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Pope Saint Paul VI (3 April 1969): “Although the text of the Roman Gradual—at least that which concerns the singing—has not been changed, the Entrance antiphons and Communions antiphons have been revised for Masses without singing.”

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Views from the Choir Loft

Beauty in the Service of the Lord

Dr. Gregory Hamilton · March 27, 2019

The encounter with the beautiful can become the wound of the arrow that strikes the heart and in this way opens our eyes, so that later, from this experience, we take the criteria for judgment and can correctly evaluate the arguments. For me an unforgettable experience was the Bach concert that Leonard Bernstein conducted in Munich after the sudden death of Karl Richter. I was sitting next to the Lutheran Bishop Hanselmann. When the last note of one of the great Thomas-Kantor-Cantatas triumphantly faded away, we looked at each other spontaneously and right then we said: “Anyone who has heard this, knows that the faith is true.”   —Josef Cardinal Ratzinger (August 2002)


ECENTLY, PLAYING a prelude before a Mass, I thought of the preeminence of beauty in our faith. In no other religion is beauty given such a special importance. Sometimes when we walk through a museum or listen to beautiful music in worship it can be so easily assimilated and almost discarded. We can tend to forget what work, effort and suffering goes into the creation of something beautiful.

Another statement of Pope Emeritus Benedict comes to mind:

“…Be fully conscious of your great responsibility to communicate beauty, to communicate in and through beauty!”

Special awareness or sensitivity: awareness of something for what it is; internal knowledge: being awake, aware. To be conscious is to be living and to practice mindfulness. Mindfulness is kind of a new thing that we hear about. But it’s not really a fad, inasmuch as those who are fully awake in life will be mindful of beauty. And surely, those close to God are most conscious of beauty.

So, sitting at the console, I played a “Tierce en Taille” by De Grigny. Just think (be conscious and mindful) of what layers of people effort and work it took to make my little offering possible. We could begin with DeGrigny: (baptized September 8, 1672 – November 30, 1703) one of the greatest of composers for the organ, died prematurely in 1703, aged 31, shortly after accepting a position from Saint Symphorien, the parish church in Reims. This great loss can be so regretted, but we can rejoice that we have still his Livre d’orgue, which is the only surviving record of his great creativity. There are only a few surviving copies of this book, and there is only one copy remaining of the first edition. So, next we need to be grateful for those anonymous people who loved the beauty of this music and somehow preserved it form war, pestilence an ignorance. One of those people who preserved a copy was J. S. Bach.

Where to next? We can certainly mention the great French organ builders of his day, who built instruments painstakingly by hand. The many people who hammered the metal, sawed the wood and voiced the pipes. Those builders who created a sound so rhetorically strong that deGrigny was inspired to write his Tierce en Taille, a beautiful declaration given out on the cornet stops in the left hand, and particular lovely registration, which was the result of a very long historical development in itself.

We could mention that deGrigny was born into a family of musicians: his father, his grandfather, and his uncle, Robert, were organists at the Reims Cathedral, the Basilica of St. Pierre and St. Hilaire, respectively…So based on the exquisite quality of his music, he must have had extensive training, as was schooled in the art of French organ playing by his relatives, who in turn were taught by others—all who had a heart to receive beauty.

We can continue…we can note those musicians all through the generations that kept alive the idea of worthy music in the church, who continued the tradition of organ playing, so that, coming all the way to my teacher, understood the craft and art of playing the organ—it has never been lost, thanks to a long line of teachers. We could mention the chapel where the organ is—the many donors, architects builders and supporters who conceived of the idea of this chapel as a place for the Eucharist and did what was needed to create a reality. We could mention the organ—beautifully voiced like the old instruments—forming a historical connection again, all the people who designed it (the brilliant organ builder Ross King) those who built it, tuned and voiced it…

And last, Humbly standing on the many shoulders of others, those who taught me how to play the organ, were patient with me when I didn’t practice (too often!) and imparted an appreciation of this music and why it is so fitting for sacred worship. All this just to make my little offering possible!

Let us be conscious of beauty.

Opinions by blog authors do not necessarily represent the views of Corpus Christi Watershed.

Filed Under: Articles Last Updated: August 20, 2020

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About Dr. Gregory Hamilton

Dr. Gregory Hamilton is a composer and performer currently on the faculty of Holy Trinity Seminary in Dallas TX.—(Read full biography).

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Corpus Christi Watershed

President’s Corner

    “Music List” • 28th in Ordinary Time (Year C)
    Readers have expressed interest in perusing the ORDER OF MUSIC I’ve prepared for 12 October 2025, which is the 28th Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year C). If such a thing interests you, feel free to download it as a PDF file. As always, the Responsorial Psalm, Gospel Acclamation, and Mass Propers for this Sunday are conveniently stored at the dazzling feasts website alongside the official texts in Latin.
    —Jeff Ostrowski
    PDF Download • “Offertory” for this Sunday
    This coming Sunday, 12 October 2025, is the 28th Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year C). Its OFFERTORY ANTIPHON (PDF) is gorgeous, and comes from the book of Esther, as did the ENTRANCE CHANT last Sunday. Depending on a variety of factors, various hand-missals (all with Imprimatur) translate this passage differently. For instance, “príncipis” can be rendered: King; Prince; Lion; or Fierce lord. None is “more correct” than another. It depends on what each translator wants to emphasize and which source text is chosen. All these pieces of plainsong are conveniently stored at the blue-ribbon feasts website.
    —Jeff Ostrowski
    Why A “Fugue” Here?
    I believe I know why this plainsong harmonizer created a tiny fugue as the INTRODUCTION to his accompaniment. Take a look (PDF example) and tell me your thoughts about what he did on the feast of the Flight of Our Lord Jesus Christ into Egypt (17 February). And now I must go because “tempus fugit” as they say!
    —Jeff Ostrowski

Quick Thoughts

    New Bulletin Article • “12 October 2025”
    My pastor requested that I write short articles each week for our parish bulletin. Those responsible for preparing similar write-ups may find a bit of inspiration in these brief columns. The latest article (dated 12 October 2025) talks about an ‘irony’ or ‘paradox’ regarding the 1960s switch to a wider use (amplior locus) of vernacular in the liturgy.
    —Jeff Ostrowski
    “American Catholic Hymnal” (1991)
    The American Catholic Hymnal, with IMPRIMATUR granted (25 April 1991) by the Archdiocese of Chicago, is like a compendium of every horrible idea from the 1980s. Imagine being forced to stand all through Communion (even afterwards) when those self-same ‘enlightened’ liturgists moved the SEQUENCE before the Alleluia to make sure congregations wouldn’t have to stand during it. (Even worse, everything about the SEQUENCE—including its name—means it should follow the Alleluia.) And imagine endlessly repeating “Alleluia” during Holy Communion at every single Mass. It was all part of an effort to convince people that Holy Communion was historically a procession (which it wasn’t).
    —Jeff Ostrowski
    “Canonic” • Ralph Vaughan Williams
    Fifty years ago, Dr. Theodore Marier made available this clever arrangement (PDF) of “Come down, O love divine” by P. R. Dietterich. The melody was composed in 1906 by Ralph Vaughan Williams (d. 1958) and named in honor of of his birthplace: DOWN AMPNEY. The arrangement isn’t a strict canon, but it does remind one of a canon since the pipe organ employs “points of imitation.” The melody and text are #709 in the Brébeuf Catholic Hymnal.
    —Jeff Ostrowski

Random Quote

“As liturgical art, church music is obliged to conform to ecclesiastical law. But to construct artificial polarities here, between legalistic order and a dynamic church music, demanded by the alleged needs of the day, would be to forsake the foundation of a music rooted in liturgical experience. What is in fact the pastoral value of the shoddy, the profane, the third-rate?”

— Dr. Robert Skeris (1996)

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