Let All God’s People Sing

by Patrice Metcalf - Director of Music Ministries - St Mary

Let All God’s People Sing
by Patrice Metcalf, Director of Music Ministries at St. Mary Parish

Raised by parents with a love for God and for the arts (my Catholic mother an elementary school music teacher, my Christian dad a visual arts high school teacher and illustrator), I developed an appreciation and respect for arts in the liturgy at a young age. I am fortunate that God has given me the opportunity to further my education as I currently work on completing my Master’s degree in Music and Worship from Liberty University Online. For the past decade I have worked professionally in church leadership throughout Massachusetts, and it is my pleasure to join the community of the St. Martha & St. Mary collaborative parishes as the Director of Music Ministries at St. Mary! I love this profession as I can work with the congregation to encourage you to sing and worship.

Did you know there’s over 400 references to singing in the Bible? Colossians 3:16 reads, “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, as in all wisdom you teach and admonish one another, singing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs with gratitude in your hearts to God.” We all know that at church, we sing. But why? Let me share with you five significances of singing in the liturgy. Each point I will follow with a question for you to consider in reflection.

Point 1: The act of singing encourages and expresses the Spirit’s work in our hearts. Singing is our prayer! You have probably noticed that the music selections vary from week to week. Songs are selected for each Mass after careful consideration of the readings of the day and the liturgical season. Just like we learned our English alphabet as children thanks to a centuries old tune, we also remember Christ’s word through song. Consider: How did your interpretation of the readings change because of a song?

Point 2: Singing helps us express and engage our emotions. The power of music is extraordinary in the way it can move even the most stoic of people. We shouldn’t suppress how a song makes us feel. The songs we sing at Mass are meant to be sung with passion, with us all contemplating and feeling the text as we sing. Consider: How were you emotionally impacted after singing a select passage of one of the songs today?

Point 3: Singing encourages physical expressiveness. Within the Catholic Mass we follow scriptural examples and exhortations. As an example of many, we sing the Gloria for the majority of the liturgical year, and in so doing we sing the exact praises sung by the angels on Christ’s birth, from Luke 2:14: “Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests.” Consider: How does the text of the music apply to my life?

Point 4: Music helps us teach and to be taught. We are led each Mass by trained cantors or choirs. There is never a moment where the congregation cannot participate in the musical aspects of the liturgy. During a Meditation hymn following Communion, the cantor or choir will often sing a “solo” song. Even then, we as worshipers can continue to grasp all important components of music within the Mass: meditate on the text, the emotions, and the expressiveness. Consider: What is God trying to tell me through song?

Final point: Singing helps us express our unity with the church. When we sing together, we prove that “we, though many, throughout the earth, we are one body in this one Lord.” Remember, the point is not can you sing, but why you sing. Consider: Are you praising God, right now?

When God helped the Israelites cross the Red Sea, they and Moses spontaneously broke into songs of praise to God. If you read that story in Exodus 15, it says, “Moses and the Israelites sang”, not “Moses and the Israelites sang, with the exception of Bruno (we don’t talk about Bruno).” (That’s a Disney reference.)

We all entered this world singing: crying out into the unknown world to be held in the arms by a savior. We spend our lives singing to our loving God as we rest in the assurance that he sent his only Son for our sins. And when we have reached the end of time, we will continue to sing praises to God for all eternity with the angels and saints. This is why we sing.