Reading Bonhoeffer’s pastoral heart during my dissertation writing was a sweet sound to my soul. His prison letters led me down a path of admiration and excavation to my own heart. I read almost 1,000 pages’ worth, and I left with a sense of passion for the holy. Among the many glorious things gleaned from Bonhoeffer, in particular, I was drawn to the musical component of this astute and brave Lutheran scholar. His engagement of congregational singing with young seminarians and his particular thoughts on singing in the community has largely inspired my mission for my local body and the role I see sacred music play in parish life.
For Bonhoeffer, singing is a relational tool. If there is one thing quite clear in his writing is that there is a special bond created when people sing together. Life together does not just happen; it is cultivated. The young seminarians were not immune to temptations; in fact, it is precisely their singing together that alleviated some of those natural temptations to pursue sin. Singing is and ought to be a tool of healing and reconciliation. We can engage in spectacularly contradictory forms of protests today with our yard signs and vocal cords, or we can engage in spectacularly harmony-driven singing that cultivates relationality.
As Bonhoeffer notes:
“Music … will help dissolve your perplexities and purify your character and sensibilities, and in time of care and sorrow, will keep a fountain of joy alive in you.”
A few years ago, I was invited to visit one of my parishioner’s grandmother on hospice care. She asked me to minister to her family, whom I had never met. By the time I arrived, her grandmother was no longer responsive. It was just a matter of hours before she died. I walked in there and saw that dear woman and the first reaction I had was to sing: so, I did. We all gathered, and I asked them permission to sing. I sang Psalm 23 and prayed. I was a stranger to all these people, but suddenly that old Irish melody brought everybody together. It was a mystical moment, if I can use that term.
For Bonhoeffer, one of the great pastoral means to deal with pain and death is singing. Paul says to encourage one another with psalms and hymns and Spirit-songs, which is to say, singing as a church invites the church to enter each other’s stories and narratives. Singing allows pastoral theology to come alive.
