VATICAN - “A bridge between tradition, which we want to keep alive and not under glass, and modern day production of music which draws inspiration from the great values and transmits them” Archbishop Mauro Piacenza, President of Pontifical Commission of the Cultural Heritage of the Church told Fides.

Vatican City (Fides Service) - On the occasion of a Press Conference to present the 3rd International Festival of Sacred Art and Music, Fides interviewed Archbishop Mauro Piacenza, President of Pontifical Commission of the Cultural Heritage of the Church.

Archbishop Piacenza, only 50 years ago church music was known and loved by all. But of this millenary art which serves to bring people closer to God, today?
Sacred music is essentially part of the liturgy and its purpose is “to render glory to God and to sanctify His people” (Vatican II, Sacrosantum Concilium, Constitution on the Liturgy 120). Thus sacred music is part of a living tradition rooted in the early Christian communities encouraged by St Paul “to sing to psalms, hymns, spiritual canticles to God from the heart and with gratitude” (Col 3,16; cfr Eph 5,19). But for music to be sacred it must possess certain characteristics. First of all it must express “holiness”, that is, it must have a sense of prayer and serve to lift mind and heart to God, it must help the faithful to taken an “active part in the sacred mysteries and in the public and solemn prayer of the Church” (Tra le sollecitudini); it must adhere to biblical and euchological texts, be consonant with the Liturgical Seasons and in keeping with the gestures and contents of a liturgical celebration.
Secondly sacred music must be “authentic art”, marked by dignity and beauty so it may introduce listeners to the sacred Mysteries. Lastly, and this is the most sensitive point, it must combine the legitimate demands of adaptation and inculturation, requested by the diffusion of the Church among so many different peoples and cultures and by the changes in tastes, with the requisite of “universality”, noted when a composition is perceived and received as sacred. It must also refer to an objectivity of what is beautiful and sacred not easily understood in the present day cultural context.

But is sacred music only a question of retrieving the past in a modern key?

Besides retrieving the past, another urgent need is to stimulate production of present day quality church music, since it is now time to put an end to the musical experimentation and amateurism of recent decades, marked also by truly suffocating anti-conventional conventionalism. Institutionally this task is carried out with commitment by the Pontifical Institute of Sacred Music and a few schools of Sacred Music, instituted thanks to the happy intuition of Pope Saint Pius X. It is obvious though all would welcome contributions of strongly motivated organisations or individuals who take this urgency to heart. Also in this sector as in that of figurative sacred art or church architecture there is more than ever need of illuminated commissioners.

The Church has always had a role of commissioner and it is also the highest sign of a creativity born of the Eternal and Creating Word. Do we perceive in your interventions Archbishop an expression of her desire to re-build a bridge a link with the languages of modern creativity ?

The new generations have been somewhat abandoned with regard to education to taste and I think it is important to help young people approach and appreciate this great heritage which, since it is universal and deals with what is beautiful and sacred, cannot fail to touch people of all ages. I think it is also important to encourage young composers to produce music and to uproot the conviction that for some it is like opening the door of a magnificent museum to be respected and preserved but it is always only a museum. Instead people must realise that the humanity’s heritage is a museum which lives, it is life! We must help them produce today with the sensitivity of today, drawing from eternal values such as the sense of the presence of God in the life of human beings, the sense of man’s search for the Absolute even when he takes the wrong path showing even more clearly his need of the Absolute which he claims to despise and spit on, but for which nevertheless he searches.
I think we must build a bridge between tradition which we want to keep alive and not under glass and a modern day production which draws inspiration from the great values and transmits them. (AP) (7/10/2004 Agenzia Fides; Righe:63; Parole:794)