While Cardinals aren’t sure of the precise date on which they’ll vote for the successor to Pope Benedict XVI, someone is at least working on the conclave party’s playlist.
According to a release from Spotify, a digital music service, representatives from the company enlisted two members of the University of Notre Dame’s faculty to create a conclave-themed playlist for the men in red. Tim O’Malley and Carolyn Pirtle, director and assistant director of the Notre Dame Center for Liturgy, chose from the service’s catalog of hymns and choral music to create this jam session. [Story continues...]
O’Malley described his list as the “greatest hits” of sacred music meant for Catholics who planned to pray for conclave participants, ABC 57 News reports. He offered more comments on his selections in Spotify’s release.
The playlist consists of motifs central to the Catholic imagination relative to the election of a Pope. It focuses upon certain themes, including the Church’s asking for guidance from the Holy Spirit during this time of transition; the Church’s crying out to God for mercy that we might be found worthy to receive a successor of Peter, who unites the Church in love; and praise for the God, who guides the Church through the twists and turns of history. The playlist is intended to give the listener a disposition of wonder, of contemplation, of prayer to the God who first loved us.
Terry Ponick, a former church choral music director and conductor who now writes a blog for the Washington Times, mused that the playlist could be a more spiritual, artistic and ethereal connection to the conclave than consuming huge amounts of news on the topic.
Ponick added, "A great many [of the songs] carry with them the appropriate religious significance or mood. Others, while not directly pertaining to theological or spiritual content, are almost whimsically appropriate, as with the intentional association of the Holy Spirit with Stravinsky’s Firebird Suite."
Obviously, few know if the cardinals will bring an iPod into the Sistine Chapel for the vote on the next pope, and their vow of secrecy basically ensures that we never will. So, in the less-than-holy spirit of a more open song selection process, you can contribute your song suggestion to HuffPost's own conclave playlist. Just drop it in the comments or tweet it to @huffpostcollege.