Praise and Worship: Serenading our Beloved!

"Liturgical worship is given a more noble form when the divine offices are celebrated solemnly in song, with the assistance of sacred ministers and the active participation of the people." - Sacrosanctum Concilium Paragraph 113


My parish is so blessed to have something amazing that every parish should have and actively encourage: Praise and worship prayer nights.

If you've never been to a praise and worship prayer night, it's a gathering of people to join in praise and worship of the Lord, especially in singing, and prayer ministry is hopefully usually included. Singing is done to uplift the hearts of all those gathered to help hem to praise the Lord God, and many times people are baptized in the Spirit and start praying and singing in tongues, sometimes there are words of knowledge and prophecy!

It's absolutely amazing, and in a way, necessary in today's world, especially for the youth of the Church. Today's youth are so heavily influenced by music and always at least impacted by it, especially if they're singing along with it. Because of this, praise and worship nights, having a lot of easy-to-sing-along music, are an amazing way for everyone, especially youth, to both view and partake in the power of the Spirit and a chance to fall more completely in love with the Lord Jesus Christ!

St. Augustine once said, "He who sings prays twice". Knowing how much we need Christ, to be His lover and to do His will, it's obviously good to sing to Him! In mortal relationships, people serenade each other (or at least used to) with beautiful love poems and songs. This is in a sense the same thing: We all have the desire to give ourselves to Christ completely, to be His lovers, and just like mortal lovers sing to each other, we want to sing all our hearts out for our Bridegroom!

At these praise and worship prayer nights, the gifts of the Holy Spirit are especially noticeable as people give themselves up more and more to the Lord their Beloved, and the music for His sake and glory is necessary to lift people up like that, to be open to the gifts of the Holy Spirit. So go to a praise and worship prayer night, and if there isn't one at your parish, find one somewhere or organize one, the youth need it! We have a desire to sing out for our Beloved, and this is where you can do so a lot! Everyone goes to be more and more in love with Jesus, and they want to praise Him in the best way they can.

Saint Cecilia, patron Saint of musicians, please pray for us that we can sing in the Spirit as you did and do now all for the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ!