How do you pray? Does your prayer transcend your daily experiences and your emotions, or do you find yourself praying in the context of the mayhem of your own life and heart?
I’m sure for many people it’s both. It’s a gift of God’s grace against our own will to be at peace in our meditation and contemplation.
The transcendent quality of chant and polyphony is what draws many to it. There’s nothing overly emotional or chaotic about chant and polyphony. It’s sacred by both virtue of its text and the transcendent style. Contrast a chant to the bombastic “I Am the Bread of Life” and you get the idea. One’s a screamer in the first person, the other a simple melody with it’s only context being it’s been sung in Catholic liturgies for centuries.