I love music that makes my heart leap with joy. I love the familiar
sacred music that always has inspired and often healed me. But my
experience with sacred music has been fairly narrow, and that's one
reason I'm really looking forward to Olympia's first World Sacred
Music Festival on May 21 and 22.
This festival, presented by Interfaith Works, offers a rare opportunity
to hear sacred music from many faith traditions in one place.
Joining this special celebration and listening to melodies and instruments
that praise the divine in various faiths and cultures, I expect to
feel spiritually uplifted and connected with my neighbors on a new
level.
"
There is something in music that transcends and unites. This is evident
in the sacred music of every community," said the Dalai Lama,
in calling for sacred music festivals to be held around the world.
"
Music is more than sound in unison. I want not only quality, quantity
and variation in tone, but the unction of love," wrote Mary
Baker Eddy, founder of the Christian Science Church.
Growing up, I loved the hymns we sang in Sunday school and church
and felt the "unction of love" in them. These were the
same sacred songs sung by each generation to the next -- to my parents,
to my sisters and me, to my children and now to my grandchildren.
Much sacred music is privately performed and never heard by others.
It is sung in the shower, on a windy mountaintop, in the forest,
to ocean waves, in an office cubicle, on the subway and to a child
or favorite pet. Often, the words and melodies are spontaneous, unwritten
and unremembered.
My most sacred music experience was like that. I had been praying
for several years to be healed of an irritating and unsightly skin
condition. One morning as I was vacuuming, I spontaneously began
singing songs of praise to the divine presence I call God. The words
and melodies were nothing I had heard or sung before. This continued
effortlessly for at least half an hour. I felt wrapped in the arms
of a loving, compassionate presence. It was a couple of days before
I realized that the skin problem was gone and I knew without a doubt
that I had been healed during that time of holy inspiration. That
was 40 years ago and the problem has never returned.
Perhaps drumming, chanting, dancing and other expressions of sacred
praise have that same kind of effect on those who practice them.
Appreciation for this possibility still is new to me, but I am beginning
to understand the universal power of sacred music and realize that
it is expressed in a wider variety of ways than I ever had considered.
I have come to the conclusion that music of sincere praise to the
divine, by whatever name he or she is called, and whatever form that
music takes, should be an occasion for rejoicing.
I have volunteered to work at the Olympia World Sacred Music Festival
all weekend because I don't want to miss anything. I'm looking forward
to the performances and workshops, which include West African, Australian,
Jewish, Christian, classical Indian, American Indian, Gaelic, Gregorian
chant and more.
I don't know what shapenote singing is, but I'm going to the Saturday
workshop to find out.
Perhaps I will see you at the festival. If you come with an open
and respectful heart, you likely will gain new perspectives on sacred
expression and come away more in tune with the sacred music of the
world.
Wendy Wilson is a member of First Church of Christ,
Scientist, Olympia.
The views expressed are those of the author and are not necessarily
endorsed by Interfaith Works or The Olympian.
Original
article here |
Earball
Media