Oh boy. Holy Name Church in Toronto will be home to what’s called Missa Gaia or “Earth Mass.”
This from the parish bulletin:
Cardinal Carter Academy for the Arts Music Department will present Missa Gaia at Holy Name Church Wednesday April 3 and Friday April 5 at 7 p.m. This concert will feature the combined choirs and select band/string performers of CCAA in an eclectic mix of traditional, contemporary and nature sounds all directed to praise Jesus Christ as Lord of all creation.
I’m not sure where Jesus really comes into it. Maybe it’s the sound of howling wolves? Who knows?
Now, the archdiocese mentions Jesus but is He really the focus of the Gaia Mass? Here’s a review of the work by EcoSpirit which says:
The ecosophical movement has its song in Paul Winter’s masterpiece Missa Gaia Earth Mass, for the Missa Gaia embodies a moving and convincing vision of the grace of nature and provides an opportunity for wonder and praise in the face of an interdependent cosmos.
That doesn’t sound very Jesus-y, does it? How about this part?
In Nissa Gaia the second meaning is expressed by means of a monumental initation journey into earth-wisdom, a journey that encompasses nearly the entire first-half of the Earth Mass.
Our musical initiation into the wisdom of the living earth begins in response to the cry of the chorus “Kyrie eleison,” “Lord have mercy upon us.” The response to this chorus is a solo “Beatitudes” accompanied by the chorus, the cathedral choisters (boys chorus)
and piano. The conclusion generates jubilant congregational clapping. “Beatitudes” is the answer to “Kyrie eleison,” affirming the blessedness of all of the earth’s inhabitants. The gift of mercy is here within the living earth. The mercy is this spiritualized biosphere.
As Toronto Catholic Witness writes: “it is outrageous that a Catholic church be used for a piece of work that draws its inspiration from gnostic pantheism. This underscores the grave crisis in the faith that we have not only in our local Catholic schools, but within the Archdiocese itself.”
The music reportedly includes the cries of the Alaskan wolf, the hump-backed whale, the harp seal and the loon.
I’m thinking the loon would feel very at home at this concert.
April 5, 2013 at 3:42 am
Oh lord. For a minute I thought this was the one where I live, which I will never attend no matter how many of my friends are involved. I might die of embarrassment anyway.
April 5, 2013 at 4:03 am
If I sit through this crap, does it count for time off Purgatory? What a pain to the ear drums!
April 5, 2013 at 2:31 pm
Are they using the think" system?
April 5, 2013 at 2:31 pm
"think"
April 5, 2013 at 4:34 pm
Lest you think this is new…
I believe it was 1983 when I and three openly gay priest-wanna-be friends from the GW Newman Center (absolute truth – timing is everything), acquired tickets to Paul Winter's Missa Gaia performed on the main altar at the National Shrine in DC. I don't recall who our priest/MC was, but I have a vivid recollection of the half-time homilist being a Buddhist monk who made a comparison between God and a cup of yogurt. When we heard this we busted out laughing. We were seated in the third row behind a phalanx of saffron clad monks and only ceased our hilarity when the pacifist monks gave us looks that could kill. I believe my 21 year old self was sufficiently impressed with the piece that I bought the album. Alas, I gave it away so I can't compare the performances.
Thanks a lot – The rad trad in me had almost suppressed this memory.
April 5, 2013 at 8:05 pm
Ah, just listen to the diabolical desolation! Sounds like a really bad nightmare…
April 5, 2013 at 10:35 pm
This is not the first time this has been done. I know someone who belonged to the choral society that performed it. She quit over it and never went back. The parish it was done in has had a "progressive" pastor for years and a lot of parishioners with money.
April 6, 2013 at 4:55 am
This sounds like something composed for Lon Chaney as the Wolfman! Our Lady foretold about the diabolical disorientation in the Church but it just keeps getting WORSE!
April 6, 2013 at 1:09 pm
Wait but the song is called Kyrie Eleison. That's Latin for Lord Have Mercy. You're listening to the song but you don't know the meaning of the lyrical text…. Educate yourselves before you embarrass yourselves.
April 6, 2013 at 2:05 pm
Vox carries an update on the whole story….
I can also personally attest to the Cardinal Carter Academy carrying homosexualist propaganda at its "guidance counsellor" Office. There are two main issues here: the local church being so confused.weak – nay, heretical, that such could be permitted. And the other: the local school system, as a Catholic entity, is devastated. Only recently OECTA (the militant teachers union) has elected a new pro-homosexualist president replacing the outgoing pro-homosexualist.
April 7, 2013 at 2:18 am
"Educate yourselves before you embarrass yourselves" should know that the Kyrie Eleison is not Latin at all, but Greek.