You know we are all nervous the first time we do something. Thursday evening was no different for me..From the outside everything looks like it went off without a hitch and that is good. Those doing the Mass know what is supposed to happen at a given point.
Mass of the Lord’s Supper
It is simple “do the Red and say the black”. How much easier can it get. And for 95% of the time everything went fine. There were little mistakes and I should have done this while in reality I did something else. But all four of us up there can say that. The end result was a beautiful Thursday Evening Mass of the Last Supper. Doing what it is supposed to do.. bring us right into the Triduum or the “Three days”
There was one thing though I was not prepared for and it was very intimidating… the crowds of people? No Using the incense? no that went off fairly well.. though a few mistakes were done. It was in reality just the large number of vessels to take care of on the altar. Usually at a given Mass there are 4 or 5 ciboria ( the bowls that hold the hosts) and at our parish the precious Blood in the chalices are generally not offered. So I generally have to place the corporals ( the napkins, if you will) 5 ciboria, the Missal, a purificator ( cleaning towel) patten ( Gold plate for the Altar Host) and the Chalice and pall (cover for the chalice). So usually 10 or so items
Sometimes the Quantity scares us
What intimidated me was there were 12 ciboria, the Missal, Altar Host and Patten, Main Chalice, 6 chalices 3 corporals, 7 purificators. 35 items ! Then came 3 priests, 4 altar servers, 9 extra-ordinary ministers. That’s a bit of pressure difference.. oh yeah and in a moment of so the hosts and the wine would all be transubstatiated into our Lord Jesus Christ. Body Blood Soul and Divinity.
It dawned on me a bit later.. what was I worried about? Yeah there were a whole bunch of imperfect men and women up there whose goal it was to bring Jesus to each and every one who came to receive Him. But It isn’t our Mass. We are standing in for Christ the High priest or in my case Christ the Servant. But it is His Mass. We are all doing the best we can. We are making little mistakes we are forgetting to do this thing or the next.
Remember our purpose at Mass
But we are living out the scene at Calvary. Not reliving it, the sacrifice is once and for all) , but we are experiencing the one true sacrifice. The Mass is in a say an ongoing time and space machine. Jesus is continually being sacrificed for His people throughout the ages. When we are at Mass we are there. As the old Hymn goes.. Were you there when they crucified our Lord?… Oh yes we are there each and every Mass Doing this in Remembrance of Him… And when we actually take that step back and remember this… it always causes me to tremble, tremble, tremble
I fear that many do not know this is all part of the Mass. We let the education slip. We tried to make it easier to understand… It is impossible to understand ! Doesn’t matter how you teach it, the human mind cannot comprehend all of these miracles and events that are happening. How can you imagine that each and every baptized man, woman and child throughout all of the ages are there with you at the Mass… We think in terms of time and space. there is not room for the billions of people to be there.. How long will they take to get back to their homes?.
Yet it Happened
But let’s be honest, God though doesn’t make it too easy for us… He gives us the gift of faith and if we accept it we can make some small steps into thinking about it. Without this gift of faith it must be a very dark existence.
If you think about it rationally, there is nothing in the story that makes sense. But in its entirety makes perfect sense. The story goes that God humbled Himself and was made God and man by being born through a virgin. People aren’t born through a virgin… There are two tangoing in this process. But yet it happened.
So then God is a small baby and goes through all of these rituals to consecrate himself.. to… Himself ! Why would he do this? He hardly needs to make himself holy…But it happened.
And then to show His love for us.. he gets nailed to a middle eastern torture device and dies. We can imagine giving up pasta for dinner because our loved one wants rice. Giving our entire life? Yet it happened.
And after 3 days, He rose from the dead That certainly doesn’t happen !.. Yet it happened.
We cannot understand, but Trust
Science cannot explain any of this. Our own personal experiences cannot explain any of this. Nothing that we have can bring us to fully understand any of this. But what I think we have to pull out of all of this is that it is NOT about understanding any of it. It is God simply saying to us.. Trust me.
Yes, your life is difficult.. there is pain, suffering, sickness and natural disasters. God is saying , been there. Peter’s mother-in-law was sick, the blind man saw, the crippled man walked. my friend Lazarus died for 4 days and I cried. Trust me
And we look at our news and we see people killing and people turning their backs on friends, war pestilence… And God says, I saw all kinds of wars between people..Invasions, exiles etc… scattering my family throughout the world. I promised to bring them all together. I brought the nations together. Trust me!
Remember, I was slapped in the face, with a kiss I was abandoned by all but a very very few people, I was sent in front of King’s, governors, religious leaders who did horrible things. They lied, cheated, and used others to further their own desires. I was the scapegoat for their fears, and their ambition.
Trust me, says the Lord. Read through my time when I was there on earth.
I was able to make good out of bad.
I gave you everything you need to go out into the world
and to show a better way for people to act.
I gave you a Church to show what the faith and the
moral law means.
I said that the gates of hell would not prevail against it.
I did not say that these people would be perfect.
They too need support and at times fraternal correction.
But like all humans they are good,
you are right to hold them to a higher level..
but perhaps one should think that perhaps
we should hold ourselves up to a higher level as well.
Sri Lanka Martyrdom
Martyrdom can happen anytime and anyplace. This Easter, people just like you and I living out their lives in Sri Lanka were killed because they were Christian. Suicide bombers took the lives of people at Churches Both Catholic and Protestant and at Hotels in two cities there. We should and must pray for their souls, none of them expected to die yesterday. For the ones who did expect to die, we should also pray for. Their misguided actions to hurt in the name of religion and politics must be condemned. But their souls will need comfort as they come to the next life.
There are many things that God finds repugnant. Anything that takes away the dignity of one of his people He died to bring this dignity to all of His people. Yelling at your family. Whose dignity are you belittling? Not taking the time to forgive past hurts? who are you belittling? Not listening, hearing, figuring you know best how to fix a situation… Do you even listen to what the real problem is? What is the focus of your life? Is it those around you? Or is it just you? God dealt with all of this and showed us the better way. All of this sounds so incredible to even fathom, yet it happened.
An Incredible feeling !
For all of this there is one further thing that we must know and take into account. We saw in Gethsemane that God could even understand what fear was. He felt it all, He saw it all.. And He destroyed it all with one selfless act of love. and the most amazing thing ever that makes or breaks the whole deal.. He died and came back again. His resurrection we are celebrating… People saw him die… people saw him 3 days later.. and then they also saw him Ascend into Heaven. Today we cannot make logical sense out of it. Yet it happened.
In this time, he gave to Holy Spirit to those in the upper room.and that power has been sent down through the ages through the laying on of hands. Today we are still the same human beings, doing the same things.. but we have an opportunity to become more and more like God. We can learn, we can challenge others to learn. We can go out and serve others and we can challenge others to help serve others.
Faith in Action
On Easter itself, I welcomed a lady into our church. She had never been to Saint Patrick’s before. She was visiting her son. So she came to Easter Mass . She was so glad to be able to come to Mass that day. and she started to break down. She had recently lost her husband, this was her first Holiday without her husband…
I was intimidated by 35 pieces of gold and silver on the altar. Until I remembered who I loved and who I trusted, Do I trust perfectly.. no not yet.. I still think too often that I can run things or I can fix things. or I can… well you name it.. I am often guilty. But after time, I recognize that God gave everything He had to save us.. And because God did it.. it is very difficult for us to come up with our own explanations..
But Easter brings us a hard truth. It doesn’t really matter too much what we can explain or how we feel.. What matters is that we killed God on Friday… He rose from the dead on Sunday and we celebrate the gift that we too now have that to look forward to. We too will be raised.. not by our own power, but through the grace and love of God. It may make no sense.. but man it is a great truth for all of us !
Happy Easter to All
Be good, play nice Think God!