A Tribute To Adam Politzer

This beautiful book celebrates the discovery of the hearing organ by the Italian anatomist Alfonso Corti in 1851. He first described the microscopic anatomy of the organ that contains the cellular receptors that transduce and carry airborne vibrations into electric signals to the auditory nerve and brain. Already by then, and still today, this organ was and is regarded as the most difficult of the organs in the human body to study. Indeed, it is a stealthy and miniscule organ surrounded by the hardest bone in the body. Since his discovery, researchers have continued to fascinate over this complex and gracile organ.

How do we hear our prayers? In the words of philosopher Gemma Corradi Fiumara, there can “be no saying without hearing, no speaking which is not an integral part of listening, no speech which is not somehow received.” Therefore, hearing should be considered an essential aspect of participation in Christian worship. However, although almost all studies of Christian worship attend to the words spoken and sung, almost none consider how worshippers hear in the liturgical event. In Hearing Our Prayers, Juliette Day draws upon insights from liturgical studies, philosophy, psychology, acoustical science, and architectural studies to investigate how acts of audition occur in Christian worship. The book discusses the different listening strategies worshippers use for speech, chant, and music, as well as for silence and noise: why paying attention in church can be so difficult and how what we hear is affected by the buildings in which worship takes place. Day concludes by identifying "liturgical listening" as a particular type of ritual participation and emphasizes that liturgical listening is foundational for the way in which we pray, and think about God, the church, and the world.