338: Catholic Mass as Truth, Beauty, and Evangelism (w/ Peter Carter)

0:00Hi! Hey! Welcome to the Courageal Catholic, a podcast for non-catholics, for new catharsis those are going to be deeper into the Catholic Church, I'm Keith Little, an even-Dalkal Convert to Catholicism, and this podcast is based on one particular idea. It began from me, when a Protestant pastor I was working for, asking the question, what's more important to Bible or tradition? Well, that question led me on a deep drive in the history of my faith, the history of the Catholic, history of the Christian Church, history of the Bible that they can in the scripture, the early church, reformation, and everything in between, and it was in that journey I encountered the Catholic Church for the very first time, it was a loose, large in church history, and it began reading for the very first time from actual Catholic sources, real Catholic authors, and realized then, what I knew book of thought was, I mean, the Catholic Church and what Catholics believe, was based on large part on a misinformation, and more often than not, on simple misunderstandings. Well, this podcast serves a fill in that same gap, the gap between what do you think Catholics believe, and what we actually do.

1:01Each week, I have a Catholic conversation with a real Catholic thinker from the heart of the Catholic Church, no misinformation here, and this week I am joined by Peter Carter to talk about the liturgy, the beauty of the liturgy, the sacredness of the mass was happening there, the importance of those elements of feeling, and being, you know, transformational and to transport us to a different time and place, and just got the importance of beauty and truth, and those things working hand in hand, it's a conversation about the mass, the sacredness, about the differences by and large that you would encounter, that I encountered as a Protestant entering into the mass, it's fundamentally a different thing. Well, this week Peter joins me to talk about what that thing is, he's the author of an amazing new interview book with Cardinal Robert Sarah, you may have heard of him before, an amazing theologian speaker, writer, the thinker, cardinal in its own right. Well, Peter is a co-author on this book and joins me to unpack this idea of the sacredness

2:04of liturgy this week on the show guys, I think you will love it. It's an amazing conversation, a truly amazing conversation. This was brought to you, we get to meet by our patrons at patreon.com slash cordial Catholic, and are one of those buttons that paypal.me slash cordial Catholic, guys, you know, this thing goes thanks to the grace of God and your support, guys, it's not my full-time job, and there are increasing sometimes, oftentimes studio cost things to upgrade things to maintain, there are often shortfalls in this kind of emerging and changing podcast landscape, it's different at difficult times sometimes, guys, so your support of the show makes it possible to keep doing this thing week after week to afford those things. So thank you to all of those who are already supporting the show, you guys are the absolute best, you want to help out, those links are in the show notes for patreon and for paypal, and thank you guys for your consideration. And now, without any further ado, my awesome conversation on the beauty of the liturgy,

3:05truth beauty, the mass, all those things, guys with Peter Carter, please listen and enjoy it. Hey friends, welcome back to the show, thank you for watching, thank you for listening. This week, amazing conversation we're about to have here, music, liturgy, beauty. This is an awesome topic, guys, I'm excited to dig into it this week with Peter Carter. He is among other things, director of the Catholic Sacred Music project, which is wonderful, devoted to forming emerging leaders in their new world of sacred music. Good on you, Peter, that's a wonderful thing to do.

4:08I'm sure of sacred music at both, a quiet institute of Princeton University and St. John the Baptist Church in Allentown, New Jersey, he's the author in conversation with a cardinal Robert Sarah of the song of the Lamb, Ignatius Press, Sacred Music, and the heavenly liturgy. My copy fell into a puddle, but yours, if you got this one, would look much nicer than this. It's fantastic. Peter, welcome to the show, thanks for being here. And hello. Yeah, no it's great to be here. Yeah, happy to talk about Cardinal Sarah's books anytime. I'm thrilled to have you. And likewise, I'll say this one again, because our show, this show is geared a lot towards new, converged new Catholics, was looking into the Catholic Church, wondering what we're doing here as weird Catholics, pulling them back to the veil a little bit. I don't think, I've had a lot of converts, a lot of former evangelical pastors and even local ministry workers worship leaders on the show before, but you, sir, are a Catholic director of sacred music at a Baptist church.

5:11Same John the Baptist. I was wondering where you're going. It was a terrible joke. I read that from your bio earlier, I thought, I got a great joke in here somewhere. I didn't quite find it, but thanks for hearing me. I think that's wonderful. Listen, this is an awesome topic, because this is, again, I mentioned one of those things that were in this time and space when the beauty of things like sacred music and liturgy is what is captivating so many of the guests that I have in this show, it's who tell their conversion stories, Peter, there is a time and a place, and lots of the stories might include the theology and the church history and the church fathers and scripture and tradition and magisterium, these kind of things. But more and more and more, these stories also, or if not completely, are revolved around the idea of beauty. I mean, I'm thinking about, back in, say, 2010, when I was kind of beginning to, on my

6:11journey into the Catholic church as even John Cole, I encountered someone like Bishop Baron, talking in his big Catholicism series, talking about truth and beauty. And back then, I thought, okay, so truth compelled me. But since then, I've talked to many theological heavyweights, people like Peter Creeft, a Lawrence Fine Gold, these philosophers and analytical thinkers who for them, the first kind of nudged towards the Catholic church came from beauty, from art, from music. This idea of beautiful liturgy that speaks in these certain ways. So I think I want to begin there. I have lots of questions to ask, but I kind of want to begin that space there in thinking about what role does sacred music? It's beautiful liturgy. It's beautiful, the trappings, the vestments, the music, the singing, the beautiful actions of the mass, of the liturgy. What role does that have, do you see, in evangelization of those who otherwise wouldn't

7:16be interested in the Catholic church? What do you think? Yeah. Well, I think, you know, it's important to remember that none of these things exist completely in isolation, even if one element certainly draws us more than another. But I think the pull of beauty, and especially why perhaps white has a strong pull today and is much needed today, is because it's one of the things that's lacking that helps to make us fully human. And, you know, we have to have an experience of beauty in how we encounter the world. I mean, that's how we know that, you know, people are good. It's the beauty of the home, and we experience the goodness through the beauty of the relationship of the family, and that's how we begin to discover, you know, the goodness in creation.

8:16And that is a reflection of the goodness and beauty of God. And if we don't perceive that on the natural level, then we can't go to, you know, we can't understand why God's law is also beautiful if we are, you know, if we don't see the beauty in the human person. So I think, you know, it's definitely multifaceted, especially when approaching these theological discussions regarding liturgy and the mass. But on the fundamental human level, beauty is what speaks to us, and it's, it's naturally what's attractive to us, right, where we're naturally pulled in by beauty and repelled by what is ugly and uncomfortable, right? And that's also the danger of the attraction of beauty is sometimes it leads us to things that are not good for us. But when it is, when we present the truth and goodness through beauty, it is the truth and goodness in its full integrity, since it's leading us to learn to love what is ultimately

9:18for our own good. That's very well said, that, that, that dual aspect of the truth and beauty together, right? You can, you can see, I think this was, that was remarkable about thinking of sacred music or the liturgy, these beautiful things. I mean, you can, those things, and I've heard this many times on talking to guests on this show, those things point to something that, that we can't explain, right? The, the reason why, I mean, and this, you guys get, I see you guys, I mean you and, and current Robert Sarah, so I should, I should like, you guys, maybe a little bit, to, uh, familiar terms I'm using, but, but, but the both of you kind of mind this idea of, there is an aspect of, of emotion in something like, beautiful music is a, is a, is a motive. There's, there's part of what, what it's doing is lifting you up, right? I can, I can get lifted up like that in a pentacostle, and I did worship service with loud guitars and music and rock music, that, that, that's pointing to something, okay? And, and it did, and I've talked to lots of guests on this show who, even guests who are,

10:20who were a form of charismatic Christians who are now, who are priests, who actually love and teach sacred music in their congregations, in their communities, but they would say back then, as I would, I would say that, that was pointing us to, to something, something greater than ourselves, the, the motion in that music, we'll take that and, I mean, amplify that in, in truly sacred music in the setting of a beautiful mass at a church that, that, right, in a, in a, in a service that is all Christ, that is pointing to Jesus in, in his entirety, like that, that music is pointing to a thing that, many of people that walk in those doors, especially those kind of form of even jocles, they can't explain apart from, well, this, this is, like, this is the thing I was longing for in that old songs I was singing. I'm hearing it now in its right place, so that, with the truth of the mass and the theology and the beauty kind of combined, point to that thing that just is transcendent. That, that makes sense. I, I thought for a lot there.

11:20Yeah. Exactly. No, and it's, it reminds me exactly what you're saying of the experience, you know, with beauty is definitely true in that way, and then it's always pointing ultimately towards God who is beauty himself, but, you know, even in how we experience goodness and how we experience love, you know, it's, it's in relationship with people. And even, you know, we can discover a true element of love in feeling loved, even in a love that's not, you know, completely good for us, right? And it leads to a deeper love and, you know, a better connection. And then, but ultimately, all of our stumbling on the way to find, you know, what is love is leading us to Christ, you know, that's St. Augustine. My heart is restless until it rests in thee. And it's the same thing in all of our human relationships, you know, we want perfection

12:21and we desire that and we need that. And if we always become disappointed when we, you know, find out that the person or thing that we were hoping turned out to be that, turned out to be a fantasy and it's not that or that person and we have to continue searching, right? And I think in terms of beauty, it's the same thing and it's not to kind of discount profound human experiences that, you know, we're not experiencing the Catholic church or, you know, in other musical experiences, other worship experiences, but, you know, those things point to a profound realization of, you know, where is the beauty and goodness coming from? And where is it leading us to? It's, if we're honest with ourselves, it's not about affirming our own worldview all the time or, you know, with what we think is most comfortable or most aligned with our

13:22values of, you know, the way we want the world to be or, you know, Christianity to be. But if we are humble and, you know, follow the goodness, truth and beauty, where it leads, it will be, you know, God will reveal it to us more and more fully. And that's what I think is so appropriate, beautiful and profound in having the celebration of mass wrapped in the beauty of sacred music is that you're presenting the glory of God, the worship of God that we're all called to participate in and you're clothing it with beauty in the way that tells all of us this is what it should be. This is what the beauty is pointing towards. This is pointing towards the person who is beauty and it's an invitation and if we don't have beauty in the mass, then it's, you know, it's a lie, you know, it's, that's where

14:23the beauty needs to be most evident and most all of our efforts need to be given towards the ultimate glory of God and the worship of God. And so since worship is the highest activity that man can do, you know, it's a, to worship his creator, then we have to, you know, drape all of our actions of worshiping God with the integrity of what the church tells us, but in the best of human beauty that we can offer to God. That's so, that's wonderful. There are so many things now that I want to tease out Peter, I absolutely love that. One of those ideas that I'm thinking of and the experience, okay, so for myself and many of those looking into the Catholic church is often looking, doing the head research, right, doing the, maybe watching some, some debates on YouTube, reading some books, reading lots of books, then reading more books, and then maybe going to mass eventually, right?

15:27Yeah, yeah. That's often, no, this is not always true, but often the case, that's down the line, right? So you do all the head research, then you, then you go to Catholic church and what happens, I think in, in many cases, I've heard this many times on this show, doing this show, because you go to that first mass and, you know, this is nothing like what you thought it would be. And often, and often not in a good way. So often, I can think of my own case, I did all the research, all the thinking, I, I phoned up the local Catholic parish, knowing nothing about what to expect, talked to a, wonderful sister who ran the RCA program there, went to my first mass and it was, it was a dude with the guitar singing from the, the, the Ambo leading, leading songs. And it was, it was, I, I think it was a Bob Dylan impersonation, I think it was what it was, what it was, it was a week, and not a very good one either, right? And, and Bob Dylan was not a great singer to begin with, so I mean, I mean, it's a choir tape.

16:28So this was, yeah, anyway, I digress, he was trying his best and there's something to be said for, for effort. I want to go back to the idea of, of effort in that, in that kind of worship experience, that music experience, but the experience, for many people who begin to explore the Catholic church, right, not, I don't think many of us will go to a parish and end up getting a home run and finding a parish that has great music and beautiful liturgy and a sense of the sacred, I think, unfortunately, more often than not, right, it's that spirit of Vatican II, still haunting many of our parishes, where the, the music, the liturgy is, is, is that dumbed down, music, that dumbed down liturgy, and it's meant to make, and here's my soapbox, Peter, it's meant to make it more accessible, right? This was the intention of the spirit of Vatican II, is to make the liturgy, the church more palatable for the, for the common folk, right? But what the common folk, one, is not folk anymore, right? What's strong in these converts is the beautiful sacred music, it's the beautiful liturgy,

17:29is the incense, is the beautiful vestments, is the meaningful prayer, is the sacred silence. So people who are, who are seekers, go to that parish, Peter, they hear the Bob Dylan personation, that becomes then a barrier to conversion, it makes it actually more difficult, then more accessible. Yeah. Right? So what do you, I mean, there's, there's lots to, and obviously you're deeply involved in, in renewing parish ministries like that. But yeah. And I've seen some good examples and examples, I've seen a, a folk band just fired on the spot by a new pastor who came in and just kind of cleared house and what do you, I guess what do you say to the person who arrives at that parish? First of all, and then those people who are hanging on to that, that, that folk band, and just can't let go, because I mean, you, you see these people having first hands sometimes. Yeah. No, sure. And, you know, there's no, there's no one answer that's going to fix all your issues, you know, to whoever's watching.

18:30But I think there's, there's a few things to keep in mind. Well, I mean, yes, that's, since the mass is important and we need to imbue, the church needs to imbue the liturgy with beauty and great sacred music. I mean, that's why I'm doing the Catholic sacred music project and helping to, trying to help train musicians to, you know, raise the standard so that the sacred act of praying the mass, you know, looks and sounds sacred too, isn't just intellectually, you know, understood a sacred. I think one of the kind of going back to beauty as helping us to be more human, I think also one of the important things for converts, but also for people curious about the Catholic church to remember is even, you know, theologically the church is the body of Christ, it's a family where united and, you know, I think there can sometimes be a danger if we are to, you

19:37know, if we read our ways into the church and don't have any personal relationships in the church, you know, if we don't have mentors, if we don't feel part of a human community body and family, then, you know, when the human trials come and they will and whatever form, you know, you won't, who will you be leaning on to have help, you know, and if you don't have human connections and human, you know, community with your family, with your church, then, you know, you're not going to be leaning on the church. You're going to go back into your own head if you, you know, or whatever, you know, you did the last time, so I don't say that to discourage anyone, but that, you know, yes, try to seek out a parish, a community that does feel that present the integrity of the church, of Catholicism, but also establish, you know, friendships and, you know, especially

20:45for, for converts, you know, have mentors in the faith, who can help guide you, who you can help, you know, lean on and help work through any human struggles, because that's where we grow as a family and as a community as a church, and that's what I think the soil needs in order for it to be, you know, well, well-tilled and fertile ground, so it can sprout 100 fold, rather than being, you know, the seed on the rocky soil, which, you know, might sprout up initially and then fade. We can't forget all the human sides of life and the faith and what that looks like, even if we're excited intellectually, you know, don't dampen that at all. It's, it is all there, but that's not the only thing, and we also need, you know, to cultivate ourselves, you know, as human beings, in what we need and feel that, that human connection. It's not just a spiritual reality that we're united as a church.

21:48It's, you know, it's a visible church, and that means we, you know, have, were, were united as brothers and sisters in Christ. We'll be right back after this quick message, which helps to support this show. What does it mean to live a life of faith? What does it mean to live as a Catholic Christian? Hi, this is Bishop Kevin Sweeney, host of the podcast Beyond the Beacon. Join me as we unravel and discuss the mysteries of our faith, of the church, of living as Catholic Christians. Be inspired by engaging interviews with priests and seminarians, deacons, religious women and men who live the life of faith day by day here in our diocese of Patterson, in food pantries and classrooms and parishes and ministry. How has God working in their lives today? How has God working in our lives? Join me as I ask them and be part of the conversation on Beyond the Beacon. Listen and follow Beyond the Beacon wherever you get your podcasts for watching on my YouTube channel. Please check the show notes for more details. Thank you and God bless you. That's a very good point. So I, so I shouldn't stand the back with the sign saying, bring back Gregorian chant

22:51or, or don't, when I first arrive at the parish. Is that what you're saying? I should not say. The bad idea. Well, I mean, there's, there's a lot of, I mean, get involved, you know, again, it's, it's a family. If you don't have relationship with the priest or with other people, then are you really participating in the family, you know, or, or are you just kind of clocking in to check off the box that you attended mass on Sundays and then you really want to live your faith and isolation all the time. So it's just really a personal relationship, except maybe you have to show up and fulfill your bare minimum. You know, that's, that's not a Catholic attitude. It's, it's, we're all in and yes, we need to cultivate our personal relationship with Christ, but we also need to be invested in our communities and, you know, it doesn't have to be the, the parish that's, you know, two minutes down the street from you. It can be, you know, further one away. But so, but find a place where it can feel home that, you know, presents the integrity

23:53of what the church teaches and the mass with beauty and you, you know, you'll grow if you give yourself to that. That's a, that's a, that's a brilliant, yeah, I love that. And like you say, the involvement, right, the involvement in that family is important too. And I think this is one of the things that, for a lot of new converts, like you, you come from, say, these mega churches that have all kinds of ministries, small groups, Bible studies, worship teams, like children's ministries, all these things, you come to a Catholic parish that is just structured quite differently, right? There isn't like 10 full-time ministers doing these kind of different jobs. It looks quite different than that, right? And often the thing that the new convertible will wrestle with is, well, I can't, like this doesn't have this minister, this minister, this minister, or the, the liturgy here is terrible. Nobody's doing this. The readers are not reading very, the music is terrible. No one's playing very nicely, no one's singing nicely. So oftentimes, like that's the Holy Spirit giving you enough to say, hey, what do you

24:53do? You can help out here. You're gifted in here. You try this. Like there is that, right, that space who has that family, right, to get involved, right? And there is that, that human aspect to it, I think, I think many of the zealous new converts and myself, including myself in this picture as well, might arrive at a parish and go, okay, the music here is awful. There's this folk band. There's terrible. They're off key. The instruments are terrible. They're playing songs from the 70s or the 80s or the 90s. It just gets worse. I think it's a good, more modern, actually, it's not a good thing necessarily. But that tendency is to complain about this kind of thing versus, okay, this is a, a family I'm joining, right? And okay, Uncle, right, Uncle Bob likes to play the guitar at Mass. We can't just, I don't know, maybe I'm wrong, but kick him out of the band and bring in an organist and a chant choir overnight. But we can make movements to, I think, I don't know, help everybody to recognize the importance

25:58of the sacredness of the Mass and making that, like, making that beauty match that truth, right? Does that make sense? No, for sure. And, you know, it's, I think that's a very common experience for converts. I mean, I'm not a convert myself, but my parents are converts. So I grew up, you know, in a household of converts and, you know, a lot of my extended family's Protestant. But no, there's a lot of great social offerings and programs that these Protestant churches, the mega churches, you know, things like that. That aren't present in the Catholic church, you know, that's the reality. You know, if you, you know, some big churches have playgrounds and coffee shops and things, you know, you can just, like, take your kids and that's their, their, their play date, you know. So, yeah, again, there's no kind of simple solutions to it because I, I think when, you

27:02know, yes, we need to deal with whatever we need in our family life, you know, whether you, whatever you need personally. But then also, you know, the church needs a lot of help too. And as a family, you know, it is a little bit more of the attitude of, well, don't complain that all the plates are dirty and in the sink, you know, roll up your sleeves and start washing them. You know, like, that's what you need to do in a family. You don't complain that, you know, the table isn't set, the food's late and that's not going to make it any quicker, right? So, like, but, you know, it's, it is that type of thing of, you know, then who has to need support and help with, with leading the community towards more in the line with what the church is, is, is teaching us and leading us to what the liturgy should look like. You know, of course, like, you know, these changes oftentimes need to be done slowly and

28:04organically. So just like a garden grows, you know, you don't kind of just like clear everything and plant stuff anew unless it's that type of situation where you're basically starting afresh. But, you know, you do have to, you know, have the personal relationships with people, you know, and of course, there comes a line, you know, where, you know, the pastor has to make decisions for the good of the parish of, you know, who is the director of music, you know, are we going to have guitars or not, you know? And, you know, in that line is going to look different for different places and different, you know, traditions of, you know, this is the way they've always done it here for 60 years or whatever. And, you know, and regardless of what you do and say, you know, you're not going to change people's hearts overnight. And if you just make a bunch of changes, you know, it's not going to be effective in people's hearts. You're not leading them towards the truth and beauty. You're either turning them away or they'll buy their time until the pastor leaves and,

29:06you know, and then flip back, you know. Yeah. So, just even that human element of, you know, whatever the pains of needs are real, you know, and whatever that is, human connection. And that's why it was emphasizing that because oftentimes it is hard to find in the Catholic church where, you know, a lot of them, the masses are, you know, it's the main event that the church is offering. People go to mass and they leave and oftentimes there's no social time after. There's no real opportunity to meet other like-minded people and establish relationship with them. And so, you know, that needs to be done if the church is going to be a real community, you know, and not just kind of a show up at this time, you know, and then you don't know anyone after. I know my parish, St John the Baptist in Allentown, New Jersey, after the big 1230 mass, we

30:12have a, they call it convivium, but it's a luncheon every week. And so people come and the kids play and run around and everybody hangs out for, you know, an hour or so and that's really, I think, been one of the recipes for success for our community is that, you know, everyone goes to mass and then we all, you know, eat and get to know each other and welcome new people and establish friendships. Yeah. That sounds fantastic. And I think you're right that that's what, I mean, that's kind of the solution. And I think many parishes are pursuing understanding this, this need that exists for that fellowship, right? And this goes back to, I mean, we can get, we can get into the history of the Catholic church in North America, right? Globally, right? This goes back to that loss of those, like, you don't Catholic community, you don't Catholic, like, oh, not ghetto, but you're Catholic, like, you know, where you, where you were, some other Catholics, like, we've, we've lost that as you move out to the suburbs and whatever. And so now, yet there's this need for, we have to intentionally kind of build this

31:15community, right? And I think that leads me to another question. This is actually relevant for many parishes. I think that as we see an influx in non-Catholic Christians, as we see more of this kind of seeker, as we try to be, like, welcoming as you describe, right? Not a cold place to come to, but balance the sacredness of the liturgy and of the, right, what was happening there in the mass. There is this, I think, I've noticed, maybe I'm just persnickety, Peter, but a loss of that sacred silence during the mass. Before the mass, even during the mass, I know for, for Cardinal Sarah, this is an important topic. He has a whole lot of a book on the power of silence. And you guys do touch on this in this interview as well, but this idea that, okay, we want to welcome in, Peter, those new, those seekers who are coming to mass and who are exploring

32:16and who are curious. We want to, like, the mass isn't necessarily a tool for evangelism in that sense, so that it's not meant to be outwardly, right? It was. It was primarily evangelism. Yeah. That's right. Yes, right. It was, in its infancy, only Catholics allowed. Like, humans couldn't even, couldn't even come, it was pretty serious. There is, though, that truth, beauty, kind of, it is a, it came to that tool to draw people in. We got to balance that, though, with everyone's just chatting and saying, hi, and shaking hands, and the ushers are up in the aisles, hi-fiving the kids before mass, right? There's, there is that tension, I think, that exists in a lot of parishes, at least where we are, of balancing that need for that sacred, prayerful time before mass, and during mass, and that not feeling like you're this closed-off, cold community, I think in one part, as you describe this kind of luncheon idea, or coffee after mass, like those things, I think, I think in large part, are a solution to that.

33:19You say, hey, welcome, join us from coffee after mass. Be quiet right now. Yeah. But what do you think, what do you think about balancing that sacred, bouncing that welcoming, that evangelization, but also recognizing it's a sacred time, rendering? Yeah, and I think probably that impulse and tendency is because, you know, that is the only time where people will see them, right? And so you want to make that personal connection, you want to, you know, kind of capture that moment when you can. And that's, again, not like we're supposed to be so much more than just Sunday mass Catholics, right, that this is a community, it's a family. And so part of that means, you know, we, you know, we have connections and relationships outside of the mass. The mass is primarily, for God, it's the worship of God. And through that worship of God, it edifies us and sanctifies us as we participate in that. But it's oriented towards the worship and glory of God.

34:23And so if we make it primarily about a community gathering, because we need to have community, that shows that, you know, we're putting everything in one boat, you know, at one time. And, you know, we're going to lose sight of something, you know, if we do that. So, yeah, I think, you know, the importance of providing opportunities, you know, and even just, you know, having picnics afterwards or whatever, potlucks, you know, people can, you know, have their own ideas, bring their lunches, type of thing. It can be informal if it, if you can't do it formally with the parish. But yeah, I think it's, it's a, usually a natural and good, important tendency. So you know, the people are well-intentioned, even if the action is, you know, maybe objectively inappropriate for that time and place, right?

35:26So that just needs to be channeled to where it is most appropriate and helpful and good for us all, so that, you know, we worship God and we pray together, and then we can, you know, play together, have fun, eat, you know, and that's not primarily about God. That's about, you know, the nourishing of the body, the human connections, right? And that's, that's properly ordered, you know, yeah, yeah, that's very well said. I love that. It's something that I think is so important to underscore. And it's just, I mean, the, the nature of what's happening at mass, right? Because I think if you had asked many evangelical Christians, many Protestant Christians, of a variety of stripes, you asked me this question when I was even a non-dominational church, meeting in the Lutheran church campus, there was trappings of liturgy in the building that we met in. We were a non-dominational church, but if you'd asked me, I think what, you know, hey, Keith, what are you doing on a Sunday morning? I think my answer would have been, well, I'm gathering together with other Christians. Yeah. I think that would be maybe a full stop. That's what I would have said, that, that gathering, that is, that is fundamentally different.

36:31It might look similar to a, to a mass, right? We're gathering in a room with people, there's pews, thank you, thank you for sending them. But we're, we're, what's happening in mass versus my gathering, even on those weekends, months when I, we had communion in my non-dominational church. Even in those weekends, it would look even more similar to a Catholic mass. What's happening is, is fundamentally different in those two gatherings, right? One is this gathering, and one is, you said, is, is for God. It's worship, right? Now, we would have sung what we called worship music in that even ducal church, right? Part of the service would be seeing worship songs, hymns or contemporary songs, sometimes even older songs, would have then heard a, you know, a sermon from the pastor, we would have prayed, and then we would have, we would have gone home, right? Or gone to the, the hall for coffee and stuff, right? There was an aspect of, quote unquote, worship in that. But it's fundamentally different from what's happening at mass, right?

37:35The, the, the music, if we're going to send, send her to the music, the music at mass in the liturgy is doing something, but that's not the primary thing that we call worship in the Catholic mass. Right. Can we, can you, are you able to kind of see what I'm going there and make a little bit of a connection? Yeah. I mean, in terms of the, the difference in those kinds of, of worship and the role of music in those two different settings. Yeah. And it goes back to then the theology and the nature of what is, you know, worship, what is the liturgy? What are we doing when we worship as Christians in the mass? And how is that different than a community gathering where we, you know, sing praise songs and, you know, cheer testimonies or, you know, even preaching? You know, and symbolically, you can kind of see that in, say, Presbyterian churches where the, the pulpit is in the middle. And that's visually, that's the primary focus, right?

38:35We're gathered to hear the sermon and to be edified by what the preacher has to say, to reveal the scriptures. And then we sing songs which uplift us and give praise to God. As opposed to what's in the center for Catholic churches is the altar and on that altar is the priest performs the sacrifice of Christ, right? And so, theologically, you know, the church is clear and teaches us that the mass is instituted by Christ at the last supper, but is, is his sacrifice of the cross, you know, the do this in memory of me is the participation in Christ sacrifice on the cross that he invites all of the Christian faithful to participate in through the body of the church, right, through Christ's body. So that participation in the mass allows us all here and now to participate in the same

39:43sacrifice that Christ offered 2,000 years ago. In that sense, outside of time, it's an eternal sacrifice, you know, he is offering himself to the father now, right, and in that sacrifice is, he's offering the worship to the father through that sacrifice, right? In an incarnational way, you know, the God existed before creation, right? And then through the incarnation, the father sends the son into the world who offers himself to the father through his death and resurrection. And his commissioning of the apostles to, in founding the church and commissioning them to evangelize and go into the world to make disciples of all nations invites us all to participate in his trinitarian life, right? So we get to participate in the action of the trinity of Christ sacrifice. We're not just sanctified humans, right?

40:45And like elevated, we're special and we, you know, ranked up, you know, no, we are participating in the Godhead, the action of God the Son. And you know, it's, it's so, yes, it's mysterious and we can't quite grasp exactly what that means or realize it because we, you know, this side of eternity. But it does have a profound impact on how we understand the nature of our worship when we come together, right? And it's not just about, say, a natural form of worship of praise, of, or even pagan worship of, say, offering sacrifice and praising God and giving the best of what you have, you know, that is the natural virtue of religion, you know, to sacrifice to give the best that you can. But through the sacrifice of Christ and our participation in that, it's not just what

41:45we offer that becomes sanctified, is we become sanctified because we're participating in what Christ is offering, right? So in that sense, when Protestant churches lose sight of that sacramental nature of liturgy, of that the Eucharist is the sacrament and it's not just about a sacrament that we receive and about what we get out of it. It's not about us, even, but it's about our participation in the life of Christ and his life and the Trinity. That's fantastic. I love that so much. This idea that that really does reframe what's happening there, right? The idea that we're participating in that, I learned, I, this, this term from that I can do, right? Active participation is sometimes a watch word for that dumbing down of the liturgy, right? I think a lot of what happened to sacred music, what happened to beautiful liturgies, beautiful

42:50buildings that were kind of whitewashed, right? Alter rails that were taken down, like these things, I think a lot of that was a name of making liturgy more accessible so we could take part in that liturgy, right? Now I've learned in becoming Catholic and doing this show for the last seven years and talking to brilliant minds like Chris Carsten, who does awesome liturgy stuff, the people like yourself, Peter, that that term, right, is what you're describing, that we're meant to take part in liturgy in a sense that we're meant to take part in that, in that sacrifice, right? Of Jesus, of Himself, back to the Father, we're meant to join in that sacrifice. It doesn't mean that we're meant to be singing songs that consist of three chords that are really, really easy to sing, right? Or that we know from the radio or that we know from, in the case of my wife and I, from our time as even jocals in the 90s that are now being sung 30 years later in our Catholic

43:53parish, that we know by heart and grown when they begin to be played, right? That's not what the active participation in liturgy means of the dumbing down to make it more accessible, right? It means joining in in that sacrifice and part of that participation can be beautiful sacred music, beautiful liturgy that challenges us, that elevates us. I mean, I can't, or I couldn't with my eyes closed, walk into a Catholic parish and sing Gregorian chant, right? Does that mean that music directors shouldn't engage in Gregorian chant? Because it's too hard for the congregation, right? I think the answer is no, but what do you think? Those things, the liturgy is meant to elevate us and I think it meant to challenge us a bit. Is that fair to say? No, for sure. And Cardinal Sarah has a line in the book somewhere as well that it's, yeah, it's not

44:54about making us just comfortable, you know, but confronting us with the reality of Christ and the Christ and the cross and sometimes that means making us very uncomfortable. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think, yeah, the idea of active participation or also translated as actual participation is another way. It's translated oftentimes was understood or, you know, enacted as meaning that we need to engage physically or didactically in some way that we need, you know, everyone needs to say the responses together, everyone needs to stand, sit and kneel at the same time and all of that. And I don't think that is inherently wrong. It's just a very surface level idea of understanding actual participation in that when we participate

45:56in the liturgy, we are participating in Christ's sacrifice and we do that through the forms that the church gives us, right? Christ as, or the apostles as Christ, Lord, teach us to pray and he taught them the our father. You know, it's a form of liturgical prayer. And the church gives us the form of prayer to worship God. You know, it's something that we receive just like the apostles received the sacraments from Christ. And so it's not that we, you know, need to adapt the words, structures or styles to what's going to be most familiar or acceptable or, you know, cool. In a way that, you know, make churches do, right? They try to just capture what's going to engage people the most, right? That's oftentimes, you know, a paradigm many people come from. As opposed to how can we enter into the mystery of Christ through the forms that he give

47:00us through the church, right? So part of that is, yes, we need to, you know, say the responses in Mass or sing them, you know, the church invites us to participate in that act of singing and praise and to kneel at the times, to kneel and to stand and sit. But also the, our participation is primarily, you know, it's the whole person. So the exterior is an element of it that the physical side is an element, but we are body and soul and we have what about our interior participation, which is, you know, what's even more primary than our external participation, right? That should just be externalizing what's already happening internally, right? That we're participating spiritually in the Mass that we're listening to the scriptures being proclaimed, you know, the role Cardinal Sarah talks about the distinct role of the

48:01choir in the Mass and how, you know, they have a distinct musical and the surgical function and not all of the music in the Mass needs to be sung by everyone. You know, and many, you know, depending on the church saying the U.S., like that can be their barometer of participation is like everybody needs to be standing and singing loud the whole time, right? And I am all for congregational singing and people singing, yes, but that's one element. That's not the whole story, you know, that's one chapter and not the whole book. And the church, you know, the choir has a distinct role, just like, you know, not everybody has to say the readings aloud, right? It's, we hear them proclaimed and we receive them when we participate by listening humbly and attentively and also, you know, in the preaching and, you know, at times for when the choir sings by themselves, right, for, for the various antiphons in the Mass and also

49:11by singing ourselves in the various parts of the Mass, like the Gloria and the Sanctus. So it's an all of the above and when we take kind of a very narrow idea of what participation is and just say that's the whole story. We distort not only what the liturgy is, but even what our, what we are capable of doing and participating, you know, we're the whole person and I, there's an element of the book where we, you know, there's a couple chapters on participation, but, you know, if we have this narrow idea of participation as being, you know, that we need to understand every word, it needs to be in the vernacular, of course, no, no Latin or no, you know, language we don't understand because that would be exclusionary, you know, an elitist or, you know, reduced participation, but no, we don't have to understand everything in order to participate in a whole way. Otherwise, you're also saying that little children and disabled people can't participate

50:15in the Mass, you know, so how does that make you look, right? We're participating in accordance with what they're capable of, right? And that's a beautiful and good thing and, you know, it doesn't mean that we need to stay where we are, right? If you don't know what the words Keri L.A. so I mean, you can learn them, they're not that hard and it's fine if you don't know them, whoever's watching this means Lord have mercy, right? But it's, it's the ancient Greek and it has so much more power to use the ancient languages and sacred languages of the church, you know, Greek and Latin and pray through them, especially the really ancient words in Hebrew, the Amen and Alleluia, right? These are the same words Christ would have said exactly in Moses. And so if we just use a translation of, you know, Alleluia's praise be to God, yes, you can say praise be to God, but don't get rid of the word Alleluia, right? We don't do that in the US, thankfully.

51:16But it's the same attitude of, well, why are you getting rid of, you know, Keri L.A. son and Gloria and Michelle C. Stale, right? These are beautiful parts of our heritage and rather than being affronted that we don't understand them and, you know, this is not allowing us to participate. No, we need to be humble and learn and participate it and pray the prayer that the apostles said to our Lord, Lord, teach us to pray. I build your soapbox higher and higher. I love it. I love it. That's fantastic. There's so much in there. I'm thinking of, I mean, first of all, this, I had this written down because this is just stand out to me. And again, I don't know that this is somewhere in the book, but the idea, and then there's even explicitly, but the idea of, of, of, of ego that plays a part of the self, right? Of the self emptying. I mean, there's so much in there. For the person who approaches the mass and has certain things they require of it, right? Things sung certain ways, things done certain ways, things, literally looks like this.

52:20And they might even be right on all those things, right? They might understand the pride of place of glory and chant and the importance of parts of the liturgy and these done properly, but there is that, there is that need to shed part of that ego, right? Not that you're not right about those things, but maybe there has to be some kind of, there's a compromise, but understanding of the human elements that play in the mass. And I think that the flip side exists too for the past living a parish or the director of music, leading, leading, or those involved in the liturgy. I mean, there's this wonderful interview I saw Father Mike Smith recently talking about the idea of vestments and talking about, you know, he, talking to somebody who approached him about, you know, why you as a priest wearing this, this vestment, why you so important looking like this. And his response was actually no, no, no, this is meant to, to anonymize me. Right. Because all the priests look like this, right?

53:23And I think that was, that was, that was quite profound because I think in the same way, if you are somebody in charge of a parish or a ministry or have your little silo at a church or that person coming into the church with an agenda for that, that, that math they're going to, I mean, there's a lot to be said for the, for the idea of, of ego, of, of emptying yourself, of not needing to do things necessarily a certain way or having done a certain way or if you're the, the, the choir leader, the band director, you know, these are the songs that people like to hear, right? Are we literally this way? Because this is the right way of doing, I mean, in all those cases, right? It's not about us. Right. Right. It's not about us. And there has been element of emptying that out. That makes sense. Yeah. No, for sure. And I think, you know, we can oftentimes all fall into this attitude about the mass of, you know, what do I get out of it? Right. Yeah.

54:23And even, you know, like you said, if we're, you know, say well formed with, with the church teachers about liturgy and music and what it's supposed to look like, and then, you know, we go to mass and our experience is just mentally criticizing and judging everything. And, you know, we're not praying, like the public in that, when we're doing that, right? And so, yes, it's that entering, the emptying of ourselves, of the Lord teaches to pray, so that regardless of the bad music, of the cantor singing off key, and, you know, the priest with little to no public speaking skills, it is the same sacrifice of Christ on the cross. So that's the beauty of the sacraments, right? It doesn't depend on our human abilities. Yeah. Right? That we can have, if we are properly disposed, we can participate in growth spiritually in as unideal

55:31a celebration of the mass like that. Maybe even more than if every, all the boxes were checked of, you know, the most beautiful church, the best choir, all these things. I mean, not that I would discourage anyone from, you know, trying to seek out those things, but don't be a snob, you know? You know, because that's not what God wants for you. You know, that's not how you're going to grow spiritually. And if we go into mass with even just, you know, that desire to kind of feel satisfied and, you know, feel good about ourselves and our decisions, you know, we've already gone in with wrong intention, you know, and we can fix that. We need to enter more deeply into the humility of, you know, in prayer. It's the Lord teaches to pray and to form my heart so that I can make an act of perfect praise, right?

56:37With the cantor singing the hymn I hate, right? Am I going to let that, you know, hearted my heart? Or am I going to, you know, give myself fully to Christ in that moment, right? That's a fantastic example. There is a high school music teacher who occasionally comes to our pairs when he's in town visiting family with his wife and kids to come to town to see the in-laws and he's that mass. And what I find fascinating in this experience is even when we are singing the terrible songs from the 90s, I'm sorry guys, but they're objectively terrible. Here he is and he's a beautiful singer. Yeah. Belting out the tunes elevates the rest of us, right? In the matter of how about the music is his enthusiasm, his participation in that does elevate the rest of us. I mean, that speaks to his attitude. His willingness to take part in that you say, you know, singing along with maybe even the hymns that we hate.

57:38I mean, something to be said for that. I love that. The pair you have a fantastic, and this is near and dear to my heart, chapter on the divine office, literally of the hours and the importance of this. And I got to say this for me was one of those things that really did draw me into the life of the church. I mean, I, I, advice I got from somebody along the way as I was looking into the Catholic Church is, what are you just trying to living like a Catholic? What are you trying to do in Catholic things? And I get that advice to other listeners, viewers as well if I'm, I'm asked to, you know, try to just pray in the rosary. Maybe you don't buy into it entirely. I feel logically, but just try and see what that experience is like. Well, for me, literally the hours was that thing. I mean, I, I found an app on my, my super old like iPod or something like back in the day that would, that would, I think I put it in the computer and it would download the various offices and the chance. And I began to live out the rhythm of praying the, the hours, the divine office.

58:41And I found love with this, this rhythm. And I found love even further with the idea that that it can do calls us to, to pray this. And that clergy and, and lady, I think increasing numbers are, we're all praying that same thing every morning, every evening. I mean, I think that is just, that, that is so profound, that, that kind of connection. But talk a little bit about the, the important, the idea of really embracing this call to, to pray liturgy hours, the fruit of that. Like, like, why? Tell me. So, so, you know, to sell me on it, but I'm curious, your thoughts on this, because it, to me, it's such a powerful, beautiful practice and, and so Catholic. It is. And it is so ancient. And, you know, the, the liturgy hours is really, it's the praying of the Psalms and of the scriptures, right? And it is, it is part of the church's tradition and that it, it is a liturgical act, right?

59:44The church, the, the, the different hours of the liturgy of the hours are the prayer, the official prayer of the church. And so, even if we're praying at private, privately, we're participating spiritually in the official prayer of the church. But, as you said, Vatican II has encouraged the divine office or the liturgy of the hours to be sung. And, you know, that ideally is, you know, like the mass, it is in community in a parish or, you know, seminaries still do it, oftentimes in monasteries and parish life. It's, it's not frequent, but there's, you know, more and more priests who are trying to do Sunday vespers and things like that. But, that you don't have to wait on anyone to enter into it, as you were saying, you know, there's apps you can download and you can even begin without, you know, singing anything, right? The full, fully performed liturgy with, is everything is sung, but, but it is, the liturgy of the hours presents the, the Psalms from the scriptures to pray all the Psalms, which were the original,

1:00:58hymnol of the church, right? And of the Jewish temple, that was, they were singing the Psalms of David in the Jewish temple and Christ was praying Psalms in the temple, right? And, even the scriptures mentioned, you know, the apostles went up at the third hour and prayed, right? And, you know, we have that, that's, that's terse, you know? And, you know, so that tradition of sanctifying the day with praying the scriptures throughout it is, it's a beautiful practice. It's also a great, I think that it's a great tool for evangelization and getting people to understand the prayer of the church and to, to pray the scriptures. You know, that's also a, it's an important way to understand even what the scriptures are, you know, that the church didn't just give us the Bible to have Bible studies, right?

1:01:58The church, you know, we have the Bible to pray the scriptures, right? To praise God through the scriptures. That's what they were doing in the Old Testament in the Jewish temple. That's what Christ was doing in the temple. That's what the Christian church still does today. It praised the scriptures. It's not just for our own edification and, you know, our own knowledge of Christ in the church. Yes, all those things are good. But, primarily, it is an act of prayer and praise, even the text themselves. And so, how much more are we, you know, using the scriptures appropriately when we're not just, not just reading them, but we're praying them, right? And so we can pray the Psalms and really enter into what does this mean? And the Psalms are just so beautiful and incredible because it captures the whole range of human emotions, right? You have, you know, David almost on the brink of despair, but still crying out to God. It's not despair because he is still praying, you know, to God.

1:03:06You know, and he's saying fulfill your promises, which means he doesn't feel those promises fulfilled. That's why he's asking for it. And at their times, you know, it's on top of the world, you know, of, you know, praise the Lord, you know, and all the emotions are happy and joyous. And it's, there's prayer for that sanctifies the whole person, right? We just, we don't have to just have good days as Christians. But, you know, it sanctifies the whole human person. And then when we enter into praying the liturgy, the hours, you know, throughout the day, and day after day, we are forming ourselves, our emotions, our hearts to praise God because there's going to be times when, you know, say, if you commit to praying the hours, where you pick it up, you know, to pray it. And you don't feel, you don't feel like doing it. And you don't feel, you know, the warm and fuzzies, and you don't feel very religious, you know, you'd rather, you know, play another game or, you know, eat some more food or whatever.

1:04:18That forms us, right? And that's good for us. It's the discipline of prayer and that forms us humanly, spiritually, and emotionally, and that we are, that's what it means to become sanctified is purifying ourselves so that we become wholly oriented towards God. So well said, so well said, Peter, I love that. That's wonderful. I want one more thing I want to put to you. I'm curious, but you're experiencing this or your thoughts on this and then wrap this up. I appreciate your time. This has been an awesome conversation. I wonder, okay, what is lost? What do you think is lost in the bad experience of liturgy, the experience of bad music at mass? What do you think? Like, I get the question of really getting at what's the importance of good music and good liturgy, but I'm trying to put it on its head a little bit like, what are we missing out by not putting the effort in to make good liturgy and good music? What do you think?

1:05:26I forget what the exact quote is, but it reminds me of this quote, which I'll paraphrase, but it was, you know, if you want someone to love home, you need to make home lovely, you know, or it was, you know, yeah, it was maybe the reference to something else, but yeah. We want people to love the church, to love Christ, to love the Catholic church, right? If we believe this is the truth, the true church established by Jesus Christ, we don't want to make a person have a difficult experience with that, right? We want to present the full goodness and beauty with that, right? And so if we want them to love the church, then we need to make sure that into love Christ, then we need to make sure that we're representing Christ ourselves, and that as a community, we're imbued with Christ beauty, primarily spiritually, right?

1:06:26And then from that spiritual beauty that our hearts are on fire for Christ and we're good and kind and humble and pure, and that will be reflected and should be reflected in all of our external actions, right? In our celebrations of the Mass, in our the music of the Mass, in the architecture, all of these things are important, but we have to be people of integrity. And I think, I think I would say the fundamental aspect of what's most important for a parent in relationship with their child, is that the child, is that the child feels loved, that if you get everything else wrong as a parent, if the child feels loved, you know, you did something right, and that's the most important thing, right? And though, hopefully, forget everything else. Do we have that relationship with other Catholics, with our pastor, with each other, right?

1:07:33And I think we have that relationship of the people we want to stay in the church, who are visiting, do they feel loved? Are we showing Christ to them, or are we upset because they're late, or give them a side eye, or whatever, or something right? Yeah, we have to be Christ to people, and to show Christ love, and that will, you know, and should be reflected in the beauty of the Mass, because that's what forms us, and forms everyone else to say that Christ is beautiful, right? And how we treat someone tells us the truth about someone, if we treat our grandparents with reverence and respect, it tells us the truth about that, about them, right? And about the nature of who they are, and their dignity, right? It forms us, even if we don't understand everything, that, you know, if we don't understand our grandparents as little children, but we have to treat them with respect and dignity.

1:08:41And there's good reasons for that, and it forms the person, so that, you know, as they mature and get older, they realize more and more why, and what that means. But in the same thing with the Mass, this is the most important action we can participate in, it is the most beautiful action that we can participate in. And so it forms us, it forms our hearts, our imaginations, our dreams, our desires, because we want people to want to go to heaven, right, to desire eternity, and an eternity of praising God forever, right? Which is what the Mass is, and if the Mass is not imbued with beauty, then you're not helping people desire to go to heaven if they just want to get out and have lunch, right? You want to go to heaven in a different way, really, really quickly, right? If heaven is just satisfying the passion, you feel good, right?

1:09:41But the Mass is this reality that's transcendent, and we are, you know, sensuous people, we have senses, and those, all of our senses need to be directed and oriented towards that reality, of that transcendent reality, imbued with beauty and reverence and goodness, reflecting Christ and all of those things, so that we're ready. We're ready. We're there, you know, at the throne of heaven praising God, and, you know, we want to stay there forever, because we are contemplating Christ who is so good and so beautiful, and we can't wait to continue doing that for all eternity in heaven. That's fantastic. That's so well said. I love that so much. Peter, this has been an awesome conversation. I appreciate your time. This is wonderful. The book is the song of the Lamb of Ignatius Press. I'll put links to that in the show notes, for sure. Where else do you want to point people towards to find and follow stuff that you're doing? Where can they go to find more?

1:10:45Yeah, so my organization is the Catholic Sacred Music Project, so you can go to sacredmusicproject.org to see more about that. Yeah, that's fantastic stuff. I'll listen. I want to say thank you. Thanks for being here. Yeah, thank you, Keith. This has been really fun. God bless you, the work you're doing for the church. Peter, it's awesome stuff, and thank you. Thanks again. This has been fantastic. Yeah, God bless. Well, that was a great conversation. Guys, hopefully you enjoyed that. Let me know. You know, corduacathacademy.com is our email address for your feedback. Guys, we know you think of these kind of conversations. Our socials are linked there as well, too. What were you seeing over to youtube.com, so I have to corduacathacademy. If you could, subscribe there, have that community to grow. That gives some listeners more viewers to the show, so thank you for doing that. And guys, thanks listening. Please pray for me. Note that I'm praying for you, too. Talk to you soon. Take care. God bless. Thanks listening.

1:11:46A very special thanks to our Patreon co-producers, help make this show possible each and every week. Thank you to Amanda, Ellie and Tom, Father Larry, Gina, Heather, James, Yorg, Michelle, Noah, Robert, Shelby, Suzanne, and Victor, and William, for your support as Patreon co-producers, helping to make this show possible week after week. You guys are the absolute best. Thank you and God bless. Thank you.