Significant changes in the liturgy and music of the Roman Catholic Church have occurred since the promulgation of the Second Vatican Council document, Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy, on December 4,1963. A major emphasis of this document and the liturgical reform movement that spawned it, was the active participation of the congregation in both the spoken and sung elements of Catholic worship. The post-conciliar revision and vernacular translation of the liturgical rites created an urgent need for music that was different in text and form from that of the pre-conciliar Latin Mass. The vacuum created by this need led to experimental solutions that many American Catholics viewed as unsuccessful and inappropriate.
In response, the National Association of Pastoral Musicians (NPM) was founded in 1976 by Virgil Funk for the purpose of improving musical liturgy in American parish churches. Since October of that year the organization has published a bimonthly magazine, Pastoral Music (PM), in which it has addressed the challenges associated with the liturgical and musical changes such as: the conversion of a generally passive and silent congregation into an active singing force; the changing roles of musical personnel; the appropriate use of music in the new liturgy. Important post-conciliar documents issued by the Vatican and the U.S. Bishops' Committee on the Liturgy have been interpreted and critiqued for PM's readership, the musicians and clergy of American parish churches-those ultimately responsible for implementing the Vatican II reforms.
Pastoral Music witnessed and participated in the liturgical reform of the post-conciliar Catholic church in the U.S., and now provides music historians with a detailed account of the changes and insight into the nature of the change process itself. The shape of the reform has not been welcomed and accepted by everyone. The resulting polarization in liturgical and other areas was recently addressed by the late Joseph Cardinal Bernardin. NPM is currently engaged in his Common Ground Initiative both at its 1997 National Convention and on the pages of its journal.