I was at a wedding yesterday of Christian friend I met before my apostasy. The service left me wistful, reminding me that I did enjoy some of the music. The lead musician was even a trumpeter, a role I used to play. I had to suppress the impulse to go and snatch the instrument away from him when it became clear that his lips were tiring and he wasn't quite able to keep the higher notes on pitch without the occasional warble.

Me too. Although I am conflicted about performing it, and try to draw some lines in doing so: if it's being played as concert music outside a religious context generally I will, but in a context where it will be understood as a religious expression/promoting religious values, I generally won't...

Thirded. I can't say I like the entire genre, but Bach's Johannes Passion (BTW a great recording, the closest I heard to the version used in Tarkovsky's 'Mirror') and Arvo Pärt's Te Deum and De Profundis are sublime.

For some reason, I really like H.E.R.R.'s The Meek Shall Inherit the Earth, which is pretty much pure praise to God. There's something appealing in the image of an innocent and completely devoted singer that the song evokes.

It's not all that surprising to me. Some of our best music has long been Christian. "Christian Rock" is a strange anomaly.

Five Iron Frenzy is some of the best of third-wave ska, and they're an explicitly Christian band with Christian subject matter.

And, of course, Black Sabbath had Ozzy in the character of the devil and used Christian themes extensively.

It shouldn't really be that surprising; there's an awful lot of church music, after all -- it was a very important and greatly admired genre for many many years. (Not so much now, though composers still write masses and requiems every now and then.)

Is that really the link you intended? It seems to go to a performance by Paul Simon of his "American Tune", which doesn't (so far as I can tell) have anything to do with non-Christians liking church music.

Paul Simon does, however, seem to be a non-Christian who likes church music; one of the tracks on Simon and Garfunkel's first album was a version of a Benedictus setting by Orlando di Lasso.