In 1970 French organist Jean Langlais wrote a composition for the organ competition at the Paris Conservatoire; a technically demanding piece he entitled Imploration pour la joie, and was probably an expression of happiness in his personal life. He added to it two further Implorations after the one for joy: one for indulgence, which could be a theological theme of its own, but the more pointed theological statement was made in the third, the Imploration pour la croyance (for faith).

It opens with the intonation for the credo from a plainchant Mass, but responds to it not with an affirmation but with a dense, dissonant, loud cluster; continuing with further restatements of the credo theme, in canons of increasing voices, and further dense chords.

Although one might take this treatment, and this title, as an expression of doubt as to the content of the creed, the composer’s stated aim is rather different. His concern was not, at least as far as his own word can be taken, that he was in any doubt as to his own faith, but that he could no longer be confident that the wider church shared its traditional faith. Such a concern was raised at that time by the significant changes then being made in the Catholic church’s liturgy as the documents of the Second Vatican Council were implemented.

It may be noted already that my previous sentence distinguished the outputs of the council itself from their implementation – and my understanding is that Langlais would have made the same distinction. But was he justified in suggesting in this piece that his distaste for particular forms of liturgical music meant that the faith of the church – or perhaps more generously, the treasures of the church’s inheritance – was interrupted?

Certainly we must allow that his feelings were hurt by the situation that arose, and that his expression of those feelings is valid. That said, an expansion in the possibilities for expression of the faith is not on the face of it the same as a revocation of older options, let alone a change in the underlying understanding. Unpacking the detail of Vatican II and the liturgical changes which followed from would require a longer essay than this post, though it is likely that we will return to the theme as it is implicated in many other works of theological music at the time.

There are cogent theological arguments that suggest it is not so easy as it seems to divorce form and content in terms of the theology expressed within the church’s liturgies. And given that liturgy is the context within which the majority of non-specialists encounter theological discourse, it is constitutive of the understanding many Christians have of their faith.

As a lover of plainchant, as many other traditional elements of liturgy, I share the sadness of many that such inherited practices have largely been displaced (rather than complemented) by newer options. I also share as a matter of personal taste a dislike of (theologically and musically) over-simplified worship songs, of which there are far too many (though ‘over simplified worship songs’ does not exhaust the wider category of ‘worship songs’ which includes some admirable contributions). But I can’t help feeling that the frustrations of some at the time of change were as much about power and influence as they were about much of the content they appear to discuss.