Father Likes It

I don't like plainchant much, I like singing the psalms, I like the Salve, I like the Kyrie from Orbis Factor but truthfully I just can't remember chant unless I have the notes in front of me. If it is done well it is a pleasant sound that meditates on the words, if you hear them but for me it is a sound to be pray with, a sort of tuneful silence. I love baroque music, sagbutts and cornetti, viola d'amori etc but as clever as it is I find polyphony, again useful to pray with, it quietens the soul but I don't actually like it. So therefore when my parishioners mutter, "We sing Missa di Angelis because Father likes it" I want to bash them over the head with a candlestick. We sing what we do because the Church tells us to do it, or at least to sing chant and this late, decadent, almost hymn tuney stuff is about the best we can manage, if the majority of the congregation are going to take part, but I don't like it.
It is a sad reflection that doing what the Church instructs, is put down by good Catholics to Father's preference.
The problem is that it is not just liturgy, it is devotions too: we say the Rosary because Father likes Our Lady, we have Exposition because Father likes Blessed Sacrament, well he does actually and he loves Benediction but that is not why we do it.
It is the ghastly problem of today and the victory of a wicked strand in modern theology that everything is put down to personal preference: Father preaches about Papal Infallibility, openness to Life in marriage, frequent   Confession, going to Mass every Sunday and Holy Day, the Last Things because its Traditional and Father likes Traditional things.
"We go to Father's Church because we like what what Father likes", has become the mark of the Cafeteria Church which is really another name for a Broad Church, which used to be associated with the CofE, now is very much part of The Church, we have been infected by "Churchmanship".

I beat my head against the wall wondering how we get over the idea that it might well be your way, or even Father's, way but we are after is the Church's Way, the Right Way, which in Greek is Ortho Dox. I am glad that at least a few Bishops: Portsmouth and Shrewsbury, are at least using the word from time to time, without smirking, or suggesting there are other legitimate ways that aren't orthodox.