a crowd and by the emotional shock of rhythm, noise, and special lighting effects.” In this way, B16 would have found a “Christian rock concert” to be something of an oxymoron.
My concerns with P&W (and the culture surrounding it), which are generally textual, musical, emotional, spiritual, historical, cultural, theological, liturgical, economic, social and visual, are as follows:
TEXTUALLY:
Both of these points are to be expected, as most P&W composers are not Catholic.
Many (certainly not all) P&W song lyrics are spiritually, theologically, literarily, and/or poetically deficient. Sometimes, these lyrics are explicitly heretical or otherwise somehow incompatible with Catholic dogma and/or doctrine.
Generally, P&W lyrics do not exhibit an absence of awareness of the liturgical calendar and liturgical seasons, cycles, and themes, all of which are an integral part of Catholicism.
MUSICALLY:
Many P&W melodies (although certainly not all) are poorly-constructed and banal.
P&W’s harmonic language is often very limited, exhibiting A) a general lack of any chords beyond I, IV, V and vi, and B) direct key changes, as opposed to carefully-handled modulations.
(This can be contrasted, for example, with Gregorian chant melodies that have lent themselves over the centuries to all kinds of different harmonization traditions - traditions that inherently consist of intentionally-constructed, rule-governing musical systems such as voice leading, codified harmonic progressions, etc.) Of course, though, there are abundant examples in Catholic liturgical music history of diatonic pieces of music.
Many P&W musical rhythms are highly-syncopated and often repeated inconsistently throughout the same piece without any particular reason for these slight rhythmic variations. This can make group singing difficult to unify. These rhythms (which involve 16th and even 32nd notes) can also be very difficult to read off of paper. Of course, P&W is really an oral tradition, intended to be hear and inwardly digested, memorized and repeated, not notated. However, a person who has not heard the song before may desire or even need to read the song’s musical notation.
P&W can possess insensitive instrumentation and/or over-production in the studio (e.g. excessive synthesizer). (However, many P&W recordings also have very tasteful instrumentation.)
P&W can have a culture of excessive amateurism and volunteerism that often produces a tendency for low quality of P&W performance. (Of course, many P&W bands and recordings also exhibit an extraordinary amount of talent.)
P&W’s typical style of singing (which utilizes, for example, the vocal practices of scooping and warbling) derives from pop and jazz styles. It was deliberately designed to deliberately contrast with the “highly-trained” style of operatic singing. This singing style also contrasts with the pure, tranquil tone required for the singing of chant and polyphony, which symbolizes the unity, catholicity and universality of the Church.
P&W can possess a lack of grandeur, majesty, nobility, loftiness, solemnity, dignity, reverence, and ability to produce contemplation, meditation and a sense of transcendence.
EMOTIONALLY/SPIRITUALLY:
The hyper-emotionalistic, trance-like state into which P&W can induce people (not just individually, but collectively) can resemble a sort of mass hypnosis and/or hysteria that seems incompatible with traditional understandings of healthy Catholic spiritual experiences in, for example, its lack of restraint. (Are many P&W participants simply just "rocking out"? Are P&W bands able to be completely sure of whether they're praying or performing at any moment? Does the medium itself even permit, let alone encourage, such clarity?)
HISTORICALLY:
There is a rather stark rupture between P&W and the Western Catholic sacred high/fine art musical tradition, in which we see an amazingly organic, authentic trajectory - from the early/ancient Church’s psalm tones, to medieval chant and organum, to Renaissance-era polyphony, to Baroque-era concerted liturgical forms, to Classical-era orchestral Masses, to Romantic-era resurrection of Renaissance and Baroque forms, and onward. This is the historical argument that would seem to disqualify P&W music from inclusion in the sacred liturgy. (Consider seeing my article here on which instruments are suitable for Catholic worship and which ones are not.) Even within the 4-part hymn “genre”, we have hundreds upon hundreds pieces over hundreds of years, from the 1500s through the 1800s (and beyond) - this itself exemplifies a musical continuity that is valuable.
There appears to be quite a bit of variability within the P&W genre between songs that are quite successful and songs that are very much not. This seems to be an inherent limitation of the genre. On the other hand, it is essentially impossible to write an ugly-sounding piece of Gregorian chant, Renaissance polyphony, or Baroque organ music, because the abundant music-writing rules that govern those musical genres intrinsically prohibit any ugliness.
P&W may be unable to provide either A) room for such aforementioned authentic, organic musical development or B) material for genius composers to work with - the way that, for example, the great Renaissance composers of the Western sacred music tradition were able to take secular folk tunes and turn them into some of the most glorious polyphonic Masses ever written. (See Palestrina’s “Missa L’homme armee”, based off of the drinking song “L’homme armee.")
Many (not all) elements of P&W originated in secular, charismatic, Pentecostal, and other Protestant contexts. This mainly just means that Catholics have to be discerning in which elements of P&W can be subsumed into Catholic use and which ones cannot.
Historically, secular music styles have been arguably very successfully appropriated for liturgical use - think of, for example, stylistic similarities between A) 16th-century sacred motets versus secular madrigals or B) Mozart’s Masses versus his operas. There is simply something about these Renaissance motets and orchestral Masses that makes them seem more inherently compatible with Catholic liturgy. In its explicit use of raw pop and rock musical materials, P&W seems not to exhibit as much transformation and sanctity as do the motets and orchestral Masses. P&W is likely best regulated to the personal, devotional sphere and car radio, as opposed to the sacred liturgy.
P&W often (not always) seems to target specific age groups and populations, such as teenagers, college students and post-college young adults. It seems to not to display a tremendous amount of interest in the project that considered so many of the great Western sacred music composers - that of producing sacred, artistic masterpieces to be enjoyed, preserved and passed on by all future generations. All of this may contribute to a limited staying power.
CULTURALLY/ECONOMICALLY/SOCIALLY:
P&W clearly originated in pop culture in a postmodern world that is nearly unrecognizable from the pre-modern one. In the latter, we can point to much natural, organic, authentic infusion and integration of high art into “low”, folk art and popular culture, in which secular and sacred material synergistically spoke the same artistic language. In the former, it is more difficult to do so.
In P&W, a personality cult sometimes (not always) revolves around the lead singer. This contrasts with the inherently communal nature of A) chant, B) polyphony sung by a schola or choir, or C) hymns sung (especially in four parts) by a choir or congregation.
P&W possesses something of an individualistic, egotistical authorship/copyright culture (what are the implications of copyrighting a prayer?). This contrasts with the anonymous, communal, public domain culture of Gregorian chant, Renaissance polyphony, etc.
Much (not all) of P&W culture exhibits and perhaps even glorifies a fashion culture (e.g. ripped jeans and V-neck shirts) that certainly contrasts with the dignified choir dress that is a part of the Western sacred choral tradition and also with the church-attending tradition of “Sunday best” for all parishioners.
Much (not all) of P&W culture upholds superficial, unrealistic, secular beauty standards (think, for example, of the stereotypically well-groomed, buff, tattooed P&W™ leader) as part of its branding, marketing and advertising. This is problematic for obvious reasons.
There is a tremendous amount of money (and power and influence) tied up in the P&W wing of the popular music and radio industry, particularly in regards to individual performers’ wealth. Much more could be said about this, but perhaps not here.
Much of P&W culture socializes people into a certain system of body language. In Catholic P&W contexts, this often includes standing for extended periods of time in front of the Blessed Sacrament at Eucharistic Adoration. This body language system seems to contrast with the physical restraints that the Western Catholic worship space (AKA the church) inherently and naturally imposes upon the human body (e.g. genuflection, kneeling, sitting, and stillness).
THEOLOGICALLY/LITURGICALLY:
In P&W culture, lead singers are often called “worship leaders.” In Catholicism, ordained clerics (priests and deacons) lead the worship of the Church. Of course, though, there is of course a sense in which a Catholic choir or schola “leads” the congregation in song. Of course, also, a layperson can and should lead, for example, the rosary or Divine Office (or Liturgy of the Hours) service, when a priest or deacon is not present or unavailable.
P&W culture possesses an improvisatory component that can lend itself to superficial, sappy ad-libbing and even incorrect theological statements. This contrasts with the highly intentionally and carefully structured, scripted, rubrical, catechetical, didactic liturgy of the Church. Of course, however, numerous Catholic prayer traditions involve improvisatory elements, such as Ignatian contemplation, lectio divina and basic mental prayer.
VISUALLY:
P&W requires certain physical materials in order to operate optimally - namely PowerPoints, which facilitate the bodily freedom that P&W culture involves. PowerPoints are inherently visually and physically incompatible with the Catholic church space, largely (or primarily) due to the manner in which they block the tabernacle, altar(s), statues, altar rail, etc., no matter where they are placed. There is also a real sense in which the gnostic ephemerality of disappearing lyrics on a screen contrasts with the material permanence of a beautifully bound and printed hymnal (such as the gorgeous Hymnal 1940), which codifies a musical canon, having been through a rigorous editorial process, and therefore reflects a certain timelessness.
Parts of the visual culture of P&W are rather incompatible with the authentic Catholic visual-material tradition (e.g. fog and lights, which seem to be technological, artificial, one-step-removed imitations of the “real”, natural candles and incense used in Catholic liturgy).
P&W seems to rely on technology and media (e.g. electric guitars and microphones, in addition to the aforementioned PowerPoints, fog-makers and lights) in an already excessively-digitized world. Perhaps the worship space (AKA church) should be the one place that is set apart (AKA sacred) and non-digitized, using hymnals (or paper booklets), real pipe organs, acoustically high-quality spaces that do not require amplification, etc.
If P&W is somehow inherently incompatible with the Catholic worship space, it may not be too big of a jump to claim that P&W is at least somewhat incompatible with the concept of Catholic worship (which is largely supposed to take place in Catholic worship spaces). Even when Catholics hold P&W events in non-church spaces, such as basements or auditoriums, we are still prone to many (or most) of the emotional, spiritual, cultural, social, physical, musical and visual issues that P&W can pose.
When a person prays in a Catholic church with the Blessed Sacrament reposed in the tabernacle or exposed in the monstrance at Adoration, the object of prayer is clearly the Eucharist. At Mass, of course, the object of worship is Jesus in the consecrated host, in which He is substantially and sacramentally present, hidden under the appearances of the accident of bread and wine. In a non-church space, such as a home, or in a basement or auditorium with a PowerPoint and/or a band on stage or otherwise up front, the object of worship is still Jesus, but in the mind and heart.
As Catholics, we materially, tangibly worship Christ through receiving His body, soul, blood and divinity in the Most Holy Eucharist. When Catholics pray the Divine Office, novenas, the Rosary, the Divine Mercy Chaplet or other authentically Catholic prayer forms in non-Catholic-church places such as at home, where the Eucharist is not physically present, we are not prone to the aforementioned myriad problems that P&W can pose. This is because these authentically Catholic prayer traditions (constituted by sung chants, hymns and other texts that are integral to their structure), which obviously arose within Catholicism and not outside it (as P&W largely did), by their very nature are not able to pose such problems.
And yet, there is truly something about P&W that can make people feel that we are having an intense religious and/or spiritual experience. I do not want to dismiss this feeling as simply a socio-emotional one, because I do not believe that to be true. Yet I do want to suggest: sociologists and researchers know a good amount about the effect that pop and rock music have on human emotions and brains, but perhaps the spiritual/religious/Christian element should be brought into more of the research. How exactly does the emotional and psychological state that P&W induces contribute to a feeling of religious conversion or closeness with God?