04 Aug 2015

Music is an important component of liturgy and it enhances one’s Christian faith, says businesswoman Chedza Siwawa.

Speaking during the Vicariate of Francistown Catholic Association music festival in Mahalapye over the weekend, Siwawa said music was important as it also helped one to grow spiritually.

She said music was played everywhere in celebrations, whether death or birth as it connected people with God, adding that through the singing of hymns and choruses it helped them connect to their faith.

She explained that choirs were important as they played a vital role in making sure that music was played, as it also reinforced the priest work and bound people’s souls.

Siwawa applauded participating choirs for taking part in singing, since singing required more work and it showed that they would rather abandon their personal lives and sacrifice their time to participate in choirs to praise God.

She said serving God with singing required more work and this was  commendable work as it would also affect those that they lived around.

She said it was admirable that most choirs were made up of young people and it showed how the youth had now resorted to living exemplary lives, as through these choirs they learnt discipline and could rise above their personal challenges.

She said young people were faced with many challenges and engaging in bad things but through gospel they could overcome them and learn good moral behaviour and also help grow their families and the community they lived in.

Furthermore, Siwawa advised choirs to respect their leadership, their choir leaders as they imparted in them good musical skills.

She said good and respected leaders promoted oneness and cohesiveness and with that build a strong choirs and communities.

She advised choir leaders to be open and transparent at all times so that the knew how to help grow their choirs and certain individuals amongst their choir members, adding that they should be approachable to members’ needs and vulnerability at all times.

She said they should also work closely with parish priest and liturgy chairperson so that they could help grow their choirs.

To the parishes, Siwawa said they should offer support to choirs, financially, travel wise and also help them get their desired uniform and often offer encouragement when needed.

Siwawa donated P10 000 towards the association.

Also during the festival the choirs donated toiletry to the Mahalapye Centre for Disabled. The festival which was made in the form of competition saw Tlhatlong Choir from Selebi Phikwe scooping the best male category while the best female choir went to Modisa oo Molemo choir from Francistown.

Mixed duet went to St Anthony from Palapye; the standard hymn song went to St Patrick from Mahalapye, followed by Selebi Phikwe Tlhatlogong and St Anthony from Palapye and Modisa oo Molemo from Francistown.

The standard western song went to Tlhatlogong followed by St Anthony and the standard African song was scooped by St Patrick followed by Tlhatlogong and then St Anthony respectively.

In the large section category St Gabriel from Serowe scooped the entire standard hymn, western and African songs. Ends