I received as an email the following (slightly edited for this post) from a music director. With permission I post what is written but anonymously. It all makes very good pastoral sense to me!
I believe that the Mass is worth singing and that the congregation should also join in, but we have always had a representation that stands in for another.... you [priest] stand in for Christ himself, the servers stand in for us at the altar, God parents stand in at Baptism, etc. This is nothing new for us as Catholics.
The choir stands in for the angelic choir that chants (sings) the praises of God in the Heavenly Liturgy.
When I read some of the material on various blogs, what is most striking to me is the force of the individual thrust to make his/her point, a kind of I'm right, you are wrong because you don't agree with me. Com boxes limit the discussion by their nature.
From my point of view at this point in my life, is that we have a tendency to approach Liturgy (Mass) the same way we approach our lives in an individualistic culture with a feeling of ownership and entitlement. What is missing, I think, is an overall attitude of humility to receive what the good God gives to us at Mass and to receive it humbly with deep gratitude for the contents and appearance of this magnificent gift to us. We don't tend to view the Liturgy as a pure gratuitous gift from God to us, but as something we need to manipulate to suit our own tastes and times.
I am the music director of a principally Hispanic parish and I am responsible for the "English" Masses and liturgies. As time permits, I have been studying the role of Sacred Music and the Liturgy, so I am by no means an expert. But I have my observations. As I have learned about the Propers of the Mass, they have enriched my own experience of the Mass and they seem to be able to highlight something that is more deep and intangible than singing hymns or songs. For almost two years now (since the new Missal Translation) I now play the organ for an opening Hymn and a Closing Hymn. Depending on the priest and his requests to me, I sing an Offertory Song or the Proper, either one, acapella. I always sing the Communion Proper and after Communion the appropriate Marian antiphon from the season.
The biggest change I have experienced of congregational singing has, interestingly enough, come about in the Responsorial Psalm. We have our Missalettes and I use a 3 to 4 note ranged Psalm Tone. I use the same tone for the antiphon as for the verses. This allows the congregation to hear the tone, repeat it with me, but not compete to read the words of the Psalm in a different melody and then have to struggle to recall the original "tune" of the psalm. It is all very organic and it seems to have reduced the angst of attempting to sing something having only heard it once and because it is the same tone throughout, they are more comfortable about singing.
By the importation of Protestant, and later "new" Catholic Music and demanding that the congregation participate by singing I think that we are robbing them, especially those who only come to Mass once a week and lead very busy lives outside, of the implicit aspect of contemplation and true union with God in their souls. This has really bothered me because it would mean that I am a means of distraction and not a means toward this union with God.
This is the part of the discussion that seems to be absent from the overall discussion about the proper use of Liturgical music during Mass (and to a much lesser degree regarding the Liturgy of the Hours).
The question for me has become "Is what I am doing leading people to deeply encounter God who transforms us, or am I demanding from them an observable assessment of my efficacy to engage them?"
As an educator I live in an environment that demands assessment at every level of performance of students. There are the formal assessments, written, oral, projects and there are the informal assessments: are they participating in class, are they doing their work, do they participate in discussions, get along with one another, etc.
There are performance reviews conducted in business, in health care, any manner of work. I wonder if the level of congregational singing is not the standard and assessment we are looking for as feedback to asses our own effectiveness?
Just as in Catholic Education we assess every academic subject including Religion as well as PE, Music, Art, Technology, and even living skills that are not an academic subject. But really, we are beyond being able to assess accurately the effect of the Catholic portion of the education that we provide. Even the most astute spiritual director cannot fully assess the progress or status of another's soul before God.
To this view, I think that as musicians we need to follow and study and submit ourselves to the work that lies before us in understanding more fully the Liturgy and our part in it. If we can submit ourselves and our talents to the service of the Heavenly Liturgy and not import the world into our temporal portal into heaven through the earthly Liturgy we will have done our best to make heaven more present on earth.
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