Ray Repp was there during a great transition between the Latin Mass and the early post-Vatican II liturgy. Ray stepped in, not simply to fill a gap, but to call the church to wake up and sing.

We asked America readers for their 10 favorite hymns of all time, as well as their favorite St. Louis Jesuit hymns, to mark the farewell concert by the St. Louis Jesuits. There was some crossover on both lists.

“Someone once said to me that the St. Louis Jesuits wrote the spiritual soundtrack to our lives,” said John Limb, former publisher of Oregon Catholic Press, the publisher of the St. Louis Jesuits. “For those of us of a certain age, that was true.”

A supposed need for variety imposes more and more hymns on congregants, but the cost of novelty can be the full, active participation of those in the pews, writes John Zupez, S.J.

Last year, 'America' published “An (unconventional) Advent Playlist.” This is my (much more conventional) Advent playlist.

On Christmas Eve 1818, in the church of St. Nicholas in Oberndorf near Salzburg, “Stille Nacht” (“Silent Night”) was sung for the first time. Today, the carol has been translated into some 300 languages.