Samuel Cardinal Stritch, archbishop of Chicago, last week banned from the Roman Catholic churches in his archdiocese some of the country's favorite church music as "unliturgical." The cardinal's authority: Pope Pius X (1903-14), who, in his encyclical Motu Proprio, cited "sanctity and goodness of form" as necessary to sacred music. Among the forbidden titles, many of which have also been banned in other dioceses: the Wagner and Mendelssohn wedding marches, originally written for the theater, and several Ave Marias, including Schubert's, originally a concert number; Verdi's, from the opera Otello; Mascagni's, based on the Cavalria Rusticana intermezzo; and Bach-Gounod's (the Bach...
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