#078: "Sing a *new* Song Unto the Lord" (with Gabriel Wanous & Chris Nolin) - a podcast by National Association of Pastoral Musicians (NPM)
from 2019-11-25T14:00
The Catholic Church has a history of music that brings people closer to Christ. It’s what we hope to do. Stylistically, this music has changed over the last several hundred years, but especially since the Second Vatican Council in the 1960’s.
Similar to the revolutionary wave of folk-style music that pioneered the post-Vatican II musical culture, the Catholic Church has seen an evolution of a new genre of music, typically named “praise and worship music” or “contemporary music”. This music includes a wide array of instrumentation, from guitar and piano to percussion and a troupe of backup singers.
The contemporary music genre has received a lot of support and a lot of reservation from pastoral musicians in the Church. While some see this modern style of music to be a strong source of evangelization for the Church- especially with younger generations- some see it as a style too similar to pop music for use in the sacred liturgy.
And yet Pope Francis has been quoted as saying: "Gregorian chant, polyphony, popular and contemporary music resonate in the liturgy, bringing the past and present generation together in praising God."
How do we find common ground in the age-old “style wars”? What can we learn from more modern music in our ministry today?
Today I talk to the minds behind WorshipNOW Publishing, a new publishing company that created the WorshipNOW hymnal. If you haven’t heard of WorshipNOW, you will very soon. In many ways, their hymnal is revolutionary- as is their perspective on contemporary music in the Church today.
Whether you use contemporary music or not in your music ministry, take a listen to today’s episode. Today I speak to Gabriel Wanous and Chris Nolin, two of the minds behind WorshipNOW. We discuss what is the WorshipNOW hymnal, along with the mission and motive behind modern music today.
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