site banner

Small-Scale Question Sunday for December 28, 2025

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

• Do you have a favorite piece of sacred music?

• Is there any piece from a video game or anime which feels like sacred music to you?

Pretty much any version of the Tantum Ergo, so long as it doesn't get too baroque. The O Antiphons of Arvo Part, even though we're into Christmastide now and well out of Advent. Of course the Miserere by Allegri (even if revisions over 'is this the original original version or not?')

Video game music - from Path of Exile, Church Dungeon. Got killed a few times here because so distracted by listening to the music 😁 Reworked version of this.

The Darksiders 2 OST by Jesper Kyd (not surprised that he's already been mentioned) is the first thing that comes to my mind and it is utterly sublime. I still listen to multiple tracks from it!

I have always had a soft spot in my heart for the Christmas carol "Oh Holy Night". Something about it feels hopeful in a way that almost no other sacred music ever has to me.

Jesper Kyd manages to really nail the aesthetic in the Darktide OST.

I've pointed to Cash's Hurt and Air Traffic Controller's Blame, and I'll point to them again. Fastball's The Way is... reeaaaaally fucking dark if you look up the backstory, but it does make the song a little bit more poignant.

For video games and anime, I'm a bit of a basic bitch. Gurren Lagann's Libera Me From Hell and FLCL's I Think I Can aren't ultimate songs -- I'd say not even the best songs from their respective shows -- but the ethos they describe and how they reinforce the themes of the shows are extremely powerful. The Chrono Cross soundtrack is from a pretty meh game and there's nothing special about Scars of Time beyond just being good, but I'd listened to it on repeat a lot in a specific time and trance state, so I don't think I can resist reacting to it now.

I have a real soft spot for Handel's Messiah.

This whole playlist by Fr. Apostolos Hill, especially "Open to me." https://youtube.com/watch?v=nNXfVzRnRyc&list=PLGKKxM9Gk6HeNDYFEsfhzmepx1IEz24OU&index=3

Crucem Santam Subiit

I don't play videogames or watch anime, so no.

Serious Sam 2 - grand cathedral music.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=_4wc2ywFWW4

Also mountains of thunder world of warcraft

https://youtube.com/watch?v=HA11M02xevE

  1. This puts me in a mood and has since I was like 16.

  2. The theme from Halo or something idk

Carlo Gesualdo is one of the few renaissance composers who boasts a “homicide” section in his Wikipedia article, though his life overlaps with Caravaggio who also boasts such a section. A very interesting time for sacred art.

Sacredness is a feeling of deep and important meaning. I'm not religious, so my feelings of sacredness aren't either.

Cat Stevens father and son song. I forgot the exact name. Had a very sacred feel at the time and place in my life I discovered it.

Hello Darkness my old friend song. Gained a more sacred feeling after reading a book series called arkendrithyst (sp?).

The song Africa, but not by Toto, by a choir called perpetuum jazzle or something.

The theme song from Neon Genesis Evangelion, "Cruel Angel's Thesis" always sounded like that to me. Enough so that I get low-key annoyed when people play it in a casual setting.

video game or anime

Elfen Lied's Lilium comes to mind. Also, Starcraft 2's version of Aria has a religious quality to it though the lyrics are quite Roman.