Canta et ambula
St Augustine’s sensitivity to music is well documented. In the Confessions he says how struck he was by the singing in the cathedral of Milan: ‘How I wept, deeply moved by your hymns, songs, and the voices that echoed through your Church!’ Better than anyone he has made sense of the jubilus in chant, ‘a certain sound of joy without words, the expression of a mind poured forth in joy’, joy that is ineffable, yet singable. Today, on the last day of the Church’s year, the Divine Office gives us another wonderful text on singing. Augustine speaks here of the kind of singing apt to keep our courage up as we pilgrimage towards hope in a world that often appears like a vale of tears. His words have great poignancy. They resound credibly still as the counsel of a father, a friend: ‘Always go onward in goodness, right faith, good habits. Sing, and walk onwards.’ Thus we shall be preserved from discouragement and pusillanimity.
