Ministry Monday: Recent Episodes
National Association of Pastoral Musicians (NPM)
An indispensable resource for all those engaged in ministry, this weekly podcast covers important practical issues for today's parish ministers.
Wedding season is well upon us, and with it always comes with a story. Many of you may already know that prior to working full-time for NPM, I was a full-time DIrector of Music at a Catholic church, which was set in a very beautiful, very visible, and also very tourist-laden area of my city. For 13 years I played 60-70 weddings annually, half of which were non-parishioners. The experiences came with a sense of excitement and joy…but also a time for catechesis for the bride and groom. We’ve probably all had the couple who needed a bit more clarification on why their favorite secular tune cannot be a part of the music at their Catholic wedding, and honestly, I’m sure we could compile our best wedding stories into a book! (I’ve heard it said, “I could write a book” many times…)
I’ve often heard a dreadful saying by pastoral musicians that “I’d rather play three funerals versus one wedding.” While this has always bothered me, I think the roots lie in a mutual misunderstanding of young couples being married, and the pastoral musicians who serve them. The beauty of the Sacrament of Marriage can often be eclipsed by the secular aesthetic that couples mostly worry about, from the flowers to the bridal party to, of course, the bride and groom’s ensembles. But just because a couple may not fully grasp the Sacrament does not mean that they cannot enter into a paradigm of catechesis prior to their wedding day. And in fact, I think we shortchange many couples by assuming they do not grasp a general understanding of the liturgy and how it will relate to their wedding. Why not take it as an opportunity to bridge that gap of understanding, even if only to help them more deeply understand their wedding?
Today on Ministry Monday we speak to Paul Radkowski, Director of Music at the Church of St. Edward the Confessor in Granville, Ohio. Paul discusses the ways that pastoral musicians can support couples as they prepare for the Sacrament of Marriage: how can they best plan their ceremony music? what if a loved one wants to sing in the wedding? What if the couple wants to include secular music in the wedding? Paul addresses these questions and more.
This episode of Ministry Monday is brought to you by Boston College Clough School of Theology and Ministry (CSTM). Boston College Clough School of Theology and Ministry (CSTM) is accepting applications for Courage to Preach: A Post-Master’s Certificate. Courage to Preach trains participants to read and interpret Scripture and use it as a foundational collection to preach on contemporary issues, such as racial, economic, and environmental justice. The certificate is completed over 12 months. Learn more at bc.edu/preach.
NPM is blessed with a rich community of Asian/Pacific American pastoral musicians that support their parishes and the NPM community at large. Ariel Mayormita, Jose Gallardo and Maria Nieva are all pastoral musicians across the United States. They each demonstrate hospitality, kindness, and a deep Catholic faith in their lives. Today's episode highlights the deep faith and profound hospitality found in AAPI culture, from 500 years of Christianity in the Philippines to today. Our presenters to reflect on this topic today are Ariel Mayormita, Jose Gallardo and Maria Nieva, joining us from New Jersey, Texas, and the Philippines!
SHOW NOTES
For more resources celebrating AAPI Heritage Month, visit npm.org.
All content of this podcast is property of the National Association of Pastoral Musicians or its content suppliers and is protected by United States and international copyright laws. For information about the podcast and its use, please contact us.
Growing up in the Catholic Church I was familiar with the poster of the liturgical calendar. You know the one: its circular design reflects the changing colors and seasons in the Church calendar. I always found this poster to be fascinating, even as a very young person: What did it mean? How did the The Church decide these things? Why do the colors change? As a young adult I asked myself questions about the saints on the calendar, the nuances of Holy Days of Obligation, and more. The practical and historical contexts of our Church calendar have always fascinated me.
Which brings me to our episode today. I recently came across Fr. Paul Turner’s new book, Sacred Times, which is described as “A Guide to the General Roman Calendar and the Table of Liturgical Days.” The book reads like a story you’d find at a sacred bookstore, but is so full of information it’s as indespensible as an encyclopedia at times. I reached out to Fr. Paul and asked to interview him for the podcast, of which he obliged, thankfully. In preparation for my interview I read the book. I quickly realized that this could be a series of episodes, simply to capture the full breadth and depth of the book. And so consider the following interview as an introductory course on the book, Sacred Times, published by Liturgical Press. Our chat addresses many questions about the Church’s observances, such as: What is the Proper of Time versus the Proper of Saints? Why does Easter move each year, versus being on one set date? How are Holy Days of Obligation chosen? and more.
*This episode of Ministry Monday is brought to you by Ministry Scheduler Pro. Take the pain out of scheduling church volunteers with easy-to-use software designed just for ministries. Free up your time, and make it easy for your volunteers to answer the call to serve. Start your free trial today at MinistrySchedulerPro.com.*
We are back from a brief Easter hiatus, and while we are happy to be back, our hearts are heavy here in the NPM National Office at the passing of our Holy Father, Pope Francis. I recently read his autobiography, “Hope,” and it gave me the chance to learn more about Pope Francis and his life as Jorge Bergoglio as well. If you haven’t read it, I strongly encourage that you do, especially in this Jubilee Year of Hope.
As we collectively mourn the loss of Pope Francis, our Holy Father, NPM has offered a compilation of resources for personal and ministerial use. They can be found at www.npm.org, and they will be linked int the show notes of this episode. We pray that they provide solace, comfort, and hope in the Resurrection.
Today we continue the topic of sequences. Fr. Michael Joncas began our examination of the Church’s current use of sequences before we journeyed through Holy Week, and today Fr. Roc O’Connor continues this conversation. Roc O’Connor, SJ has been a member the Society of Jesus for over fifty years. He served in pastoral settings for most of his ministerial life – parishes, college and universities, and Jesuit formation. He is a founding member of the St. Louis Jesuits, a group that has shaped pastoral music for all of us today and has earned worldwide recognition.
Roc helps us with a primer of sorts on the sequences for Easter Sunday, Pentecost, and Corpus Christi. This particular episode is very beneficial when viewed as a video episode. You can find it in the show notes of this episode, as well as on NPM’s youtube channel, youtube.com/NPMlivestream. If you can’t access the video version of this episode, keep in mind that Roc allows us to flow between the Latin text, the ICEL translation, and the Roman Missal translation freely, examining how they work together and help to bring forth the sacred in some of the holiest days in our Church calendar.
SHOW NOTES
Bio: Bio: Roc O’ Connor, SJ
Roc O’Connor, SJ has been a member the Society of Jesus for over fifty years. He served in pastoral settings for most of his ministerial life – parishes, college and universities, and Jesuit formation. This includes thirteen years as Adjunct Professor of Theology at Creighton University (2000-2013).
He earned an MDiv and STM from the Jesuit School of Theology, Berkeley (1983), an STL from the Weston School of Theology, Cambridge (1993), and an MA in Liturgical Studies from The Catholic University of America (2003).
As a founding member of the St. Louis Jesuits, he contributed songs to six recordings and has produced three solo recordings. The SLJs have been recognized with honorary doctorates at the University of Scranton (1978), Creighton University (2006), and St. Louis University (August, 2022).
In October 2021, his provincial assigned him to address serve on the staff at the Bellarmine Jesuit Retreat House, Barrington, IL.
His work include over a dozen articles plus:
– In the Midst of Our Storms (LTP, 2015). Here, Roc proposes a way to pray with and from our resistance to the intrusion of God in our lives whom we meet in liturgical Word, gesture, & symbol. Exploring our resistance opens up depths we previously disregarded.
– I Want to See (23rd publications, 2017) Roc offers an intense study of the Bartimaeus story with three basic points: a) we follow Jesus as blind disciples; b) the scribes, Pharisees, chief priests, elders, disciples, & the Twelve mirror for us what we don’t want to see in ourselves; c) whatever we avoid can, through the working of the Holy Spirit, become our Best Friends Forever on our walk with Christ. The Association of Catholic Publishers recognized I Want to See with the 2018 Excellence in Publishing Award – Prayer and Spirituality Second Place.
– All Shall Be Well: The Hand of God (OCP, 2020) His collection of eight new songs was released in June, 2020. Six of the eight piecesexplore very slow tempos as a help make room for breathing and presence. Another collection of fifteen songs based in gospel and blues awaits completion.
– Long Division Ever Divisive: A Lament was published in Worship July 2021.
All content of this podcast is property of the National Association of Pastoral Musicians or its content suppliers and is protected by United States and international copyright laws. For information about the podcast and its use, please contact us.
Today is the last episode Ministry Monday will be airing before a brief Holy Week and Easter hiatus. We wanted to leave you with an episode that would provide a prayerful pause as you wrap up the last rehearsals, make the last binders, and write the last “thank you” notes to your Holy Week musicians. Today we begin a conversation focusing on the sequences and hear from Fr. J. Michael Joncas. What is the history of a sequence’s form? What terminology predates the sequences? How can we most effectively employ sequences in our parishes? It is a great episode from which to prepare the Sequence for Easter Sunday.
During the month of March NPM celebrates the women that shape us and love us into being. Those who fight against the injustices of our society today. Women in religious life who are our spiritual guides. And those among us who lead and serve the Church in lay ministry. We are honored to celebrate you! And today we offer a replay episode that celebrates some of the strong women in our Church’s history. We hope this episode inspires you, and maybe prompts you to learn more about these holy women- and more.
SHOW NOTES
BIO: Holly Mohr
Holly Mohr is the Director for Parish Faith and Family Formation for the Diocese of Pittsburgh. Previously she served as Director of Religious Education for Mary, Queen of Peace Parish (St. Adalbert and St. Mary of the Mount Churches) in Pittsburgh, PA. She finds inspiration in Montessori pedagogy, peace and justice movements, reading and yoga.
Book Recommendations by Holly
Medieval Writings on Female Spirituality, ed by Elizabeth Spearing
Four Women Doctors of the Church, by Mary T. Malone
Women and Christianity, Vols. 1 and 2, by Mary T. Malone
Dorothy Day: Selected Writings, by Robert Ellsberg
Dorothy Day: The World Will Be Saved By Beauty, by Kate Hennessy
Primary texts:
Scivias, by Hildegard of Bingen
Revelations of Divine Love, by Julian of Norwich
All content of this podcast is property of the National Association of Pastoral Musicians or its content suppliers and is protected by United States and international copyright laws. For information about the podcast and its use, please contact us.
Today we speak with Irish composer Dana Scallon (known professionally as DANA) about the life of Saint Brigid, patroness of Ireland. Dana was inspired to write a hymn reflecting the life of Saint Brigid, celebrating the 1500th anniversary of the saint’s death, and she was gracious enough to sit down and share her inspiration for the piece today. Dana joins us today from her home in Ireland.
For more information about St. Brigid and St. Brigid's Song, check out the show notes of this episode at ministrymonday.org.
SHOW NOTES
For more information about Saint Brigid’s Song, visit:
National Catholic Register: ‘St. Brigid’s Song’ Debuts to Mark 1,500th Anniversary of Irish Saint’s Death
All content of this podcast is property of the National Association of Pastoral Musicians or its content suppliers and is protected by United States and international copyright laws. For information about the podcast and its use, please contact us.
We’re in the small window between the Christmas and Lenten seasons, which means it’s time to plan. Lenten music, Triduum music, and Easter music are in its final stages of planning. How can we stretch our dollars in our music ministry budget to add new variety, new depth, into our chosen music?
Today we feature an episode from 4 years ago that explores the music available to us in the public domain. Public domain music can be somewhat work-intensive, as it’s not regulated in the same way as a published piece, but the efforts to sift through the selections can repay you in spades. This free music has lovely arrangements to embrace the liturgical seasons in renewed ways, all for free.
NPM is hitting the road this summer for 2-day events across the United States! Today we're sitting down with Executive Director Jennifer Kluge to unpack these series of events, titled "NPM On the Road." What can we expect out of these events? Who should attend them? Where can we stay? These questions - and many more - are answered in this jam-packed episode.
Today on Ministry Monday we return from our holiday break! Our first episode of 2025 features Steven Warner the founder and director emeritus of the Notre Dame Folk Choir, as well as founder of the Newman Vocare Ensemble. Like many pastoral musicians, the Holy Spirit clearly is working through Steve and his decades-long work in music and ministry. Steve is no stranger to the podcast: we spoke of his connection to Saint John Henry Newman while he taught at the Newman Centre for Faith and Reason in Dublin, and we also discussed the Catholic Church in Ireland on another episode. Today’s episode focuses on his most recent project, titled “The Contemplative Classroom.” If you know Steve’s music you know that many of his compositions are ostinato refrains within an accessible singing range for most singers. Steve has taken this idea and begun to make a curriculum for classrooms that cultivate healthy singing, mindfulness, and spirituality in a way that, I dare say, may not have ever been created quite like this. It’s a great start for this Catholic Schools week, and a great way to begin our podcast for the year.
This week we feature part two of our conversation with Dr. Benjamin Cornelius-Bates, Professor of Musicianship at Duquesne University. Last week Dr. Cornelius-Bates shared some basic tips on how to improvise on traditional and contemporary Advent hymn tunes this Advent and Christmas season. If you haven’t listened to it, we strongly encourage you to! This week we pick up where we left off and see how we can develop his improvisation tips into more complex ways of sparking creativity in the liturgy.
On our 250th episode of Ministry Monday we offer a replay from the podcast's archives on improvisation. In the midst of many Advent and Christmas preparations, I’ll admit that solid improvisatory skills are an excellent tool to have in my arsenal. Today Dr. Benjamin Cornelius-Bates - a professor of musicianship at Duquesne University - shares tips on how to improvise on traditional and contemporary Advent hymn tunes this Advent and Christmas season. Ben’s tips are practical for well beyond the Advent season, but I hope that they spark some creativity during a trying time like Advent for the pastoral musician.
*This episode of Ministry Monday is brought to you by Ministry Scheduler Pro. Take the pain out of church volunteer scheduling with powerful, easy-to-use software designed especially for ministry scheduling. Start your free trial today at MinistrySchedulerPro.com.*
This week on Ministry Monday we are excited to speak to leadership from the NPM Cincinnati, Ohio Chapter. The Cincinnati Chapter is NPM's 2024 Chapter of the Year. Today they share the challenges of the chapter and how they have embraced the power of local programming to cultivate community and recruit members.
Watch the Episode (YouTube) SHOW NOTES
About the Cincinnati, Ohio NPM Chapter
The Cincinnati, Ohio NPM chapter serves pastoral ministers across the Ohio and Kentucky region. They offer numerous opportunities for prayer, music, formation, networking, and camaraderie within the calendar year. Additionally, they serve the region with assisting with substitute requests, an extensive mailing list, assisting in a fundraising concert annually, and more.
For more information visit https://www.npmcincinnati.org.
***All content of this podcast is property of the National Association of Pastoral Musicians or its content suppliers and is protected by United States and international copyright laws. For information about the podcast and its use, please contact us.***
This episode of Ministry Monday is brought to you by Ministry Scheduler Pro. Take the pain out of church volunteer scheduling with powerful, easy-to-use software designed especially for ministry scheduling. Start your free trial today at MinistrySchedulerPro.com.
Part of the cultural fabric of our parish life are the songs we sing. We, as pastoral musicians, are highly aware of this fact. There are so many considerations we make when choosing the repertoire for our parish: instrumental, scriptural, melodic….but what about cultural? How much does our music adequately represent the varied, complex, beautiful human existences that make up the Church? Do we really consider the representation we provide in our music?
That is where our conversation starts today. I am pleased to introduce M Roger Holland as my guest for this episode. Roger is a Teaching Assistant Professor in Music and Religion and Director of The Spirituals Project at the Lamont School of Music, University of Denver. In this episode, Roger shares his reflections on the need for representation of all races, musical and cultural styles in what we do in music ministry.
Today we speak with Laura Huval, a Grammy-nominated recording artist, Catholic speaker, author, composer, and pastoral musician. Laura recently released a sung setting of the rosary, which was premiered on October 7, the feast of Our Lady of the Rosary. I had the chance to reflect on her inspiration to write a sung version of the rosary, the differences between each decade, and how to access it (for free) today.
Today on the podcast we speak to organist and composer Rebecca te Velde about the power a simple hymn can hold in any denomination's church service. Rebecca is the co-editor of the book series, "Oxford Hymn Settings for Organists," as well as the author and editor of Oxford's "Hymn Miniatures" series. The impact a hymn tune can have on the continuity of a service is large, and Rebecca helps us to re-imagine how we, as pastoral musicians, can use those hymn tunes to amplify the scriptural message - and the message of the overall season.
This week on Ministry Monday we revisit one of our most listened to episodes: a conversation with theologian and liturgical composer, Tony Alonso, about his work, "Caminemos con Jesús." "Caminemos con Jesús” is a collection of liturgical music that honors the Cuban musical heritage not often seen in its own right, liturgically, in the United States. In this episode you’ll learn the inspiration behind “Caminemos con Jesús”, as well as the people, effort and heart from so many to make this project authentic, vibrant and full of the Spirit. It is one of many great ways to celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month as well!
We’re back! Ministry Monday returns after a summer haitus with new episodes! We’ve prepared a fall season of great episodes with topics on, of course, music, ministry, and liturgy. This week Dr. Dan Girardot (Associate Director of the Office of Worship of the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston) discusses the practical, prayerful, and other musical considerations for cantors ministering in larger-than-normal Masses. Whether it's Christmas Eve, a large funeral or wedding, or a Confirmation Mass, Dan reflects on the changes cantors can anticipate and best serve the liturgy (and its faithful) at hand.
This past week we celebrated the 2-year anniversary of Pope Francis's Apostolic Letter on the Liturgy, Desiderio Desideravi. This document is still a guiding force in our Church today; for this reason, we offer 2021 Jubilate Deo award winner Fr. John Baldovin's reflections as a wonderful foundation of learning. We also encourage you to attend the Breakout session, "Desiderio Desideravi and Discernment: Revealing Pope Francis’s Liturgical Insights," at the 2024 Convention this summer.
Today we have the pleasure of speaking to Kathleen Pluth, whose hymn text, "Let the Earth Acclaim Christ Jesus," was chosen as the official hymn for the 2024 National Eucharistic Congress, taking place in just a few weeks in Indianapolis, Indiana. Today we speak of the inspiration Kathleen has found to author hymn texts, and how she was inspired to write the award-winning text.
In the last episode of Ministry Monday we spoke to Fr. Joe Laramie, a Jesuit priest, about the Liturgy of the Hours. This week we continue the conversation with Michael Silhavy, Senior Project Editor for GIA Publications, Inc., as we explore the Divine Office Hymnal: what was the genesis of its creation? What is included in the hymnal? What is the format and structure? Can it be used for prayer outside of the Liturgy of the Hours? Michael addresses all of these questions and much more.
Today we speak to Fr. Joe Laramie, a Jesuit priest who currently lives in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Fr. Joe is also the National Director of the Pope's Prayer Network, a 175-year-old spiritual mission uniting hearts to the Heart of Jesus in the heart of the Church. Additionally he is a Eucharistic Preacher for the National Eucharistic Revival. Fr. Joe recently penned an article for America Magazine titled: "Praying the Liturgy of the Hours is worth it—even if you do it badly". We discuss what he means by that title, and how we, as followers (and oftentimes laypeople), can begin to pray the Liturgy Hours on a regular basis.
Today we chat with Kathleen M. Basi (Kate, for short) and Jaime Cortez about the Liturgical Composers Forum's New Music Review taking place this summer at the NPM convention. We discuss the basics of the New Music Review, what to expect regarding the submission process, and more. The deadline to submit any compositions for the New Music Review is June 1. Tune in and learn more today! Not ready to submit? This episode gives great tips for composers and shares how you can sit in on the New Music Review yourself.
Holy week is coming, and with it comes a level of personal commitment that may exceed the normal weekend liturgical life: schedules are rearranged, extra music is learned to support the sacred days, and our bodies- especially our voices- have extra pressure put upon ourselves. Not only that, this season has seen a lot of sickness circulating, especially colds and upper respiratory infections.
For these reasons, we thought it would be a perfect opportunity to revisit an episode from 2021 featuring Lynn Eustis on vocal health.
Today we listen to an episode of Ministry Monday from 2020 that celebrates the role women play in music ministry today. We hear the stories of Nancy Douglass and Janèt Sullivan-Whitaker, both active, longtime composers and pastoral musicians. It is a great way to start our celebration of Women's History Month.
At the beginning of each year we look back at the episodes that made Ministry Monday in the last 12 months. We had several popular episodes in 2023, but one of them stood out from the rest. It featured a story of a father-daughter duo who both serve in music ministry in their respective parishes. In fact, Daniel Ladner - the father in our wonderful story - has served in music ministry for 72 years- at the same church!
I can say from a personal note that this episode was one of my favorites to record. Hearing Daniel and Beth’s stories, both together and separately, was so inspiring. It reminds me of the lives that light up our parish music ministry, across the country, and the gift that I have to share them with you on the podcast.
This week we speak to the creators of the "Meet Father Rivers" podcast: Emily Strand and Eric Styles. Emily and Eric share the stories of how their lives have been impacted by Fr. Rivers, which led them to create a podcast honoring the many ways the Holy Spirit flow through his life to others. For more information on this episode, visit ministrymonday.org. For more information on the Meet Father Rivers podcast, visit www.meetfatherrivers.libsyn.com.
I hope you had a lovely holiday season thus far, and are well-recovered after the immense amount of effort and time you contributed to Christmas season celebrations in our universal Church today. I’m happy to share this first episode of 2024 with you, listeners! January so often comes with New Year’s resolutions, which are oftentimes out of vogue for making. But what if we, as sacred musicians, made a personal continuing education resolution for 2024?
This week on Ministry Monday we speak to Vince Carr from the American Guild of Organists. Vince details the AGO certification program, specifically in regards to the two, dual certificate opportunities available to NPM members: the Service Playing Certification (SPC) and Colleague exam (CAGO).
This week on Ministry Monday we are excited to speak to leadership from the NPM Saginaw Chapter. The Saginaw Chapter is NPM's 2023 Chapter of the Year. Today they share the chapter's origins, some of the chapter's most-loved programming, and some of the reasons they find inspiration and motivation through NPM, both locally and nationally.
Today on Ministry Monday we are thrilled to offer an episode from Meet Father Rivers, a podcast celebrating the life and legacy of Father Clarence Joseph Rivers. Father Rivers - a little-known but essential figure in American Catholic history - was a composer of liturgical music as well as an author on music and spirituality.
Today we hear from the hosts of Meet Father Rivers, Emily Strand and Eric Styles. They interview pianist, pastoral musician, liturgist, workshop presenter and composer Mr. Ronald (Rawn) Harbor. Rawn met Fr. Rivers in 1973 and became his primary accompanist and eventually a liturgist in his own right under Fr. Clarence’s careful mentorship. Rawn discusses his own approaches to composition and even shares a recording of a psalm arrangement that he’s particularly proud of: Psalm 63 “My Soul is Thirsting,” on this special, most musical episode of Meet Father Rivers to date.
This week's episode of Ministry Monday features composer and NPM member Luke Rosen. Luke shares his reflections on the many things a pastoral musician can consider as they compose music, whether it's for a parish music ministry or just for personal enjoyment.
Today we go to the Ministry Monday archives and re-discover one of the most popular episodes. We speak to Brother John Glasenapp, a Benedictine monk of Saint Meinrad Archabbey in southern Indiana, where he currently serves as the Director of the newly-formed Saint Meinrad Institute for Sacred Music.
Today we speak to Irish Catholic singer DANA. Her story begins in Northern Ireland, representing Ireland in the world-famous Eurovision contest. After winning this prestigious competition, her career carried her through both pop music and Catholic music, listening to the Lord's voice throughout each step. Her story is a decades-long testament to her spirituality and openness, and the music she has created to guide and inspire so many others.
Ministry Monday is happy to offer a 2-part series on Lessons and Carols! Today's episode features NPM member Timothy Lewicki, Director of Music at All Saints Catholic Church in Manassas, Virginia. Timothy shares his best practices for Lessons and Carols at his parish and provides some takeaways for recruitment, engagement, and musicality, whether it's your parish's tenth Lessons and Carols or your first time offering the service. It's a great conversation to round out our discussion on Lessons and Carols.
Ministry Monday is happy to offer a 2-part series on Lessons and Carols!
Our first part of the series features Jennifer Runge, NPM member and Director of Sacred Music at Parish of the Holy Eucharist (Diocese of Portland, Maine). On this episode, Jennifer shares her best practices and suggestions on how to offer Lessons and Carols, both musically and considering the needs of a merged/clustered parish.
Choir season is quickly approaching. We know that you’re planning which choir anthems to use, the rehearsal schedule and the plans for each rehearsal, but in this episode, we encourage you to pause and think about the needs of a choir a little bit differently this fall.
Today’s guest is Steven C. Warner. Steven Warner is the founder of the Notre Dame Folk Choir and, until recently, worked for the Notre Dame Newman Center for Faith and Reason in Dublin, Ireland. One of Steve’s many gifts lies in his ability to foster true inclusion and listening in his ensembles. Today we focus on the special qualities that elevate ensembleship within a choir, most of which are not actually music.
I’m happy to be back after a brief summer hiatus from Ministry Monday. It was great to meet many of you at the convention, both in person and virtually!
And now we’re back. Today on Ministry Monday we speak to Daniel Ladner and Beth Shaver, two pastoral musicians, NPM members, and father and daughter. While both have served in music ministry for decades, Daniel himself has served in music ministry for 72 years- at the same church! Today we get the chance to hear both Beth and Dan’s stories in music ministry, and the impact NPM has had in their lives.
We are ramping up our summer schedules here in the Ministry Monday studio! This means plenty of preparation for our summer Ordinary Time liturgies, planning our summer formation opportunities, and of course, carving out some time to enjoy the summer sunshine as well.
We found ourselves gravitating to an episode from the Ministry Monday archives, which was also a reflection from the 2021 National Convention by Kate Basi. Her Key Change presentation, named, “How to Pray While I’m Working,” reflects on the nuances we as pastoral ministers experience while participating in the Mass. I myself have found that I experience the Mass differently when I’m ministering versus when I (rarely) simply sit in the pew. How can we set our work mindset aside, or at least, pray alongside that mindset?
I’d like to mention that after this episode, Ministry Monday will be taking a short break as we prepare for both the in person and virtual NPM conventions. We will return with new episodes on July 31. In the meantime, if you’re participating in either the in person NPM convention in Reno or the virtual convention online the week afterward, please reach out and say hello to me. I always love meeting fellow listeners of the podcast!
Today's episode of Ministry Monday celebrates Taizé in both the small village and the music it offers in contemplation and prayer. Today we speak to David Anderson, Editor-at-Large for GIA Publications and Director of Music and Liturgy at Ascension Catholic Church in Oak Park, Illinois.
David has visited Taizé, France, several times, and has led monthly Taizé services for years in his parish. He reflects about the depth and beauty of Taizé and how you can implement its music and spirituality in your parish.
There are so many ways to involve a parish community in its music ministry, and not all of them, of course, include singing. Haven’t we all heard the parishioner who says, “I can’t join the music ministry - I can’t sing!” Luckily for us, music ministry today can include instrumental assistance, including a handbell choir.
In many instances, handbell choirs were the only choirs allowed in a parish setting during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic. It is a choir setting that can be accomplished without projecting the human voice. It can also be done with plenty of social distancing, if space allows. And more than anything, it provides the community of a choir without singing- a perfect option for those who want to use their musical gifts without singing.
Handbell choirs are a great option in a music ministry program, but some music ministers may not know where to start: how can I afford handbells? Who do I purchase them from? How do I teach (and direct) a handbell choir? These questions and many more are addressed in my conversation today.
Donna Kinsey has served for over 50 years as the pastoral musician for St. Francis De Sales Parish. She has taught music for public and Catholic schools in both Morgantown, West Virginia and Pennsylvania. She is also a handbell clinician and has spearheaded the National Catholic Handbell Festivals with the National Association of Pastoral Musicians.
This episode is truly a primer on starting a handbell choir. Not only that, Donna has provided a handout in the “show notes” of this episode for additional tips. If you’ve ever considered starting a handbell choir, this is the episode for you.
Today we speak to Jose Gallardo, Ariel Mayormita, and Maria Nieva, members of the NPM Asian Pacific community. They share their devotional practices to the Blessed Virgin Mary and how they are inextricably woven into Filipino culture. We also speak about the importance of Saint Pedro Calungsod and his importance in Filipino spirituality as well. We encourage you to check out the show notes of this episode, as well as the video version of this episode, at ministrymonday.org.
Today’s episode explores the world of pipe organ repertoire. I so often hear discussions of high-level performance pieces fit for excellent organ concerts, but so often we may not take the time to discuss an organ repertoire that’s manageable and attainable for all levels of skill, and on a pastoral musician’s available time frame for learning. Organists who may have started as pianists and are learning how to play organ, or maybe organists who are, quite frankly, overcommitted to other tasks, can find beautiful, accessible organ music that supports the Mass each week.
That is the starting point from which I begin my conversation today. Today I speak with Joel Kumro, the Choirmaster and Organist at Saint Benedict Catholic Church in Richmond, VA. Joel is also director of his parish’s concert series and is the instructor of Liturgical Music at Saint Benedict Catholic School. Joel, originally a trained classical singer, shares how he developed a regularly-rotating repertoire of organ music as he learned “the king of instruments” and how he’s come to use it well today.
Subscribe to Ministry Monday on Spotify Subscribe to ministry monday on itunes This episode of Ministry Monday is brought to you by Ministry Scheduler Pro. Take the pain out of volunteer scheduling with powerful, easy-to-use software designed especially for scheduling liturgical ministries. Get started with a free trial at MinistrySchedulerPro.com.
Happy Easter! We hope your Holy Week and Easter Sunday celebrations were filled with music, prayer and joy at the Resurrection of our Lord. We know this episode comes to you on Easter Monday, a day where pastoral musicians are hopefully resting after Holy Week. We hope that this episode from the Ministry Monday archives allows you to strike while the iron is hot, whether that is today or later on in the Octave of Easter.
One of the best practices I learned from a fellow pastoral minister was to take the time to write down what went well - and what didn’t - almost immediately after a momentous liturgy took place. For events like Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and Triduum, it helped me to refine the following year’s preparations and made my work more efficient. If I needed an extra song at the washing of the feet on Holy Thursday, for example, I knew to add another one just in case for next year. Truthfully, I also wrote down what didn’t work, and earmarked that for next year.
And so we listen into the episode. You’ll hear former Ministry Monday host Matt Reichert interview Mike about this topic, with the hopes that it helps you to pause, regroup, and prepare for next year.
SHOW NOTES
This episode was taken from Episode #070, broadcast on August 12, 2019.
You can download the three resources mentioned in the conversation using the links below.
NOTE: These were created by Mike Novak and are his intellectual property. The files are included here for your reference and your professional use. Please ensure that you properly credit the source of these resources.
Handout 1: Overview of the Parish Liturgy Assessment Process
Handout 2: Liturgy Assessment Tool
Handout 3: Sample Assessment Report
The recordings of "They'll Know We Are Christians" was produced by World Library Publications. "Give Us Peace" was produced by GIA Publications.
All content of this podcast is property of the National Association of Pastoral Musicians or its content suppliers and is protected by United States and international copyright laws. For information about the podcast and its use, please contact us.
The marriage of melody to text is the essence of hymnody at its core. Both play a critical part in a hymn’s efficacy, both in conveying a message and encouraging a full participation by the worshipping assembly singing it. Today we focus on the text of a hymn: what is the genesis of a hymn text? How important is the relationship to text and a common hymn tune? What are some of the things we, as composers, or we as pastoral ministers need to listen for? Alan Hommerding shares his reflections on text-writing and the power of words we can utilize by simply singing a hymn.
Today on the podcast we revisit the most-listened-to episode of 2022, which was also part 1 of Ministry Monday’s Exsultet series. We speak to Fr. Paul Turner about the historical context of the Exsultet, the sacred chant sung at the start of the Easter Vigil. The Exsultet is such a distinct moment in the Triduum journey: covered in darkness, punctuated by candlelight, the Exsultet is a 9-minute chant prefacing what is about to happen in the Easter Vigil liturgy: Christ, returning "from death's domain", grants us all eternal life through His resurrection. It is to begin. Today Fr. Paul Turner provides a historical, biblical and liturgical context from which to prepare the Exsultet this Lent. When was the Exsultet first sung? How did it find its place at the start of the Easter Vigil? Why are deacons so often chosen for the role? And what about the role of bees in the newest translation?
We encourage you to check out the other 2 parts of this Exsultet series, including an instructional video on how to best learn how to sing the Exsultet. These can be found on the NPM website, npm.org, as well as the show notes of this episode at MinistryMonday.org.
This episode is co-produced by Emily Strand. For more information about Emily and the podcasts she hosts, visit https://emilystrand.liturgyandlife.com/.
The music we choose speaks volumes about us as musicians, whether we realize it or not. It expresses our personal tastes in terms of style, genre, modality, and more. Not only that, our musical choices have the power to amplify the people behind them: from gender to culture, race to religion, the composers themselves are just as much a part of the music we choose as the notes on the page.
It’s a topic we’ve discussed on the podcast before, but during Black History Month, I return to one of my favorite interviews of the history of the podcast. I spoke with Dr. Mickey Thomas Terry, organist and lecturer currently based in the Washington, D.C. area. Among Dr. Terry’s varied accomplishments is the African-American Organ Music Anthology, which recently released its 10th volume through MorningStar Music Publishers. Dr. Terry’s professional work, both through the anthology and his research at large, seek to raise visibility for music by African-American classical composers and give them the opportunity to be played and celebrated today.
And so today I replay my discussion with Dr. Terry, sharing his thoughts on the struggles of African-American composers and what we can do today to honor their esteemed work.
Today Ministry Monday host Amanda Bruce speaks to Marilyn Santos, Associate Director of the Secretariat of Evangelization and Catechesis at the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB). They discuss the National Eucharistic Revival Musical Competition and the opportunity to compose the music that will be used at the 2024 Eucharistic Congress and across the country, sharing the love of the Eucharist. For more information, visit https://www.eucharisticcongress.org/musicalcompetition. The audio version of this episode as well as the show notes can be found at ministrymonday.org.
This is our first new episode back for the podcast in quite some time! The podcast was on a brief hiatus as I enjoyed the first weeks of parenthood. I was blessed to welcome a son this past fall, but I’ll admit to you listeners that his arrival into the world did not come as planned. He came seven weeks early and had to be in the NICU for a month in order to facilitate more growth. As I made my maternity leave schedule – including the list of wonderful episodes I was going to record for the podcast – I didn’t anticipate such an early delivery! And so I am thankful for your understanding for this short break of episodes as I brought baby home and found a new level of sleepiness – and joy – in my life.
Our first episode of 2023 starts with a question that I believe is truly pastoral. Our work in ministry is so unique because we seek to bring the highest music as praise to God, while making sure that all who is called to share these gifts uses them well, with all levels of ability. Maybe it’s a choir member who can’t read music or someone who struggles with the aging voice, or it’s a young guitarist who is still learning but is so eager to participate, our role is to guide those who are offered to us by Christ for praise, using the gifts that were given to them.
Today I speak to flutist, composer, writer, and mother Kathleen M. Basi, or Kate for short. Kate shares the ways that the COVID-19 pandemic brought an opportunity for her family to minister together in her parish, and how important it is for all people of God to be recognized, valued, and included in our ministerial efforts.
Today we replay an episode from last summer, featuring Katie Deaver from ONE LICENSE. Katie breaks down the many ways that we can use copyright licensing to our advantage, and helps us realize that reporting our usage supports the composers who wrote the beautiful music we use every week. In more ways than one, copyright licensing is more important than ever.
Subscribe to Ministry Monday on Spotify
Subscribe to ministry monday on itunes
This episode discusses topics of infertility, miscarriage and child loss, and could be triggering for some.
Today’s episode faces the indescribable pain of miscarriage, stillbirth and the loss of a child. October 15 is Pregnancy and Infant Loss Remembrance Day, and offers a chance for parishes to minister to families who carry a grief that no one ever should. We speak to Leeanne Schweiger, a woman who has started the St. Gerard Ministry in her parish.
This episode discusses the St. Gerard ministry- with St. Gerard being the patron saint of expectant mothers, mothers, women in childbirth and unborn children - and celebrating a Mass to honor those who long to be parents but have experienced a tragic loss that no one should endure.
For more information about Pregnancy & Infant Loss Awareness Day as well as resources that could aid in creating a service to support those suffering in your parish, check out the show notes of this episode.
SHOW NOTES
Bio: Leeanne Schweiger
Leeanne Schweiger is a member of Regina Coeli Parish (Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania). She has helped to create and lead the St. Gerard Ministry, an organization that ministers to women and men who have lost children through miscarriage, stillbirth or early infancy, and to couples who are struggling with infertility.
For more information about Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Day, visit the following links:
Star Legacy Foundation: Awareness Month
Pregnancy After Loss Support
Baby Loss Awareness Week
Ministry Monday Episode #052: Of Womb and Tomb (with Kate Williams)
Of Womb and Tomb: Prayer in Time of Infertility, Miscarriage, and Stillbirth (Ed. Kate Williams, GIA Publications G-9816)
All content of this podcast is property of the National Association of Pastoral Musicians or its content suppliers and is protected by United States and international copyright laws. For information about the podcast and its use, please contact us.
This episode of Ministry Monday is sponsored by GIA Publications. Rooted in tradition with a clear focus on the future, Gather—Fourth Edition from GIA Publications features a diverse roster of composers and a wide breadth of musical styles in a worthy hardbound hymnal. Gather—Fourth Edition. Learn more at giamusic.com/hymnals.
September is Deaf Awareness Month in the United States. To a Deaf person, being deaf is not a disability! In fact, it is a subculture of its own that provides new, beautiful ways for worship in our Church. Today we speak to Karen Shepherd, director of the Deaf choir in the Diocese of Pittsburgh for almost 20 years. Karen explores what is a deaf choir, as well as the subtleties of an “interpreted” Mass versus a “signed” Mass. Karen also spearheaded the installation of a “hearing loop” system in her church and shares what we need to know, as pastoral musicians, should we ever want to install one in our own churches.
Choir season is quickly approaching. We know that you’re planning which choir anthems to use, the rehearsal schedule and the plans for each rehearsal, but in this episode, we encourage you to pause and think about the needs of a choir a little bit differently this fall.
Steven Warner is the founder of the Notre Dame Folk Choir and, until recently, worked for the Notre Dame Newman Center for Faith and Reason in Dublin, Ireland. One of Steve’s many gifts lies in his ability to foster true inclusion and listening in his ensembles. Today we focus on the special qualities that elevate ensembleship within a choir, most of which are not actually music.
This episode of Ministry Monday is sponsored by GIA Publications. Rooted in tradition with a clear focus on the future, Gather—Fourth Edition from GIA Publicationsfeatures a diverse roster of composers and a wide breadth of musical styles in a worthy hardbound hymnal. Gather—Fourth Edition. Learn more at giamusic.com/hymnals.
Subscribe to Ministry Monday on Spotify
Subscribe to ministry monday on itunes
Today we speak to Timothy Johnston about the General Instruction of the Roman Missal, or the GIRM: what are its origins? How can we navigate this document for our ministries, both as a tool for learning and a liturgical reference?
Stay tuned to NPM’s future programming for more educational support on how to best use the liturgical documents to guide our efforts in pastoral ministry.
For more information about The Essentials of Catholic Liturgy, mentioned in this episode, visit teocl.org.
All content of this podcast is property of the National Association of Pastoral Musicians or its content suppliers and is protected by United States and international copyright laws. For information about the podcast and its use, please contact us.
Many of our listeners are pastoral ministers, whether that’s in music, liturgy, religious education, or other facets of the parish life at large. But today’s focus is religious education. The early days of our faith formation are so critical, and are an absolutely vital part of our Church, its legacy and its future, all at once. Not unlike the needs of other ministries, religious education continues to change and evolve in hopes to meet youth where they are and gain a sense of belonging and presence as they grow into their baptized roles as disciples.
Today we speak to Holly Mohr, Director of Religious Education at Mary, Queen of Peace Parish. Holly shares the way that religious education has transformed from a solely CCD mentality into the call to encounter Christ as the mission for faith formation. We also speak at length about Catechesis of the Good Shepherd, a Montessori-based religious education model growing in the United States today.
Today's Ministry Monday episode features NPM's 2021 Jubilate Deo Award recipient, John Baldovin, SJ. Fr. Baldovin reflects on Pope Francis's new Apostolic Letter on the Liturgy, "Desiderio Desideravi". Fr. Baldovin’s reflections focus on four main points, of which you will hear identified through interlude music:
Was this document expected?
What is the message of Desiderio Desideravi?
Liturgy and Theology of the Church
What does it mean for regular Catholics?
In addition, we’d like to thank the Boston College School of Theology and Ministry for allowing NPM to re-broadcast this reflection.
Today Ministry Monday replays part two its focus on making the most out of the public domain. With music-buying budgets being squeezed tighter than ever, making the public domain work for you can be a huge asset as you spend the summer planning for fall repertoire.
Before we begin, we want to hear some feedback from you, our listeners. This summer Ministry Monday will be focusing on parish mergers and its impact on music ministry. We want to know: are you working at a parish that has recently merged? Or are you about to merge with another parish? Is your diocese undergoing a consolidation?
What were some of the things that best unified your parishes' music programs? Or what advice would you wish you had when you were consolidating a music program?
Email us with your response at ministrymonday@npm.org. As we prepare episodes on this topic, we want to hear from you!
For the next two weeks, Ministry Monday replays two of its most popular episodes, both of which focus on making the most out of the public domain. With music-buying budgets being squeezed tighter than ever, it’s time to get creative! Making the public domain work for you can be a huge asset as you spend the summer planning for fall repertoire.
Today's Ministry Monday episode explores the changes to the Rite of Baptism, which went into effect in spring 2020, during the initial shock of the COVID-19 pandemic. Michael Ruzicki is the Director of Sacred Music and Liturgy at St. Mary of the Lake and Our Lady of Lourdes Parish in Chicago and is also the Training and Events Manager at Liturgy Training Publications.
This episode of Ministry Monday is sponsored by the Liturgical Music Institute, taking place July 24-29, 2022 at the Seminary of the Immaculate Conception, 40 miles east of New York City. This 5-day immersive experience combines prayer, learning, liturgy, and music for a retreat-like experience for all pastoral musicians to experience. For more information about the Liturgical Music Institute, visit npm.org.
Subscribe to Ministry Monday on Spotify
Subscribe to ministry monday on itunes
The Faces of Mary continues this week with two stories of Our Lady, both from different cultures but similar in devotion. We start with Dr. Gerardo Ramos, or as many call him, Dr. G. Dr. G has obtained his Master’s and Doctorate program at the University of Texas- Austin, both in music. He is currently the Director of Spanish Language Publications for ILP. Today Dr. G shares his experiences celebrating and honoring Our Lady of Guadalupe, both in Mexico, North America and the Americas as a whole.
Our second and last interview for today’s episode comes from Christopher Ferraro. Chris is also the chair of the Pastoral Liturgy Interest Section on the NPM National Council. Chris is the Director of Music at Our Lady of Perpetual Help in Lindenhurst, New York. You can probably guess why I’ve asked him to speak today. As his parish’s namesake, Chris celebrates large liturgies and celebrations honoring Our Lady of Perpetual Help each year. He was kind enough to share some insights and reflections with us today.
SHOW NOTES
This episode originally aired on May 25, 2020. Click here for the original episode.
All content of this podcast is property of the National Association of Pastoral Musicians or its content suppliers and is protected by United States and international copyright laws. For information about the podcast and its use, please contact us.
NPM is blessed with a rich community of Asian/Pacific American pastoral musicians that support their parishes and the NPM community at large. Ariel Mayormita, Jose Gallardo and Maria Nieva are all pastoral musicians across the United States. They each demonstrate hospitality, kindness, and a deep Catholic faith in their lives. Today's episode highlights the deep faith and profound hospitality found in AAPI culture, from 500 years of Christianity in the Philippines to today. Our presenters to reflect on this topic today are Ariel Mayormita, Jose Gallardo and Maria Nieva, joining us from New Jersey, Texas, and the Philippines!
This is our 200th episode of the podcast! Today’s episode includes colleagues and clergy, leaders and laypersons, fellow pastoral ministers who are actively supporting the Church today. As this podcast is produced by the National Association of Pastoral Musicians, I’ll admit that some of our topics are more NPM-centric today, but are no less centered on discussing the needs of pastoral music. In fact, I think this episode reveals some themes that we encounter today. Themes of the needs that exist; themes of the joys we find in our ministry; and themes of the need for associations like NPM to exist.
Featuring guests Jennifer Kluge, Dr. Gordon Truitt, J Michael Joncas, Msgr. Rick Hilgartner, Fr. Roc O'Connor, Andrea Ramos, Maria Nieva and Jose Gallardo.
Next week Ministry Monday will celebrate its 200th episode! As we prepare for that 200th episode, we look back at Ministry Monday's 100th episode. Released on April 19, 2020, the 100th episode was produced as we stepped newly into the pandemic. We were a month into a jarring Lenten and Easter season, with many of us not leading our parishes in music ministry in a “normal” way. Pastoral ministry had, in many ways, screeched to a halt, in the newest days of the pandemic. We celebrate the courage and faith we find in Episode #100, and look forward to celebrating Episode #200 with you next week!
Today’s episode focuses on an exploration of our Baptism. We may feel that our baptismal calling is fully expressed in pastoral ministry, and in many cases, it might. But what if the Holy Spirit has different plans for us? What if we feel our baptismal calling change? How can we reflect and truly listen to the calling of the Spirit?
Brother Louis Canter from the Diocese of Orlando, Florida, begins our conversation today. Brother E. Louis Canter, OEF serves as a Pastoral Assistant for two parishes in the Lakeland Florida area. In subsequent Ministry Monday episodes, Brother Louis has reflected on the role of lay leadership in today’s Church, and the spirituality of the saints and holiness among us. Today we speak about baptism and begin at a liturgy we all have experienced very recently: the Easter Vigil.
Ministry Monday has returned from its Holy Week and Easter break! We hope that your Triduum celebrations were prayerful and filled with song, prayer and the joy of the Resurrection. We also hope that you’ve found some rest after Holy Week as well!
Today we continue the topic of sequences. Fr. Michael Joncas began our examination of the Church’s current use of sequences before we journeyed through Holy Week, and today Fr. Roc O’Connor continues this conversation. Roc O’Connor, SJ has been a member the Society of Jesus for over fifty years. He served in pastoral settings for most of his ministerial life – parishes, college and universities, and Jesuit formation. He is a founding member of the St. Louis Jesuits, a group that has shaped pastoral music for all of us today and has earned worldwide recognition.
Roc helps us with a primer of sorts on the sequences for Easter Sunday, Pentecost, and Corpus Christi. This particular episode is very beneficial when viewed as a video episode. You can find it in the show notes of this episode, as well as on NPM’s youtube channel, youtube.com/NPMlivestream. If you can’t access the video version of this episode, keep in mind that Roc allows us to flow between the Latin text, the ICEL translation, and the Roman Missal translation freely, examining how they work together and help to bring forth the sacred in some of the holiest days in our Church calendar.
Today is the last episode Ministry Monday will be airing before a two-week Holy Week and Easter hiatus. We wanted to leave you with an episode that would provide a prayerful pause as you wrap up the last rehearsals, make the last binders, and write the last “thank you” notes to your Holy Week musicians. Today we begin a conversation focusing on the sequences and hear from Fr. J. Michael Joncas. What is the history of a sequence’s form? What terminology predates the sequences? How can we most effectively employ sequences in our parishes? It is a great episode from which to prepare the Sequence for Easter Sunday.
Today’s episode comes as a listener request, and a very appropriate one at that. Allow me to read a portion of an email I received from a listener:
Dear Ministry Monday, I hope this message finds you very well! I am writing to you today as I feel you are the perfect person to receive this idea. I wanted to suggest an inclusion of Dr. Lynn Eustis’s Ministry Monday presentation about voice care somewhere in the agenda.
The reason I am forwarding this request is due to the hiatus several choirs have been on after Christmas. The strain of Holy Week can be damaging if voices are not “in shape” to sing the repertoire.
While I am just a volunteer musician at the Basic NPM level who joined the organization last May, I believe this topic is relevant to all.
We couldn’t agree with you more. Today’s episode is directed to all vocalists serving in the Church today: choir members, cantors and choir directors alike. We’ve been using our voices differently in the past two years, and our conversation with Dr. Lynn Eustis is a great reminder to re-condition our voices with care. For more information on this topic, check out the April edition of Pastoral Music Magazine, NPM’s quarterly magazine published for its members. Pastoral Music Magazine is available to all Standard and Premium members of NPM. Not a member of NPM, or are you a Basic member who would like to receive it? Check out npm.org/membership to join or upgrade your membership. Pastoral Music Magazine alone is a great reason to become a Standard or Premium member of NPM today.
And now to the episode at hand!
Well, I want to thank everyone for listening to the last 3 weeks in our Exsultet mini-series. It has been very well-received, and it was equally a treat to produce the episodes. It’s clear to us at NPM that there is a definite desire to learn more about the liturgical prayers and nuances that we experience in our faith today. Stay tuned for more episodes focusing on music, ministry and, of course, liturgy.
During the month of March NPM celebrates the women that shape us and love us into being. Those who fight against the injustices of our society today. Women in religious life who are our spiritual guides. And those among us who lead and serve the Church in lay ministry. We are honored to celebrate you! And today we offer a replay episode that celebrates some of the strong women in our Church’s history. We hope this episode inspires you, and maybe prompts you to learn more about these holy women- and more.
This week Tony Alonso (composer and Director of Catholic Studies at Emory University) reflects on the cultural and linguistic needs in a bilingual community: What is the best solution for the Exsultet when a parish speaks both English and Spanish? What are some of the things we need to consider? How do we truly include all who worship in our Church?
Today begins our second episode focusing on the Exsultet. Last week we featured a conversation with Fr. Paul Turner about the historical context of this sacred chant. If you missed it, it can be found wherever you listen to podcasts and at ministrymonday.org. This week we speak to Nicholas Will, Director of Liturgical Music, Organist & Lecturer at Mount St. Mary's Seminary in Emmitsburg, Maryland.
This episode is unique in its truly didactic approach. As a result, it is perfect for the priest, deacon, cantor or other elected layperson who is preparing to sing this Exsultet this year. Nicholas takes us through learning the Exsultet, step by step, even if you don’t have a musical background.
This episode in particular is most beneficial in its video podcast version! We recommend watching it, especially if you are learning the Exsultet this Lenten season. The video version of this episode can be found on NPM’s YouTube channel, NPM livestream, and in the show notes of the episode at ministrymonday.org.
This week begins a 3-part series on the Exsultet. The Exsultet, the sacred chant sung at the start of the Easter Vigil, is such a distinct moment in the Triduum journey: covered in darkness, punctuated by candlelight, the Exsultet is a 9-minute chant prefacing what is about to happen in the Easter Vigil liturgy: Christ, returning "from death's domain", grants us all eternal life through His resurrection. It is to begin. Today Fr. Paul Turner provides a historical, biblical and liturgical context from which to prepare the Exsultet this Lent. When was the Exsultet first sung? How did it find its place at the start of the Easter Vigil? Why are deacons so often chosen for the role? And what about the role of bees in the newest translation? This episode comes with additional resources. We strongly encourage you to find them in the show notes at ministrymonday.org.
Today we feature a replay of an episode that was one of our most-watched and listened-to episodes in 2021. Today on the podcast I have the pleasure of speaking to Dr. Mickey Thomas Terry.
Dr. Terry is a lecturer at Howard University in Washington, D.C. and Dr. Terry has also taught on the faculty of Georgetown University in Washington, DC. Dr. Terry speaks about the presence - and, until recently, the absence - of classical organ music by Black composers, particularly among published works for organ.
Today on the podcast I have the pleasure of speaking to Dr. Mickey Thomas Terry. Dr. Terry is a lecturer at Howard University in Washington, D.C. and Dr. Terry has also taught on the faculty of Georgetown University in Washington, DC. He is also Director of Music at Epiphany Catholic Church in Georgetown. He is the recipient of the 2020-2021 Artist Fellowship awarded by the District of Columbia Commission on the Arts and Humanities. A current biographical sketch of Dr. Terry also appears in Who’s Who in America.
Dr. Terry is the editor of a critically-acclaimed multi-volume (currently 8 vols) African-American Organ Music Anthology published by MorningStar Music Publishers (St. Louis, Missouri).
I met Dr. Terry in 2011 in a masterclass as I played from the African-American Organ Music Anthology. He was kind enough to discuss the Organ Music Anthology, as well as the struggles of African-American Organ composers and African-American classical composers.
As we look toward the spring, I can’t help but stop and think about the upcoming season in pastoral music: Lent, Easter, and of course followed by, wedding season.
Now, prior to being a full-time staff member at NPM, I was the Director of Music at a church for 13 years that hosted 65-70 weddings per year. And during my time there, I met with every couple, helped them plan their music, and played for all of their ceremonies.
I’ve often heard a dreadful saying by pastoral musicians that “I’d rather play three funerals versus one wedding.” While this has always bothered me, I think the roots lie in a mutual misunderstanding of young couples being married, and the pastoral musicians who serve them. The beauty of the Sacrament of Marriage can often be eclipsed by the secular aesthetic that couples mostly worry about, from the flowers to the bridal party to, of course, the bride and groom’s ensembles. But just because a couple may not fully grasp the Sacrament does not mean that they cannot enter into a paradigm of catechesis prior to their wedding day. And in fact, I think we shortchange many couples by assuming they do not grasp a general understanding of the liturgy and how it will relate to their wedding. Why not take it as an opportunity to bridge that gap of understanding, even if only to help them more deeply understand their wedding?
Today on Ministry Monday we speak to Paul Radkowski, Director of Music at the Church of St. Edward the Confessor in Granville, Ohio. Paul discusses the ways that pastoral musicians can support couples as they prepare for the Sacrament of Marriage: how can they best plan their ceremony music? what if a loved one wants to sing in the wedding? What if the couple wants to include secular music in the wedding? Paul addresses these questions and more.
Today we are happy to share an episode of "Meet Father Rivers" on the podcast today. Author and musician Emily Strand examines the life, legacy and her own brief, personal encounter with a little-known but essential figure in American Catholic history: Black liturgist and composer Fr. Clarence Joseph Rivers.
In this episode of “Meet Father Rivers”, podcast host Emily Strand tells the story of Fr. Rivers’ early career and the efforts toward liturgical inculturation that eventually brought him fame. She talks to Dr. Jessie Thomas who was a child at St. Joseph school in Cincinnati when Fr. Rivers was a young priest in the late 1950s. Emily recounts an early incident of liturgical disobedience by Fr. Rivers, effectively protesting the exclusion of Black forms of music in Catholic worship.
We’d like to thank Emily for allowing us to replay this episode, and hope you will subscribe to Meet Father Rivers as well. Without further ado, let’s begin!
You voted and we listened! The most listened-to and voted-for episode was "A Historical Intervention on the Basis of Chant" with Fr. John Glasenapp. Brother John’s viewpoint on chant in the Church is deeply rooted in a full historical context, which is what we’re to discuss today. Why can chant be challenging to today’s pastoral musicians? What are the roots from which chant was created? What are the roots of chant in the Catholic Church? How did we get here?
Brother John joins me from the archabbey in Saint Meinrad, Indiana.
Today continues our series on continuing education. There are many music degrees available across the country at respected colleges, but what about music ministry-specific degrees? How can we combine the experience of a college education with high-level musical, theological and liturgical educations as well? Today on the podcast I discuss the unveiling of a brand-new program available at Duquesne University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The program, built for an undergraduate program, seeks to provide a realistic education for today’s music minister.
Today I sit down with Dr. Stephen Benham to discuss this brand new program. Dr. Benham is a professor of Music Education at Duquesne University and a sacred musician himself. He joins us today from his office in Pittsburgh.
Today continues our series on continuing education. Gail Hartin, chair of the Cantor Certificate Committee, talks with us about the benefits of achieving each level of the Cantor Certificate process. Why is it important? Why should a cantor commit to a Cantor Certificate? This is a great episode to send to your cantors who are considering working towards a certificate in 2022!
Before we begin our first episode of 2022, we want to take a moment and ask for your vote on the best of Ministry Monday episode in 2021. From Gregorian chant to live streaming, the Exsultet to the liturgical prayers, improvisation to the public domain and everything in between, it’s been a busy year for Ministry Monday. This year we produced 47 episodes of topics on music, ministry and liturgy, and we’d love to hear your feedback. What did you like the most in last year’s Ministry Monday programming?
Vote for your favorite 2021 topics and/or episodes from Ministry Monday here. Deadline to vote is January 24, 2022. We will feature the “best of” episode in Ministry Monday on January 31, 2022!
Well, I hope this episode finds you rested and at least partially recovered from the joy and stress of the Christmas celebrations! We find these weeks in Winter Ordinary Time to be those of restoration and recovery when it comes to pastoral music. It’s a moment of breath before we pivot and, yes, start to think of Lent. But let’s not begin that journey just yet! Today starts a month-long focus on continuing education opportunities. As we begin this new calendar year, it's important for us to take time for renewal, education and formation. It's at the center of who we are and what we do at NPM. This year we are committing to learning and formation opportunities, and invite you to join us!
The first opportunity of learning we’ll be featuring is The Essentials of Catholic Liturgy. Liturgy, Life and Discipleship, the third track of the Essentials of Catholic Liturgy, begins this month and is developed in partnership with NPM and LTP. These six weeks of courses emphasize the celebration of the Eucharist as our source and summit of Christian life, and will help pastoral ministers—musicians and liturgists, notably—discuss and break open how liturgy interacts with the modern world, evangelization, mystagogy, social justice, and spirituality.
And so I sat down with Timothy Johnston to dig deeper. Until very recently, Timothy served as an Editor and Liturgical Training Consultant for Liturgy Training Publications. Timothy joins us today from the Archdiocese of Washington, DC.
This week is the last week in our Advent series of episodes. We know that you have endured countless rehearsals, questions from your choir members about what time to show up for Midnight Mass, a few run-ins with sick volunteers, and maybe fighting a cold yourself. You’ve had concerts and prayer services, reconciliation services and extra staff meetings…the list goes on. This week’s episode is meant to give you a moment of reprieve before the big week ahead.
Today I speak to Laura Araujo (a-rah-hoe), a classically trained vocalist and founder of the Maps Institute, an organization dedicated to mindfulness and intention for all. Laura helps us ask, “how can we stop and find moments of rest amidst the chaos that lies ahead this week?” Allow me to give you a spoiler: Laura’s advice just takes minutes of your day, and can have a world of benefits.
The next episode in Ministry Monday’s Advent series features part two of my conversation with Dr. Benjamin Cornelius-Bates, Professor of Musicianship at Duquesne University. Last week Dr. Cornelius-Bates shared some basic tips on how to improvise on traditional and contemporary Advent hymn tunes this Advent and Christmas season. If you haven’t listened to it, I strongly encourage you to! This week we pick up where we left off and see how we can develop his improvisation tips into more complex ways of sparking creativity in the liturgy.
The next episode in Ministry Monday’s Advent series features a conversation with Dr. Benjamin Cornelius-Bates, Professor of Musicianship at Duquesne University. Dr. Cornelius-Bates shares tips on how to improvise on traditional and contemporary Advent hymn tunes this Advent and Christmas season. Ben’s tips are practical for well beyond the Advent season, but I hope that they spark some creativity during a trying time like Advent for the pastoral musician.
Ministry Monday will be celebrating the Advent season alongside you through the Advent Series of episodes. The next four weeks of episodes are designed to provide you, pastoral ministers, with added support during, quite frankly, one of the most stressful times of our year. Please also know that we are praying for you as we all journey through Advent and Christmas together!
Each week in the Advent series will be centered around the psalm for that Advent weekend, and will be read at the end of the episode for reflection.
The first episode in Ministry Monday’s Advent series features a conversation with Fr. Jan Michael Joncas. Fr. Joncas helps us explore the liturgical texts we will be hearing in the weeks to come. How can we hear them with a sense of newness? And how can we, as pastoral musicians, be renewed in a season of Advent preparation, so often fraught with extra responsibilities and stress? How can the wisdom of the Church and its prayers guide us?
Today we speak to John Angotti, composer and music director in the Nashville, Tennessee area. John's passion is truly fostering the youth of today, and it shows: this episode is a great framework for how to attract youth into a music program, and how to establish a foundation of prayerful, intentional music ministry. John is a fabulous, self-proclaimed “music missionary”, and this interview was just plain fun to record.
Today we offer a short reflection from Kathleen M. Basi on the nuances of praying while "working" in pastoral music. Similar to the topic we discussed with Every Sacred Sunday, pastoral musicians experience the liturgy in a different way than many others. Kathleen offers great tips and suggestions in this Key Change presentation, taken from NPM's 2021 National Convention.
Part of the cultural fabric of our parish life is the songs we sing. We, as pastoral musicians, are highly aware of this fact. There are so many considerations we make when choosing the repertoire for our parish: instrumental, scriptural, melodic….but what about cultural? How much does our music adequately represent the varied, complex, beautiful human existences that make up the Church? Do we really consider the representation we provide in our music?
That is where our conversation starts today. I am pleased to introduce M Roger Holland as my guest for this episode. Roger is a Teaching Assistant Professor in Music and Religion and Director of The Spirituals Project at the Lamont School of Music, University of Denver. In this episode, Roger shares his reflections on the need for representation of all races, musical and cultural styles in what we do in music ministry.
Today we in the Catholic faith celebrate All Saints Day, followed by All Souls’ Day tomorrow. I’ve always been impacted by the two celebrations being on consecutive days. It almost provides a “weekend”, if you will, for us pastoral musicians to sit with our communities in renewed ways. Calling upon the saints on All Saints Day seems so immense and powerful, to me, it almost felt intimidating. Saints have always been this powerful presence in my Catholic faith that I can only hope to aspire to. I visualize them with those golden translucent halos that they’re so often depicted with. They seem to have a holiness that I’ll never reach.
And then the next day we celebrate All Souls’ Day. All Souls’ Day was always a day in my community where we invited all of the loved ones of those who passed away in the last year, to join us for a night of community and prayer, i.e. All Souls’ Day Mass. It always had this sense of, a spiritual homecoming, if you will, as I saw the faces of so many from throughout the year. They were there to find solace, to find comfort, and to find hope in the resurrection as we all believe. The holiness in the church seem to envelop me each year.
The celebrations of All Saints and All Souls Day bring about conversations of holiness: holiness in those we believe to be saints in the faith, as well as the holiness we find among ourselves each day. How can we better recognize this holiness in others, and in ourselves? I called Brother Louis Canter from the Diocese of Lakeland, Florida to talk about this exact topic.
Two years ago Pope Francis canonized John Henry Newman, English theologian, scholar and poet. Saint Newman was instrumental in the founding of the Catholic University of Ireland in 1854, which, in time evolved into University College Dublin, today the largest university in Ireland.
I had the opportunity to interview Steven C. Warner, founder of the Notre Dame Folk Choir, who attended the canonization of St. Newman in Rome in 2019. This replay episode is a great one, highlighting the ways that John Henry Newman can still influence our Church today. Not only that, it’s a great episode to hear as we prepare for All Saints Day. Enjoy!
Let’s face it. Many pastoral musicians encounter the sacred Liturgy differently than a congregation member. We’re truly, deeply into the activities that facilitate prayer for others, especially with music. As we know, it’s a beautiful, humbling, blessed calling, but it does mean we can become distracted. Now, at this point, I’ll only speak for myself when I say that I’ve struggled to be truly present for the Liturgy, especially during the Liturgy of the Word. I’ve been so focused on the psalm- is my cantor ready, don’t forget to add an extra measure between the refrain and the verse so the cantor can catch her breath, did I ever tell the violinist that we’re adding that extra measure? And what is the second reader doing, coming up to the ambo already? The cantor is on her way over for the psalm! Will the presider help and gesture for the reader to sit? Wait a minute, is the presider’s mic still on?
You get the idea.
Today I had the gift of speaking with Kassie Manning. Kassie is the co-creator of Every Sacred Sunday, a Mass journal intended to help all Catholics absorb the readings and cultivate their own scripture study and prayer habit. Now, you might be saying, “Amanda, I already pray regularly. Why would I need this?” I will say that this Mass journal has truly changed my faith. A fellow pastoral musician recommended it to me after I saw it at her church when I played a funeral there. Every Sacred Sunday has allowed me to stay focused on weekends after playing the fifth liturgy of the weekend, hearing the fifth homily of the weekend.
Now, before we get into the interview, I want to say that this episode is not sponsored by Every Sacred Sunday! But it is a great opportunity to sit and reflect and say: how often do I take time for myself to sit, be still and listen to the Word of God, especially in the midst of me helping others to pray through music? How can I deepen my own prayer experience?
Today is the final week of a 4-week mini-series, focusing on The Singing Priest. Last week we heard from Fr. Michael Stumpf, pastor of Mary, Queen of Peace Parish in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Today we hear from a different Michael: Michael Olbash, the Director of Sacred Music at Saint John’s Seminary, Boston, MA, and Pope St. John XXIII National Seminary, Weston, MA.
It’s clear that Michael’s expertise lies well within the support, musical and liturgical education of clergy in the Church today. We discussed practical tips for the increasing confidence in singing for clergy, and how we can deepen that trust and relationship between clergy and music minister.
To close out this 4-part series on The Singing Priest, Michael discusses the need, post-pandemic, to address and heal the wounds for ministers and clergy in the last 18 months. How do we support each other, and as pastoral musicians, how do we support ourselves?
Today is week 3 of a 4-week mini-series, focusing on The Singing Priest. Last week we heard from Nicholas Will, a replay episode from January 2020 when he was the Director of Music for the North American Pontifical College in Rome. Today we hear from Fr. Michael Stumpf, Pastor of Mary, Queen of Peace Parish in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Fr. Stumpf speaks to us today about the relationship between clergy and music minister: how can it be strengthened, and what can it do for the liturgy? Fr. Michael also discusses the daunting task of learning the Exsultet for Easter Vigil. This is a great episode to forward to your pastor, deacon or other clergy team member.
Last week on Ministry Monday we started a mini-series focusing on The Singing Priest. Last week we heard from Fr. Ricky Manalo on the first episode that inspired this mini-series! This week we’re hearing one more replay episode on this topic. In January 2020 I spoke to Nicholas Will, who was the Director of Music for the North American Pontifical College in Rome. Nick has great experience with developing the singing voice of clergy, and that’s where our conversation takes us today. Enjoy!
We hear from so many of you in the NPM national office about the things you need most in your ministry. One of the most popular requests we receive involve the relationship between a pastoral musician, a clergy member and the music itself. For example, we get questions such as: “How do I encourage my priest to sing during the Mass?” and “What can I do to foster the relationship between pastoral music and my priest/deacon?”
Well, starting this week we are introducing a multi-episode series focusing on this exact topic. For the next several weeks, Ministry Monday is offering a series on The Singing Priest: how to encourage singing with clergy; providing resources for clergy to develop confidence in their singing for things like the Exsultet at Easter Vigil; and, of course, developing the relationship between us as pastoral musicians, and the clergy that lead and guide us all.
We’re starting the Singing Priest series with an episode from the Ministry Monday archives. It was the most popular episode of 2018 here on the podcast, and it’s a great place to start. This episode was produced and recorded by former Ministry Monday host Matt Reichert. I am pleased to bring you episode 25: The Singing Priest, featuring Ricky Manalo. Enjoy!
Today’s episode is more NPM-focused than a typical episode, but for all the right reasons: NPM’s annual Members’ Meeting is next Monday, September 20. The annual Members’ Meeting is NPM’s State of the Union, if you will, celebrating the wins of the association from the last 12 months, including celebrating NPM’s biggest awards: the Pastoral Musician of the Year Award and Jubilate Deo award.
I asked to sit down with Jennifer Kluge, NPM’s Executive Director and my boss. I wanted to hear about her first year so far as Executive Director, including her first NPM convention. She was kind enough to oblige.
At this point it goes without saying, but the COVID-19 pandemic has forced us to re-envision so much of what we do in ministry. While many of us are re-starting choirs to an extent and returning to the planning of normal music ministry life, the disruption of our normal habits and resources may allow a space to evaluate what our parish needs right now and for the next stage of ministry.
This was the mindset from which I started our episode today. Today I sat down with Adam Bartlett, the founder of Source & Summit, a Catholic technology company and liturgical publisher dedicated to helping parishes elevate the liturgy. To be honest, I didn’t know much at all about the company, and thought I’d reach out to see if they could share a bit about what their mission and their missal. Full disclosure: this is not a sponsored episode by Source and Summit! But they do go into depth about the context from which the missal was born, and what we, as pastoral musicians, can expect for this new resource on the market.
Last Thursday we celebrated the feast of Our Lady of Częstochowa, a venerated icon of the Blessed Virgin Mary found in the Polish town after which it was named. We thought it would be a perfect time to replay a previous episode that honored Our Lady of Częstochowa and the devotion to our Blessed Mother.
We hope you enjoy this week’s replay episode, and find a moment this week to pray for the intercession of the Blessed Mother this week. Mary, Our Lady of Częstochowa, pray for us!
It continues to be a unique time for music ministry, and that conversation continues here on Ministry Monday. As a fellow pastoral musician, I’ve noticed that the COVID-19 pandemic has allowed for a re-evaluation of many of the things we use and depend upon in music ministry. Why not take this moment of pause and re-evaluation to grow and strengthen our musical and liturgical skills?
That is our focus this September. For the next two weeks you will hear about two learning and formation opportunities led by or partnered with NPM.
Last week we heard from Teresa Cobarrubia Yoder about the importance of music theory knowledge, even at its most foundational level. Today we talk to Michael Ruzicki about the importance of liturgical formation in our lives. Michael is the director of music ministry at St. John Berchmans Parish in Chicago and serves as the training and events manager at Liturgy Training Publications.
Michael’s reflections today are really aimed at the working pastoral musician, and I mean all pastoral musicians; cantors, choir members, ensemble members, and of course, directors of music. Those who actively engage and help to facilitate the sacred Liturgy so benefit from a consistent dedication to learning why we do, what we do, in the Mass. Michael joins us from his office at LTP in Chicago, Illinois.
It continues to be a unique time for music ministry, and that conversation continues here on Ministry Monday. As a fellow pastoral musician, I’ve noticed that the COVID-19 pandemic has allowed for a re-evaluation of many of the things we use and depend upon in music ministry. Why not take this moment of pause and re-evaluation to grow and strengthen our musical and liturgical skills?
That is our focus this September. For the next two weeks you will hear about two learning and formation opportunities led by or partnered with NPM.
This week we begin by speaking to Teresa Cobarrubia Yoder. Teresa is a recently retired Director of Music Ministries at Immaculate Conception Church in Hampton, Virginia, where there alone she served for 25 years. Teresa is also a former instructor of music theory, chorus and madrigals at Walsingham Academy in Williamsburg, Virginia. Her combination of knowledge skill in both disciplines makes her a perfect candidate to offer a 4-week class in the fundamental basics of music theory. As you will hear shortly, this 4-week class (offered this September) will be perfect for choir members and cantors who want to learn the basics of music theory, and we encourage you to send this episode over to anyone whom you’d think would benefit from it!
The ins and outs of copyright licensing can be difficult. How do we declare what music we are using, especially across print and streaming mediums? How do we report, how often do we report, and what do we report? These were just a few of the many questions I found myself scouring the internet for as I live streamed liturgies at my parish for the first time last year. And so I called Katie Deaver. Katie is the assistant manager of ONE LICENSE and was gracious enough to sit down and answer questions about copyright licensing that I hope will help many other pastoral musicians as well.
It goes without saying that we, as pastoral musicians, have experienced a world of change in our ministries in the last year or so. The things that we never second-guessed, such as congregational singing, the incorporation of hymnals and choirs into our liturgies, became health risks. As we hopefully look towards a re-introduction of the elements that we so cherish in ministry, many of us are re-examining how we execute these elements. Now, we started this conversation 2 weeks ago when we spoke with Kelly Barth from Simply Liturgical Music. But today we shift the focus from technology to the physical, internal instrument so many of us value: the human voice.
As pastoral ministers, many of our cantors and choir members have not sung in over 15 months, at least not at the same level and frequency that they did pre-pandemic. How do we guide their voices with an even stronger sense of pastoral care?
It’s summertime, which means that many of us might be traveling, or just have a little bit of free time on our hands. Here at Ministry Monday we are pulling out a book that made a big impact on us: “Dear Joan Chittister”. “Dear Joan Chittister” is a collection of letters to its namesake, Joan Chittister, a Benedictine sister in Erie, Pennsylvania. Joan Chittister is known for her advocacy on women’s rights, peace, human rights and the renewal of the Church.
We spoke to Jessie Bazan, the editor of “Dear Joan Chittister”, in November of 2019 about the book. It was a short but sweet episode, and we think it’s a perfect interview to replay. And if you haven’t added it to your short stack of summer reading, we highly recommend it!
It goes without saying that we, as pastoral musicians, have experienced a world of change in our ministries in the last year or so. The things that we never second-guessed, such as congregational singing, the incorporation of hymnals and choirs into our liturgies, became health risks. As we hopefully look towards a re-introduction of the elements that we so cherish in ministry, many of us are re-examining how we execute these elements. Do we continue to purchase hymnals in our parish, or do we look for something else? Do we embrace the technological use that many of us depended on during the last year?
This time last year our nation was reeling and grieving the deaths of Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, George Floyd and many others who were killed in situations that simply did not justify such violence against the Black community. I spoke with Fr Joseph Brown last summer and he challenged us, as listeners, to keep listening and learning on our journey to work to end racism, in all its private and systemic dimensions.
And now today we feature a replay from the 2020 National Convention in our “Black Lives Matter” series. Today’s replay was one of four sessions at last year’s convention addressing the sin of racism head-on. While this episode is late to celebrating the social progress we’ve made in light of Juneteenth being an official federal holiday, we hope that it reminds us of the work we still have to do in our society to treat each other with kindness, true acceptance and equality.
This month Ministry Monday is offering a 3-part series about Taizé music. We began the series with reflections by David Anderson, Editor-at-Large for GIA Publications and Director of Music and Liturgy at Ascension Catholic Church in Oak Park, Illinois. Last week we featured a conversation Brother John Glasenapp, a Benedictine monk of Saint Meinrad Archabbey in southern Indiana, about the psychological and historical reasons as to why simple, repeated music including Taizé is so successful.
Today we widen the stage and re-frame the conversation. I spoke with Lauren and Dave Moore this week about the power behind simple refrains repeated consistently over time. You see, Lauren and Dave are the minds behind the Catholic Music Initiative, a sacred music collaboration based in the Dallas area. The Catholic Music Initiative’s goal is to compose beautiful liturgical music; to create a collaborative platform that leavens the heritage of our Faith through the formation of dedicated composers and musicians giving glory to God; and to bring the focus back to Jesus in the Eucharist with nights of Adoration, solid Catholic hymns, and education in our history and Tradition.
Today we consider the likeness between contemporary Catholic (and just Christian) music and Taizé music. How are they similar? Can we embrace the idea of simple music altogether to unify our communities, especially in a time when congregational singing is only just returning to our churches?
Lauren and Dave join me from their home in Dallas, Texas.
This month Ministry Monday is offering a 3-part series about Taizé music. We began the series with reflections by David Anderson, Editor-at-Large for GIA Publications and Director of Music and Liturgy at Ascension Catholic Church in Oak Park, Illinois. If you didn’t listen to that episode, you can tune in later wherever you listen to podcasts, and at ministrymonday.org.
Today's episode features Brother John Glasenapp, a Benedictine monk of Saint Meinrad Archabbey in southern Indiana, where he currently serves as the Director of the newly-formed Saint Meinrad Institute for Sacred Music.
Last week we set the stage for our conversation by sharing a personal experience about both Taizé itself and the music that stems from it. Today offers a musicological and practical analysis of why Taizé music is so effective to unify a worshipping congregation, and how its historical and global roots are deeper than we may realize.
If you are listening and work in pastoral music, you most likely have encountered Taizé music in your ministry. At the very least, I’m sure that most of you have sung “Jesus, Remember Me” at some point. Taizé is known for its simple, beautiful refrains sung over an extended period of time, with its focus on allowing the messages to sink deeply into our consciousness and spirit.
Taizé music has always been a part of my ministry. I remember ministering at a Taizé service when I was a teenager and, truthfully, I was so focused on the technical aspects of the music that I didn’t immerse myself in the spirituality of the moment and the people around me. But I looked up and saw this warm glow of light and holy presence in the space that I now recognize as that which I see at a Taizé service.
Taizé is a beautiful source of music, prayer, unity and community that it seems so right to explore the depth behind our human experience with it, as fellow pastoral musicians. And so this month Ministry Monday offers a 3-part series about Taizé music. We begin the series with reflections by David Anderson, Editor-at-Large for GIA Publications and Director of Music and Liturgy at Ascension Catholic Church in Oak Park, Illinois. David has visited Taizé, France, several times, and has led monthly Taizé services for years in his parish. He reflects about the depth and beauty of Taizé and how you can implement its music and spirituality in your parish.
Today on the episode we stop to honor our Blessed Mother. This episode aired in May 2020 as part of a series called “The Faces of Mary”. This week’s episode from the series focuses on Our Lady of Guadalupe and Our Lady of Perpetual Help, two of the ways we celebrate and honor Mary, our Mother. It is a staff favorite, and we hope you enjoy!
Today on the episode I speak with Fr. James Martin. Fr. Martin is a Jesuit priest, editor at large of America Media, consultor to the Vatican's Dicastery for Communication and author of many books including the topic of today, Learning to Pray: A Guide for Everyone. Fr. Jim not only discusses the many ways to pray, for those who are just beginning and for those who already feel a deep connection through prayer, but he also addresses the unique challenges and rewards that we, as pastoral musicians, experience. Not only that, he was gracious enough to end the interview with prayer for all who tune in!
Today I have the privilege of speaking to Kathleen, or Kate, Basi. Author and liturgical composer Kathleen M. Basi is mother to three active boys (read that: always breaking something) and one chromosomally-gifted daughter. She is a fellow pastoral musician and composer as well as an author! Her nonfiction has appeared in a number of magazines, Chicken Soup for the Soul and on NPR’s All Things Considered.
Today Kate was kind enough to sit down and talk about her book, “A Song For the Road”, which was just released last week! Her novel is an honest look at loss and the complexities behind grief and renewal. I myself have finished it and I think it’s an excellent read, especially for pastoral musicians. Keep listening to find out why.
Today's episode honors the many mothers that serve in the Church today. The women of this association lead in their churches, their communities, and their families, in whatever shape that takes. It is a true honor to take this week’s episode and celebrate the women of NPM, and the mothering role that so many of you take. Maybe you are a mother of your own children, or you offer a mothering role to those around you. Maybe you serve the church in religious life. Whatever it is, we so celebrate you today for Mother’s Day, and we thank you for the presence of Christ that you bring to all of us every day.
Today on the podcast I speak with Meredith Augustin and Lorraine Hess.
Meredith Augustin is the Director of Music at the Church of St. Francis of Assisi in midtown Manhattan. Meredith is also collaborated with musicians all over the world and has released four solo records, appealing to fans of all genres, particularly jazz, world, and Christian music, and most importantly, the mother of two.
Lorraine Hess is a Catholic singer, songwriter, music minister, and recording artist born and raised in New Orleans. She currently directs music ministry at St. Catherine of Siena Parish in the Archdiocese of New Orleans, has released six solo albums of liturgical and sacred music, and the mother of four sons.
Meredith Augustin and Lorraine Hess join us today and discuss the challenges of ministry and motherhood in the last year: from musically-restricted liturgies to children staying home for school, balancing ministry and motherhood held unique and beautiful challenges.
Today we finish a 3-part series on Media Ministry and the many ways we can use technology for outreach and communication with parishioners and non-parishioners alike.
One of the topics that is most-requested is live streaming for liturgies. Last week AJay Holmes offered tips and products that could get a church live streaming quickly and on a small budget. Today we continue the conversation about live streaming, and dig deeper into the hardware and camera options that could be used for live streaming in church.
Kevin Purcell is a pastor and writer focusing on ministry technology for over 20 years. He serves High Peak Baptist Church in Valdese, North Carolina and blogs at www.kevinpurcell.org. Kevin is also the host of podcast entitled Theotek, focusing on Ministry Tech Made Easy, as well as a vlogger on YouTube at Kevin Purcell.
I found Kevin while searching for the best camera options for my church to invest in for our permanent live stream set up. His blog, like AJay’s, is well-researched and thorough for the church minister looking for support while improving their technological output for ministry. Make sure to check out the show notes of the episode at ministrymonday.org for Kevin’s website, and helpful links to articles for your church’s digital ministry needs.
Today we continue a 3-part series on Media Ministry and the many ways we can use technology for outreach and communication with parishioners and non-parishioners alike.
One of the topics that is most-requested is live streaming for liturgies. Many Catholic churches scrambled to live stream for the first time last year when COVID-19 shut down Dioceses across the country. And while many Dioceses are slowly returning to less and less safety precautions, media ministry is a term that is becoming a more prevalent term to the Catholic staff vocabulary. Digital outreach is an area that is always evolving and expanding. Thankfully, I spoke to AJay Holmes to dig deeper on the topic.
AJay has been in church his entire life. His father was a pastor for over 35 years and he has served in multiple positions including usher, junior deacon, musician, and choir director. AJay has been a minister of music/musician at numerous churches for almost 30 years. AJay also served in the Marine Corps as a communication technician and once separating, he attended and graduated from Hampton University with a B.S. in Computer Science.
AJay is the creator and owner of TechnoBabble, LLC, an IT company focused on helping houses of worship. AJay's YouTube channel, e-books, website and digital educational offerings seek to broadcast God's Word across the world.
On Feb 15, 2018, God directed AJay to focus on teaching all ministries the importance of media in His church. Since this day, AJay has helped over 100,000 ministries all over the world to “modernize their media ministry”. He continues to teach on his YouTube channel, on Facebook, and through his books on the importance of media ministry in a cost effective way.
Today we start a 3-part series on Media Ministry. My first conversation comes after a conversation I had with a friend and associate in Texas. She works in campus ministry, and raved about how much Flocknote has been helping her stay connected to the students in which she ministers. I myself use Flocknote in my local parish, but I also know that it’s a company that some parishes do not currently use. I reached out to Flocknote to see if they’d be willing to explore the ins and outs of the software, and thankfully, they were willing.
And so I sat down and spoke with Matthew Sewell. Matthew is the Diocesan sales lead at Flocknote and has worked there for almost 7 years. He shared some of the growth that Flocknote has experienced since the global pandemic of COVID-19, and how Flocknote can help us stay connected to our faithful parishioners – and non-parishioners – especially at a time like today.
Please note that this interview was made into a video podcast as well! You can watch the video version of this episode, including a slide show presented by Jose. The video version of this episode can be found on NPM’s YouTube channel, NPM Livestream, and can also be found in the “show notes” of this episode at ministrymonday.org.
It’s Monday of Holy Week. And we know that for most of our listeners, this means that we have a long week ahead of us.
For many of us, our music is (mostly) prepared at this point, all of the liturgy committee meetings are done, and Victimae Paschali Laudes is practiced and ready. And yet, there are still things to do.
Where are we, ourselves, on our own to-do lists? Have we devoted enough time to prepare, spiritually, for our Triduum journey this week?
I asked Mary Birmingham to share some thoughts about how we, as pastoral ministers, can slow down at the beginning of this holiest of weeks and meditate on the journey ahead.
We continue to celebrate Women’s History Month in the many ways that we, as women, serve the Catholic Church. We’ve been highlighting Women’s History Month on our website, and we encourage you to check out npm.org for more resources. We’ve also made a Youtube playlist of videos highlighting women in their strength, their resilience and their faith. Our YouTube channel, and all of the playlists we create, can be found at npm.org, so go and check it out!
Today’s episode is a replay from exactly one year ago. On March 16, 2020, I released an interview with Steven C. Warner. Steven is the founder of the Notre Dame Folk Choir, and currently ministers at the Newman Centre for Faith and Reason in Dublin, Ireland. He and I spoke over Zoom in the early days of a global shutdown due to the pandemic. In many ways, our conversation could’ve taken place last week and the elements of uncertainty, hesitancy and safety still ring true. But our conversation was more than just the pandemic. In the days leading up to the Feast of Saint Patrick, we discussed the Catholic Church and its joys and struggles in Ireland. It’s a great episode, and one that bears repeating.
Lastly, we hope you’ll join us for a live streamed broadcast of Mass for the Feast of Saint Patrick this Wednesday, March 17, at 7 pm Eastern Time on NPM’s YouTube channel. Links to the Mass and our Youtube channel can be found in the show notes of this episode at ministrymonday.org, and on our main website, npm.org. We hope you’ll join us and pray with us on the evening of the Feast of Saint Patrick.
Today is part 2 of a discussion on chant, featuring my conversations with Brother John Glasenapp. Brother John is a Benedictine monk of Saint Meinrad Archabbey in southern Indiana, where he currently serves as the Director of the newly-formed Saint Meinrad Institute for Sacred Music. Br. John earned an M.A. in Medieval Studies from Fordham University and a PhD in Historical Musicology from Columbia University, specializing in chant. Last week we explored the deep historical context of chant. But how do we apply chant to our modern, mostly American churches? How can we adapt chant to our needs? Brother John joins me from the archabbey in Saint Meinrad, Indiana. For more information visit www.ministrymonday.org.
Today’s topic is a 2-part episode which features my conversations with Brother John Glasenapp.
Brother John’s viewpoint on chant in the Church is deeply rooted in a full historical context, which is what we’re to discuss today. Why can chant be challenging to today’s pastoral musicians? What are the roots from which chant was created? What are the roots of chant in the Catholic Church? How did we get here? And what can we do next?
Today on the podcast I sit down with Stephen Steinbeiser.
For 33 years Steve served as Director of Music and Liturgy for Duquesne University in Pittsburgh, PA. During his time at Duquesne, Stephen also served as the national Chair of the Campus Ministry section for NPM.
Steve’s strengths always lies in inclusion and activation. He always made sure that all campus ministry musicians were included and that their gifts would be fostered and grow. And in our case, campus ministry musicians didn’t necessarily mean music majors! Nevertheless, they all had a place at the table to minister, and Steve taught us how important that was.
Today on the podcast I have the pleasure of speaking to Dr. Mickey Thomas Terry. Dr. Terry is a lecturer at Howard University in Washington, D.C. and Dr. Terry has also taught on the faculty of Georgetown University in Washington, DC. He is also Director of Music at Epiphany Catholic Church in Georgetown. He is the recipient of the 2020-2021 Artist Fellowship awarded by the District of Columbia Commission on the Arts and Humanities. A current biographical sketch of Dr. Terry also appears in Who’s Who in America. Dr. Terry is the editor of a critically-acclaimed multi-volume (currently 8 vols) African-American Organ Music Anthology published by MorningStar Music Publishers (St. Louis, Missouri). I met Dr. Terry in 2011 in a masterclass as I played from the African-American Organ Music Anthology. He was kind enough to discuss the Organ Music Anthology, as well as the struggles of African-American Organ composers and African-American classical composers.
Today on the podcast we sit down with new NPM Executive Director Jennifer Kluge. Jennifer has been the Executive Director since early January of this year, coming to the job from her previous position as the Chief of Staff for the Office of the Dean of Research at Georgetown University in Washington, DC. Today Jennifer was kind enough to sit down and discuss the vision she has for the association. She was also willing to participate in a Q&A session so we, as members, can get to know her a little more.
PART 2 OF 2:
This week on Ministry Monday we explore the world of the public domain. Where does one start? How can we use it for music ministry, especially as our budgets are reduced due to COVID-19?
If you've never tried using the public domain, or are a seasoned user of the free online resource, this episode is for you.
This week on Ministry Monday we explore the world of the public domain. Where does one start? How can we use it for music ministry, especially as our budgets are reduced due to COVID-19?
If you've never tried using the public domain, or are a seasoned user of the free online resource, this episode is for you.
Ministry Monday's most popular interview of 2020 was in the height of a country groaning in grief at the loss of Ahmaud Arbery, George Floyd, Brianna Taylor, just to name a few. Fr. Joseph Brown, Plenum Address speaker at the 2020 National Convention, sat with our listeners and Fr. Brown begins the conversation by reflecting on the uprising across the country- and the world- to support the Black community and take action towards anti-racist policies and real social change. And today, serendipitously on Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, as we replay this episode, we are still listening, and we are still learning.
On today's episode of Ministry Monday, Fr. Paul Turner discusses the unique needs of the upcoming Ordinary Time and Lenten seasons. From ashes to throat blessings, palms to prayers, Fr. Paul shares his reflections in the months ahead.
Today on the podcast we speak to Brother Louis Canter about Lay Ecclesial Ministry. Why is it so important to the future of the Church, and how can we foster its growth?
Today’s episode comes from the November 2018 edition of NPM’s Pastoral Music magazine. The article “Spiritual Resolutions for a New Liturgical Year” was written by Margaret Felice. Now, full disclosure: keep in mind that this article was written at a time when masks were not required, “physical distancing” was not a phrase one heard each day, and public singing was more than welcomed in our sacred spaces. While I understand that all of these things our temporary in our society, it bears mentioning, as Margaret refers to singing during this article. We can’t endorse public singing with others just yet, but we hope the sentiment and core of Margaret’s message still sound true in your heart during these last few days of Advent.
The topic of self-care is an elusive one for pastoral musicians, as our calling is to serve others. It is a charism that extends to all that we do in ministry. We sacrifice our weekends, our holidays, our days off to play an unexpected funeral of someone we so value in our parish, and so on. I know that many of us are happy to do it because, again, we are pastoral ministers! But what are the unique needs for us, as ministers, in 2020? How does “taking care of ourselves” look like this year?
Today on the podcast we speak with Holly Mohr, Director of Religious Education for the South Side/Mount Washington Parish Community in the Diocese of Pittsburgh. Holly has the gift of seeing the sacred in the chaos which we all need during this pandemic year. If you’re feeling even a bit of uncertainty in your ministry or just in life this Advent season, this episode is for you.
As Kate Basi discussed in last week’s episode, 2020 has cracked open our world and the things we expect within it. But is there a small sliver of positivity in the midst of this waiting? Can we use this time as space to truly center ourselves this Advent?
Today on the podcast we feature a replay from Dr. Tony Alonso. Tony’s Key Change from the 2019 focuses on finding stillness and silence in our world as Catholics, and we believe it is a perfect way to begin the Advent season filled with waiting in our world.
As we start Thanksgiving week in the United States, we ask:
Is there space for gratitude, in the midst of division, chaos, and overcrowded hospitals? How can we pause for Thanksgiving when so many lives are at stake?
The truth is, we can’t. At least, we cannot to the fullest expression of Thanksgiving that many of us are used to. And yet, in the midst of the chaos, the uncertainty, and the awful virus that plagues our country, there might be a way to express gratitude. There might just be a silver lining.
NPM has been changing greatly in the last 18 months. Many members are familiar with the phrase “NPM 2.0”, an initiative to examine NPM at its core so we can best serve the members and vision it seeks to serve. I’m glad to say that this episode is a major update to our listeners as to how the process has developed.
Today on the episode I feature Valerie Lee-Jeter and Bob McCarty.
Valerie is the Music Director at St. Vincent de Paul Church, Philadelphia with an MA in Liturgical Studies, and is a member of the NPM Board of Directors.
Bob McCarty is NPM’s interim Executive Director, having served in leadership and guidance roles in NPM regarding the NPM 2.0 initiative.
Valerie, Bob and I sit down and discuss: what has changed? When will it go into effect? And when will we retire the use of the phrase, “NPM 2.0”?
Today’s episode features Sister Thea Bowman as she addressed the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops in 1989, less than one year from her death due to breast cancer. Sister Thea’s powerful word and song echoed in the minds of those who were gathered that day, and those who still listen, as she asks: “What does it mean to be black in the Church and in society today?”
As pastoral musicians who spend countless hours in God’s house, facilitating prayer for others, how can we deepen our prayer experience? How do we discern the time needed for our own prayer practice, apart from the ministry we offer to others?
Today on the podcast we discuss the Liturgy of the Hours and Eucharistic Adoration, two experiences of prayer that help us to encounter Christ in deeper ways.
Today I have the privilege to speak to two pastoral musicians who also compose music for the Church. They both share stories of the Spirit guiding their compositions and their time in ministry, especially through the lens of motherhood and women working for the Church. But the message ahead is clear: we, as women, use our unique experiences to support the Church and allow the guide the Spirit to flow through us. But I hope that we can honor the uniqueness we offer without putting our service in a category of “female musician”. Or “women in music.”
Previous Ministry Monday episodes featuring the “Black Lives Matter” sessions, along with other topics celebrating the Black Catholic community, can be found in the “Series and Themes” area on our website at ministrymonday.org/series.
For more information on projection and technology, thanks to WorshipNOW, along with a bonus video tour of Craig’s church, visit the show notes of this episode at ministrymonday.org.
After we finished recording Pam shared with me that her son ran in the Boston Marathon this year, which was held virtually. He ran the 26.2-mile race by circling their 2.62 mile lake, ten times. Pam used some of her banners to indicate when he would finish a lap. I dare say that they are the most beautiful race banners ever used! For photos of Pam’s banners, including photos of the virtual Boston Marathon, visit the show notes of this episode on ministrymonday.org.
Today we’re replaying an episode from March 2020 entitled “Deaf Culture and Music Ministry”. As September is National Deaf Awareness Month, we honor those who experience the liturgy in a profoundly physical way- including music.
This week we begin by speaking to a priest who dedicated his priesthood to both a hearing and deaf community. We hear how he started in this ministry, and what we need to know about deaf culture, as a hearing people.
Today on the podcast I am honored to sit down with Kathleen Haley. Kathleen is NPM’s Director of Membership Services and has served our association in the National Office for twenty years. She is one of the very few NPM staff members that has worked for all 4 NPM presidents in their time here. I am so pleased to look back at Kathleen’s 20 years of service to the association with her. I get the chance to have a cup of coffee with her and let her share some stories from the many conventions, phone calls, emails, and all the other ways she has interacted with all of our membership for 20 years.
Today on the episode I speak to Meg Matuska. Meg is the Vice Chair for the NPM Board of Directors as well as Director of Music Ministries at Communion of Saints Parish in Cleveland, Ohio. After our first episode with Joe Bazyouros regarding NPM 2.0, we’ve had a lot of questions about the process. “What about chapters?” “Is this already set in stone?” “When can I expect changes to take place?” Meg and I sit down and dig a little deeper intohe process that NPM is undergoing for our future as an association.
After speaking with Meg, I wanted to know more about the regions that she mentioned. How were they crafted for NPM? What was the logic behind them? Why are they important? And so I called Christopher Ferraro to discuss them. Chris sits on the Board of Directors for the Federation of Diocesan Liturgical Commissions, or FDLC. He shed some light on the regions and their origins.
Today I’m honored to share one of the recorded sessions from the 2020 Virtual Convention. The following session was one of four sessions in NPM’s “Black Lives Matter” series during the convention, led by an incredible team across the span of the week. Today’s topic is “Black Lives Matter: The Pandemic of Racism Before the Pandemic”.
Today on the podcast we discuss The Nuts and Bolts of Ministry. All of us are encountering our ministerial responsibilities through a different lens at this time. Many of us are working from home, and have limited access to the liturgy planning committees- and physical resources- that we normally have. What’s more, our parishioners are experiencing our parish differently at this time as well. With our numbers drastically reduced in many places due to COVID-19, our parishioners are not experiencing ministry from the pews. And the ministers that are usually our anchors for ministry are unable to attend.
What do we do? How do we plan? Are there opportunities for growth at this time?
Today on the podcast I speak to Damaris Thillet. Damaris is the Director for the Office of Worship for the Archdiocese of Santa Fe.
Today Damaris and I talk about the pastoral needs she tends to in her Diocese, both before and during this time of special ministerial circumstances due to COVID-19. She helps us all consider the needs of those we cannot reach with technology. How do they feel included in a parish community when our access to one another is limited?
Today on the podcast I chat with Joe Bazyouros. Joe is on the core team for NPM 2.0, and is also the Director of Music at the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels in Los Angeles, California. It’s been a year since NPM 2.0 was introduced to us at the 2019 National Convention in Raleigh. What has changed? What can we expect?
Expect more updates about NPM 2.0 on the podcast in the coming weeks and months, starting with this one today. Joe joins us from his office in Los Angeles.
Today on the podcast we explore the question so many of you have been asking: how do we minister in the liturgy with music, without singing? So many of us listening are pastoral musicians or clergy serving the church, and it seems as if each Diocese is addressing the risk of public singing a little differently. But as we settle into whatever this new “normal” is, we’re discovering that there are ways to safely incorporate musical elements back into your music ministry that don’t involve singing.
Our two guests are Kathy Ebling-Shaw (Malmark Inc.) and Mark Lawson (ECS Publishing).
Today I’m proud to share one of the recorded sessions from the 2020 Virtual Convention. M. Roger Holland II is a Composer and Teaching Assistant Professor in Music and Religion and Director of The Spirituals Project at the Lamont School of Music, University of Denver. His session today helps us learn about the theological roots of black Catholic music in the Church, both culturally and in light of the Church documents. He also provides several suggestions in ways you can introduce multicultural music in your parish’s repertoire, and shares the historical roots and cultural significance of “Lift Every Voice and Sing”.
Today I have the pleasure of sitting down with Michael Ruzicki, Training and Events Manager for Liturgy Training Publications. Michael has been a member of NPM for many years and this year we were honored to have him as one of our MEGA breakout presenters and one of our Plenum Address speakers.
Michael’s MEGA breakout and Plenum addressed focused on the Sacrament of Baptism and our baptismal call. Even more so, his MEGA breakout presented participants with a practical tool they can use to assess their parish's infant baptisms, first communion Masses, and the celebration of Confirmation through the lens of full, active, and conscious participation.
Our next episode from the archives comes from Patti Such. This episode was originally released in May of last year and was produced by former Ministry Monday host Matt Reichert. Patti discusses how to recruit and manage volunteers for your ministry. While we understand that many parishes’ music ministry looks different, we know that new ministries are popping up and need volunteers at this time! For example: is your parish providing hospitality at the doors in the form of a “safety ministry”, assuring all have left their contact information who have attended a Mass? What about a cleaning ministry to clean & disinfect your church space after each liturgy?
Even in the midst of a pandemic, volunteers in ministry are certainly still needed, and we’re happy to bring you this episode today.
Here at Ministry Monday we still have NPM conventions on the brain. Our next episode from the archives comes from Dr. Elaine Rendler. Originally rat the twenty-fifth NPM national convention in 2001, Dr. Rendler’s talk breaks open the rite of gathering and the liturgy of the word. This episode was originally hosted by Matt Reichert following the National Convention in Baltimore in 2018, and we’re glad to bring you this throwback episode today.
Our next episode from the archives comes from Msgr Ray East, and is a fan favorite of the podcast. Originally hosted by Matt Reichert, former host of Ministry Monday, we’re glad to bring you this throwback episode today. Please note that this is an archived recording from a previous NPM Convention, and for this reason, the audio quality has some bumps along the way. But Msgr. Ray’s message more than makes up for it, and we hope you’ll enjoy.
For the next four weeks, we in Ministry Monday will be taking a brief hiatus from new episodes, as we will be participating in the 2020 Virtual Convention. But don’t worry! We’ve combed through our archives and have found some great Ministry Monday episodes for you to listen to.
Our first episode from the archives comes from Bishop Mark Seitz. Bishop Seitz is the bishop of El Paso, Texas, as well as NPM’s episcopal moderator. This episode originally aired on February 11, 2019. For this reason, Bishop Seitz discusses the still-raw wounds from the crisis facing the Catholic Church in light of the sex abuse scandals which rocked our country in August 2018. However, in a way, his discussion of maintaining unity in good times and bad still resonates today. Originally hosted by Matt Reichert, former host of Ministry Monday, we’re glad to bring you this throwback episode today.
Today on the podcast I speak to Steve Petrunak and Berta Sabrio. Steve is the President of the National Association of Pastoral Musicians, and Berta Sabrio is the Vice President of Programming and Planning for NPM. Steve, Berta and I sat down and reflected on the ways NPM has changed in the last 3 months, and how this is only a starting point for the association. So sit back, grab a cup of coffee and sit with us as we reflect on the next steps for NPM.
Many Dioceses across the country are in its first few weeks returning to public Masses since the COVID-19 lockdown began in early to mid-March. But to the Diocese of Austin, public masses have been in place for a month already. What have they discovered so far? How did they inform and educate both their English and Spanish-speaking communities, in terms of what to expect upon returning to their parishes for the Mass? Is there anything we can take away from the weeks that the Diocese of Austin have already experienced?
I’m grateful to speak to Andrea Ramos today to discuss just that. Andrea is the Associate Director for Music in the Diocese of Austin. She offers assistance to parishes concerning liturgical music. Andrea also serves as the Director of the Diocesan Choir.
Today on the podcast I get the chance to speak to Fr. Joseph Brown. Fr. Brown is a Professor in the Department of Africana Studies at Southern Illinois University at Carbondale, and is one of our plenum speakers at this year’s NPM Convention.
I’ll admit to you that I was humbled to speak to Fr. Brown. I’ve never been so nervous to speak to an interviewee in my life, because this week I learned how much I still need to learn about the racism that pulses through the veins in our country. In the past week my eyes have been opened to how my silence works against the cause of equality and social justice.
And so I prepared to sit down with Fr. Brown. I started by reading his interview from the Southern Illinoisan, a local Illinois newspaper. The article mentioned Breonna Taylor and linked back to a news article about her. I read the article related to her being shot eight times in her own home. That article cited the death of Ahmaud Arbery in Georgia several weeks prior. I sat and read every article I could, and watched a video breakdown of how Arbery’s death occurred. From there I read more and more articles linked to deaths in the black community that simply shouldn’t have happened.
And lastly, I watched the combined footage of George Floyd. I watched it, and then watched it again.
From there, my education began. My education into the privilege I inherited as a white woman, and the privilege I hope to use to voice that black lives matter and to help facilitate change.
That was the context from where I spoke to Fr. Brown today.
Fr. Brown begins the conversation by reflecting on the uprising across the country- and the world- to support the black community and take action towards anti-racist policies and real social change.
Today Berta Sabrio and I sit down and discuss the Virtual Convention at length. We unpack all of the different ways attendees will receive content, along with brainstorming how you can attend the Virtual Convention in the same “group” mindset as when you attend in-person.
The Faces of Mary continues this week with two stories of Our Lady, both from different cultures but similar in devotion. We start with Dr. Gerardo Ramos, or as many call him, Dr. G. Today Dr. G shares his experiences celebrating and honoring Our Lady of Guadalupe, both in Mexico, North America and the Americas as a whole. Our second and last interview for today’s episode comes from Christopher Ferraro. Chris is also the chair of the Pastoral Liturgy Interest Section on the NPM National Council. Chris is the Director of Music at Our Lady of Perpetual Help in Lindenhurst, New York. As his parish’s namesake, Chris celebrates large liturgies and celebrations honoring Our Lady of Perpetual Help each year. He was kind enough to share some insights and reflections with us today.
Now this week we’re starting a multi-part series celebrating the many Faces in which we see and worship the Blessed Virgin Mary. We’ll explore the different ways we honor her, both in feasts and cultures and devotions across the world. We begin with Dr. Neil Stahurski, a Polish organist who oversees the celebration of Our Lady of Częstochowa in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. We then hear from Debbie Brown, a pastoral musician in Fairfax, Virginia, who went on pilgrimage to Knock, Ireland, and Međugorje, Bosnia and Herzegovina.
This week’s podcast honors the mothers of our association and the love and support they show everyone, especially their children. So many parents bring their children to church with them as they minister, and they also do so at NPM events! Today we feature three mothers who have brought their daughters to NPM events for many years.
Today we’re turning back the clock and hearing part of a previous episode of Ministry Monday, called “Physical Health and the Pastoral Musician”. Played in February 2019, former Ministry Monday host Matt Reichert interviewed Dr. Paul Schafer, a doctor from the Minneapolis region. We hope it is a good reminder of the things we can do to take care of our bodies, now and once we’re back in our churches for ministry again.
Today we hear from Sister Sandra DeMasi, a Sister of Saint Joseph serving as a pastoral associate for liturgy at Saint Rose of Lima Parish in Short Hills, New Jersey. Today Sister Sandy shares a 10-minute excerpt of her 2020 Convention Mega Breakout session, titled, “Christians are Made, Not Born!”
When I planned for this week’s episode, I thought of you. You, our thousands of listeners who tune into the podcast as you’re folding worship aids this week, or assembling binders of choral music for the weeks ahead. Or maybe you listen as you walk your dog in the morning, or listen as you battle traffic ! In whichever context you listen, we’re grateful for you. You are what makes this podcast keep moving.
And so today, I want to interview members of our listenership who are pastoral musicians, living out their calling in music, ministry and liturgy.
Today is our 99th episode! We can barely believe it. As we prepare to bring you our 100th episode next week, we thought it would be fitting to look back at the beginning. Today we bring episode #1 back to you.
Today we hear from Mary Birmingham, a minister and speaker on catechesis. Mary brings her passion for the liturgy and the Rite of Christian Initiation and its power to transform hearts to this work of evangelization hoping it will assist catechists in their remarkable conversion centered ministries.
Today we talk about our individual baptismal call, especially in the midst of our self-isolating reality. In this particular holiest of weeks, Mary’s insights fortified me for the week ahead. We hope it helps you too.
Last week we interviewed Fr. Walt Rydzon, a retired priest from the Diocese of Pittsburgh who ministered to both hearing and deaf communities for his priesthood. If you haven’t listened to it, we encourage you to. This week we take the conversation one step further and talk about deaf ministry and music ministry working on a week-by-week basis together. We speak to Karen Shepherd, Director of the Deaf Choir at Saint Mary of the Mount Parish, the official home for the deaf community in the Diocese of Pittsburgh. Karen has been the director of the deaf choir for almost 20 years.
Karen explores what is a deaf choir, as well as the subtleties of an “interpreted” Mass versus a “signed” Mass. Karen also spearheaded the installation of a “hearing loop” system in her church and shares what we need to know, as pastoral musicians, should we ever want to install one in our own churches.
The next two weeks of the podcast will discuss deaf culture & music ministry from a clergy member who devoted most of his priesthood to being their advocate, and a woman who is a “deaf choir” director, and yes, that’s a very real thing. This two-part series will help us, as a hearing people, explore the context of a deaf person, and see the ways they “hear” and experience music, which yes, they do! Now, just to be clear: I’ve worked with the deaf community for 7 years, and the terms “deaf person” and “deaf people” are not negative. But the term “disabled person” or “disability” hold more tension than the former, and we’ll get into that today. This week we begin by speaking to a priest who dedicated his priesthood to both a hearing and deaf community. We hear how he started in this ministry, and what we need to know about deaf culture, as a hearing people.
Today’s episode hopes to give you some insight into the thoughts and hearts of pastoral musicians across the country right now. We’ll hear from different Dioceses, from publishers and copyright licensing companies, and lastly, we’ll hear from our NPM president, Steve Petrunak.
This is a hefty episode because we wanted to make it chock full of stories, perspectives, and practical tips for you to apply in your music ministry. And besides, we all have plenty of time right now anyway, so sit back, relax and listen to our special episode ahead.
Today we speak to Steven C. Warner, Associate Director for the Notre Dame Newman Center for Faith and Reason (Dublin, Ireland). We discuss the Catholic Church in Ireland today, especially on the cusp of the feast of St. Patrick. Not only that, Steve was gracious enough to provide two unreleased songs from his upcoming album, “Easter in Ireland”. Today’s episode will feature the world premieres of these two songs! We’ll play them both in their entirety, and for this reason, the episode will be a bit longer than the 20-minute episodes we’ve been doing lately. We think that it’s well worth it. Sit back, relax, and enjoy this week’s episode of song and reflection.
Today on the podcast we hear from Tom Kendzia, composer and chair of the Composers Interest Section. Tom is a liturgical musician whose music has been published since 1980. In 2020, he celebrates the 40th anniversary of the release of his first collection, “Light of the World.” Tom participated in the first NPM Convention in Scranton, Pennsylvania, and the first NPM Composers’ Forum Competition a year later. After 40 years of composing, Tom continues to write and publish his music, while also being the Chair of the Composers Interest Section at NPM…and, of course, still ministering to his church community of 35 years.
This week is our first podcast episode during the Lenten season. We are walking our Lenten journey, and we are helping others alongside as well. From music to prayer services, to Triduum preparations and everything in between, we are truly engrossed and living this Lenten season.
Amidst all of our work, how much time have we committed to walking alongside the RCIA candidates in our parishes? That is the topic of our conversation today.
Today Bill & Lena Gokelman share some of the complications of working with so many young people in their program, and most importantly, they share some of the biggest lessons they’ve learned in their decades of working with youth in ministry. (Spoiler alert: the takeaways from this episode are actions you can take & use in your music program today.)
This week we sat down with theologian and liturgical composer Tony Alonso to discuss his new musical project, “Caminemos con Jesús”. “Caminemos con Jesús” is a collection of liturgical music that honors the Cuban musical heritage not often seen in its own right, liturgically. In this episode you’ll learn the inspiration behind “Caminemos con Jesús”, as well as the people, effort and heart from so many to make this project authentic, vibrant and full of the Spirit.
This week I had the pleasure of speaking with Maria Nieva, chair of the Asian Pacific Musicians Interest Section. I must share that I’ve always admired the sense of community in the Asian Pacific Musicians Interest Section. They are always so active at the National Conventions, attending events together and even eating meals together! It was a pleasure to hear from Maria about her interest section and what we can take away from their community, their culture and their musical heritage.