June 15, 2010

• The Lamb’s Supper

  

  Anyone who knows me (and probably those who look at my profile pic!) knows or can at least guess that I absolutely love my Catholic faith. The source and summit of this faith is Jesus Christ, especially as He deigns to come to all mankind (even me!) in the Eucharist. My primary encounter with the Eucharistic Christ, then, always will be the Mass. What I hope to do in this post and the next (and possibly a third) is to share some of my thoughts and reflections on the Mass, sort of my own non-musical version of a “few of my favorite things.” For the sake of simplicity I will be referring mainly to the ordinary Sunday Mass, though I may on occasion point out characteristics of other liturgies.

  1. “The Announcement”

  The Catholic person who attends Mass regularly, at least those most familiar with the Roman Rite, probably will be nodding their head with almost everything I point out. While my name for things may not always coincide with their name for it, they will know we are on the same page. The Announcement, I call it, is innocent enough and varies from parish to parish, and sometimes does not occur at all and things start at #2. The Processional Hymn.

  The Announcement happens when a member of the parish, sometimes the cantor but almost always a very sweet lady, welcomes the people to such-and-such parish, usually announces the particular feast day or the whatever Sunday of Ordinary Time, and may even remind people to turn off or silence cell phones, watch alarms and pagers. The hymn is often announced at this time as well.

  Really, though, the only reason I even bother mentioning The Announcement is because even this tiny little experience of the Mass can be a crucial one. For instance my mother, at the very wise age of 12 (or thereabouts), attended Mass with her Catholic friend (my mother was raised Southern Baptist). My little mother, though she would indeed grow to raise quite a bit of hell, remembers her experience of being Baptist as quite sad, and even at so young an age she was convinced that hell was her final destination, and no amount of going to church ever changed that. 

  So there she was with her friend, standing in the pew as some lady announced, “Welcome to the celebration of the Mass!” “Celebration?” my young mother thought. Sure enough, there was a celebration, with candles and music, with reading from the Bible and sung psalms, with a loving message, with a beautiful communion service…everything she longed for in her own church. When she got home however, my grandparents quickly dashed her hopes of becoming Catholic! Fortunately she married one later, after a certain blogger (me!) came along. It is so strange to think of my mother back then, longing to celebrate her faith in Christ and looking to her own church for that but finding only fear and condemnation, then coming to the Catholic Church with its ancient traditions, its touch of solemnity and all else and realizing that these strange folk she’d been warned about were celebrating the life, death and resurrection of Jesus not just every Sunday, but every single day of the week! Now her whole week is spent waiting for Sunday to celebrate the gift of Christ to the world, to her, and to receive Him personally in the Eucharist, to unite herself to the Lord she loves. So even this technical little step is super important!

  2. “The Processional Hymn”

  When I think of the beginning of the Mass, that short moment of silence when the Announcer is silent and before the organ/piano/choir begins, after everyone has stood up, I can smell the burning scent of charcoal and the faint traces of incense already being carried on the breeze. Children’s eyes are darting everywhere, trying to figure out what is about to happen. Sunlight streams in through stained glass. I imagine God’s first words in Genesis, “Let there be light!” And just as the angel’s surely sang and rejoiced in that first light, so the whole church erupts in song. Soon comes the thurifer, usually a young man swinging the thurible full of incense (though not every parish uses incense). I love the smell of incense, and it is wonderful to imagine the ancient days of the Temple in Jerusalem, when incense was offered to God daily and to connect the Temple of God of those days with the Living Temple of God today.

  Then comes the man or woman bearing the Processional Cross, a crucifix of some kind, reminding us all that we are here first and foremost because of His sacrifice, and we are all called to follow Him to that Cross. Our attention and our hearts are led by the Cross to the sanctuary (the front where the altar is) as the Procession continues. Sometimes the cross bearer is led, flanked, and/or followed by people bearing candles, and I think of how Christ is our light.

  Next often comes a man or woman bearing the Book of the Gospels from which the Gospel reading will come. I think of John 1:1- “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” You can almost imagine the creation of the world: the haze of the formless waste in the smoke of the incense and the sweet promise borne upon the wind, the light of the candles being like the first light of creation, and the Book of the Gospels reminding us of that Living Word there present at the beginning of time.

  Then come any other altar servers, deacons, priests, and finally the celebrant/presider (usually the pastor of the parish, a visitor, or a bishop), all of them in their various liturgical garb, colors and designs depending upon the season: purple for Advent and Lent (and a different shade for each), rose for Gaudete and Latare Sundays during the aforementioned seasons, white for the highest celebrations (Easter!!!!!) and some saints/events (Transfiguration, Mary, St. Joseph, etc.), green for Ordinary Time (though the Mass is HARDLY ordinary!), and red for martyrs or certain “sad” occasions, such as Good Friday. Altar servers often wear a black cassock (a robe-like outfit) with a surplice (a white thing that looks like the top half of a robe). 

  The Procession enters the sanctuary, reverences the altar with a bow, and assumes their places, again depending on their liturgical role. The celebrant usually incenses the altar, blessing it and preparing it for the sacrifice that will come later. Once the hymn is completed, there is another period of anticipatory silence.

  3. “Context”

  The Catholic Mass, as also with most devotions and prayers in the Church, always always always begin the same: “In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.” This is SO important, for what is about to take place cannot be done in any other name! Then the celebrant says, “The Lord be with you,” to which the congregation replies, “And also with you.” There sometimes follows a short message about the day’s feast, the readings, or some other kind of brief welcome, before an invitation for everyone present to reflect on their sins.

  4. “The Penitential Rite”

  A let down after so lovely a start? Not so! I am always reminded of the advice of St. Paul in 1 Cor. 11:27-28- “Therefore whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord unworthily will have to answer for the body and blood of the Lord. A person should examine himself, and so eat the bread and drink the cup.” Here the Church offers us all a chance to follow the teaching of the Apostle and consider our sins. Then we follow the advice of yet another Apostle, James, who says in his letter (5:16)- “Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed,” when we say aloud:

  “I confess to almighty God,
  and to you, my brothers and sisters,
  that I have sinned through my own fault,
  in my thoughts and in my words,
  in what I have done,
  and in what I have failed to do;
  and I ask blessed Mary, ever virgin,
  all the angels and saints,
  and you, my brothers and sisters,
  to pray for me to the Lord, our God.”

  The celebrant says, “May almighty God have mercy on us, forgive us our sins, and bring us to everlasting life,” to which the people reply, “Amen!” Oftentimes there will be a spoken or sung call-and-response of “Lord, have mercy. Christ, have mercy. Lord, have mercy.” If you are super blessed (which you are anyways just being at Mass!) you might even get to speak it or say it in the ancient, ancient Greek, the last remnant of when the whole Mass was in that language: Kyrie eleison. Christe eleison. Kyrie eleison. Some musical arrangements of this part of the Mass are incredibly somber, and sometimes (especially if you’d been particularly sinful, but not so much so that you should have gone to confession before Mass!) you are feeling pretty down on yourself.

  5. “Gloria!”

  Turn that frown upside down, for Christ forgives you! For Christ gave authority over sin to His Apostles (His first priests!) when He breathed the Holy Spirit upon them and said “Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them, and whose sins you retain are retained. (John 20:23)” Now, what should any soul say after being forgiven of their sins? Why say anything when you can sing:

  Glory to God in the highest, 
  and peace to his people on earth. (Luke 2:14)
  Lord God, heavenly King,  almighty God and Father,
  we worship you, we give you thanks, we praise you for your glory.
  Lord Jesus Christ, only Son of the Father, 
  Lord God, Lamb of God,
  you take away the sin of the world:  have mercy on us;
  you are seated at the right hand of the Father:  receive our prayer.
  For you alone are the Holy One,  you alone are the Lord,
  You alone are the Most High,  Jesus Christ,
  with the Holy Spirit,  in the glory of God the Father.  Amen.

  Not only is the Gloria just a wonderful, exultant song of praise, but especially with the opening line we are reminded by the very words of the angels that our God, for the forgiveness of our sins, deigned to descend from heaven and “emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, coming in human likeness; and found human in appearance, he humbled himself, becoming obedient to death, even death on a cross. (Philippians 2:7-8)” We have come out of the Old Testament desert of sin and sorrow and receive our first glimpse of God’s promise fulfilled!

  6. “Let us pray”

  After this beautiful and very ancient hymn there is another brief silence before the celebrant invites everyone to prayer. He then offers the particular prayer for that day, and each day of the year is different, often incorporating some theme relating to the feast/occasion/Gospel for the day. After an “amen” from the people, everyone is seated.

  7. “The Liturgy of the Word”

  Then is proclaimed the First Reading, most often from the Old Testament, though during the Easter Season it is taken from the Acts of the Apostles. Notice I used the word “proclaimed” and not “recited,” “read,” “reenacted” or otherwise related. The way I understand it, Jesus Christ is the Living Word of God; He is not the letters on a page, He is not a wrote recitation of said text, nor is He something to be memorized and repeated to an audience. Rather, and this can be tricky for many lectors, one must lend their powers of speech to the purpose of God, permitting the Living Word to become incarnate in your very body. You become not merely a messenger, but more like an instrument upon which the Song of Salvation is played. So the book with the readings is always present; one never memorizes the reading (you are not offering YOUR word, but the Word of God which is for everyone!). This is what proclamation is for me, just like in ancient days when a man went out into the center of town with a scroll containing the words of the king, crying out in a large voice what are not his own words, but the very word of the ruler, with all the power and authority of that man as though he were there proclaiming his will in person. 

  Thus not only should one proclaim and do so as humbly as possible, but “whoever has ears to hear ought to hear! (Mark 4:9)” I also love how the First Reading always takes us back to our ancestry, to the first workings of God as He lay the foundation for our salvation.

  At the end of the reading the lector says, “The Word of the Lord,” after which the people say, “Thanks be to God!”

  8. “The Psalm”

  Next is the psalm, which is always sung antiphonally. The cantor intones the antiphon, usually a line or an adaptation of a line from the psalm itself, and then invites the congregation to repeat it. Then the cantor sings a verse, everyone sings the antiphon, and this continues until the psalm ends. We thus join in the tradition of King David, the author of the psalms, who constantly sang to God.

  9. “Second Reading”

  This reading always comes from one of the Epistles of the New Testament, teaching us, encouraging us and helping us to put our faith into practice. Here we are taught by the very Apostles who were taught by Jesus Christ, the same teaching preserved by the Church and taught to her people to this day. The same “The Word of the Lord/Thanks be to God” is offered here.

  10. “ALLELUIA!”

  Then there is a great alleluia sung by the cantor, which is repeated by the congregation as they . During this time the celebrant or a deacon/concelebrant (whoever is about to read the Gospel) picks up the Book of the Gospels from the altar, and sometimes two altar servers bearing candles will flank him and stand on either side while he reads. If incense was used in the procession, it will often be used again to bless the book. This alleluia is a cry of joy, for the Word of God is among us, to teach us and nourish us. For myself (and I imagine for many Catholics) part of this joy comes too from knowing that He will feed us not only by His Word…

  11. “The Gospel”

  “The Lord be with you,” says the reader. “And also with you,” the people say. “A reading from the Gospel according to (one of the four),” the reader continues, making a large cross with his thumb upon the page and then upon his own forehead (that he may understand the Word), his lips (that he may speak it) and over his heart (that he may love it and live it). The congregation does the same while saying, “Glory to you, O Lord.” Then the Gospel is proclaimed, followed by, “The Gospel of the Lord,” after which the people say, “Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ.”

  This reminds me again of the importance of proclamation as opposed to mere reading or recitation, for when a person proclaims the Gospel it is merely His instrument; we do not hear the man, but Jesus Christ through the man. Thus when we honor Christ with “Praise to you…” we needn’t worry about that praise going to the reader!

   

  So here we are! We’ve assembled to praise and worship God and to honor His Son, we do so in His name, we offer our sins and confess our sinfulness before everyone present, here on earth and in heaven, be glorify God for His mercy, and then we sit while our Beloved Rabboni teaches us from the Scripture, both Old and New Testament. If you go to Mass every Sunday and weekday for three years, I think you will have proclaimed to you between 70-80% of the entire Bible. This is NO EXCUSE not to study and read it on your own, however!!!!!

  Anyways, my final reflection before I wrap up my post is this: The Liturgy of the Word precedes the Liturgy of the Eucharist, and when I look at the Mass as a whole I see reflected there the overall reality of our salvation. Just as John says in chapter 1 of his Gospel: “In the beginning was the Word…and the Word became flesh.” In the first part of the Mass, the part I have blogged about just now, we have Christ as the Word of God, the Great Promise. In the next part of the Mass that Word becomes Flesh and comes to dwell among us. That is one reason why the Eucharist is so important and central to the Mass and Catholic life; what is the Old Testament anyways if there was no Incarnation? Likewise, why proclaim the Word of God and remind us of His promise if we do not live to see it? The Mass is the combined experience of the entire Bible from Genesis to Revelation (as we’ll see next time I hope!). 

  And as far as charges of the Mass not being biblical, look at all the Bible we’ve covered already! God bless you all and please feel free to ask questions or offer your own reflections!

  • 11:24 pm
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