Sacred Song in America: Religion, Music, and Public Culture (review)

Stephen Marini's latest book examines sacred song's function in the religiously pluralistic society of 1990's America. Two Catholic groups are included: Chicanos of the Hispanic Southwest and the Catholic charismatic movement. The book provides a delightful travelogue through a variety of musico-religious cultures, and with its indices serves as something of a field guide for identifying and understanding varieties of sacred song.

Marini, a professor of Christian Studies at Wellesley College, acknowledges both the immensity of the subject and his newcomer status in many of the interdisciplinary fields covered. His stated purpose is to formulate a definition of sacred song (he provides a literature survey) and test it with field research. The bulk of the book is this field research, and it is in these "thick descriptions" (p. 11) of detail that he shines. He casts his net wide to catch public expressions of sacred song: we follow him as he attends concerts and musicals, goes to church, sits in on rehearsals, and watches broadcasts on television. Histories, interviews, and analyses follow.

The religions included as case studies reflect the "particular attention to diversity" (p. ix) requested by the IUPUI Center for the Study of Religion and American Culture that commissioned the book. They range from "old religions," such as Native American, Chicano Catholic, Sacred Harp, Black Church, and Jewish, to newer faiths, including Mormon, Southern Baptist, and New Age.

Marini hunts down song "function" in the public sphere by exploring sacred song available not only to the "worshipping public" but to the non-preselected "general public" (p. 9). For this reason, and perhaps diversity, the primary worship music of a tradition is often bypassed for a body of song less linked to ritual. Particularly interesting was his explanation of why Sacred Harp sings and klezmer music concerts, far removed from their original context, appeal to non-religious intellectuals. He posits that this "dislocated sacrality" (p. 90) allows post-moderns to experience "intense personal engagement in a mythic past" (p. 323) without commitment. Sacred song is both the link and the buffer.

His use of different religion theories to analyze each song type is explained as a critique of existing inadequate theories, but this methodology comes across as arbitrary. While his analyses are often interesting, his critique suffers from his refusal to formulate an overarching theory. In contrast, his questions about the effect on sacred song of commercialization, audiences that include non-believers, and "market competition" of religious groups are organic and insightful.

There are also some factual errors in the book. For instance, while John Michael Talbot is rightly situated in the Catholic charismatic movement, his music does not typify it, as Marini implies. He describes Talbot's songs as "ideal for congregational singing and thereby for consistent popularity and sales" (p. 325), but they were seldom sung by congregations, whether in "eucharistic meetings" (p. 253) or charismatic praise gatherings. His presentation of Vatican II's teaching on liturgical music ignores the great debates raging on the subject, and the Palm Sunday order of worship he says he observed in Chimayó, New Mexico, is improbable (p. 48).

This book might be useful for discussions in classes studying religion theory, or as background for a survey course in American religion. The musical examples are helpful, but a CD would have made a wonderful addition.

Primarily it serves as a very interesting and mostly non-technical tour of modern religious music-making in America.