Loading...
Loading...
Click here if you don’t see subscription options
Tom BeaudoinJuly 05, 2011

It is good for recognized religious insiders to perform material from their own religious tradition; this is what happens at most places of worship around the world every day. It is also good for those not recognizably associated with a religious identity to perform material from a religious tradition; this too happens, often with greater anonymity, but with increasingly regularity, in the (post)modern age of the global religious bazaar.

Here is something closer to the latter: Natalie Merchant, formerly of the band 10,000 Maniacs and for the last twenty years her own successful solo act, setting to music and voice a poem from Gerard Manley Hopkins, titled "Spring and Fall: To a Young Child." Go to 16 minutes 23 seconds into the video below to find it. This elegant arrangement is from her latest album, "Leave Your Sleep."

Although I cannot tell clearly from interviews that she has given, like this, in which she discusses growing up Catholic, it seems that Natalie Merchant has apparently left Catholicism behind, while retaining a deep religious sense, including an expressed interest in composing liturgical music.

Might this uncannily gifted post-Catholic (or however -- and I would be interested to know -- she might identify herself) please consider writing a Mass

Tom Beaudoin

Hastings-on-Hudson, New York

Comments are automatically closed two weeks after an article's initial publication. See our comments policy for more.

The latest from america

Delegates hold "Mass deportation now!" signs on Day 3 of the Republican National Convention at the Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee July 17, 2024. (OSV News photo/Brian Snyder, Reuters)
Around the affluent world, new hostility, resentment and anxiety has been directed at immigrant populations that are emerging as preferred scapegoats for all manner of political and socio-economic shortcomings.
Kevin ClarkeNovember 21, 2024
“Each day is becoming more difficult, but we do not surrender,” Father Igor Boyko, 48, the rector of the Greek Catholic seminary in Lviv, told Gerard O’Connell. “To surrender means we are finished.”
Gerard O’ConnellNovember 21, 2024
Many have questioned how so many Latinos could support a candidate like DonaldTrump, who promised restrictive immigration policies. “And the answer is that, of course, Latinos are complicated people.”
J.D. Long GarcíaNovember 21, 2024
Vice President Kamala Harris delivers her concession speech for the 2024 presidential election on Nov. 6, 2024, on the campus of Howard University in Washington. (AP Photo/Stephanie Scarbrough)
Catholic voters were a crucial part of Donald J. Trump’s re-election as president. But did misogyny and a resistance to women in power cause Catholic voters to disregard the common good?
Kathleen BonnetteNovember 21, 2024