My own experience of the Liturgy over that last 33 years of my ordination is that music is the most contentious issue when discussions of it occur in parishes. It is not about Latin, it is not about ad orientem and it isn't about the Extraordinary Form of the Mass.
For the most part, those who still come to Church regularly and those who come infrequently are not concerned so much about the ritual as they are about the music. There are several camps in this polarization:
1. Those who want a quiet Mass with no music at all
2. Those who like music that is "traditional" but not in the "traditional" Catholic sense of pre-Vatican II time, but in the sense of traditional hymnody that would include many classical Protestant hymns. This group would see these hymns as a higher priority to sing rather than the actual parts of the Mass.
3. Those who like contemporary music. People my age, (aging hippies) who had their youth and heyday in the 60's and 70's like the traditional folk music of that period, like "Be not Afraid," "Here I am Lord" and all the stuff of the former St. Louis Jesuits. They like upbeat music, lively music, music that gives a spiritual high, like Rocky Mountain or puff the magic dragon.
4. Then there are those today who like worship and praise music and they are the ones in high school and college and even older, music that comes from the non-denominational branches of Christianity that relies too on the rocky mountain high or puff the magic dragon but is more like prescription pain relievers that so many people are hooked on today.
In this polarization, you can see that I've not listed chant or polyphony, Gregorian or otherwise. No one has really been exposed to it and when they are they get bored by it and fall asleep, there's no caffeine or narcotize hit or lift.
And therein lies the problem, we have cast such a wide net in terms of what is acceptable music at Mass that we've lost our Catholic identity as it regards appropriate music for the Mass and the Liturgy of the Hours.
I'd like to make a disclaimer here though. In pre-Vatican II times, there was a great deal of flexibility in hymns for devotions especially Marian devotions but also for novenas. I think that could still be the case today and that contemporary, whatever that means at any given time, could be done at devotions and outdoor processions and I wouldn't even mind liturgical dance or movement at these, especially when outdoors.
But for the Mass, I think we need to pull back, take stock and realize that the Mass should have a universal character to it including what is sung and how it is sung, the quality, spirituality and essence of it. That is what is lacking today, not only from nation to nation, but from parish to parish and even from Mass to Mass in a particular parish. Polarization reigns supreme.
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