Considering the Daily Mass

I spent most of 2013 with the Anglicans. During that time I realized that I wanted something more than worshiping on Sunday. It was a pleasure to attend the Holy Eucharist service on Wednesday evening. But I was unemployed at that time and could've attended services each day if they'd been offered. And would've attended.

That's not the reason I converted to Catholicism, of course. In fact it was barely a consideration. My Mass attendance has been almost exclusively for my Sunday obligation. But this week I attended daily Latin Mass on Monday, Tuesday, Friday and am about to go again today.

Part of my motivation is just that I have the time for it now. But the other, bigger issue is that the Catholic Church teaches there's nothing better you can do than attend Mass in a state of grace and receive the sacrament.

Caring for the poor, feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, defending the defenseless, those things are all wonderful. But they pale in comparison to attending Mass, where the sacrifice transcends time and space to yesterday, today and tomorrow. It's the greatest possible thing anybody can ever do. How much truer must that be when you assist at Mass outside of your usual obligation?

I mean, I understood that much on an intellectual basis. But actually experiencing it puts it all into a different perspective.

For one thing, daily Mass at my parish is sparsely attended. There were enough people there that it didn't feel like it was just me and the priest. But it was nowhere near capacity. I didn't think to count noses but I'd be shocked if even thirty other people attended. To put that in perspective, I've never attended an obligation Mass anywhere that didn't have a large throng of people standing in the back because inevitably there weren't enough seats to go around. So that was a major difference right there.

That gives you a chance to concentrate on the liturgy, the prayers, the Latin, the sacrifice, all of it. I don't want this to sound as snooty as it probably will but when I slummed it with the Anglicans for that year, I became addicted to small numbers of people attending the service.

Understand, I got my fill of vast crowds of people in my evangelical days. I love the idea of huge numbers of people worshiping together... but I don't care to ever experience it firsthand ever again. Well, on weekends, you don't have much of a choice about that. But crowded pews are a virtual non-issue with daily Mass.

That also works on a ranty level for me because invariably people arrive late to Mass. And on weekends, there's a strange, unspoken expectation that I should scoot over and make room for them.

No.

I generally show up for Mass fifteen (or more) minutes early specifically so that I can choose a good seat. I like sitting on the outside when I can. And usually I can. So why should I give up the good seat I arrived early for so that I can give it to someone who arrived late? I don't mind if they sit next to me but they can move around me and sit on the inside of the pew. If they don't like it, they can get there early next time. But I'm not giving up my good spot.

This is another non-issue with daily Mass. There will only be one or two or (at most) three people on any given pew. Everybody has room to stretch out a little. If someone arrives late, it's irrelevant because there will still be plenty of empty pews to choose from.

Related to that stuff, and second, the intimacy of the Mass allows for silence. More people means more people moving. And more people moving means more noise. But thirty (at most) people in a vast space is very silent. You just can't beat the solemn reverence and stillness of the thing.

In a weird kind of way, it's just you and God. You're keenly aware of your sin, your imperfection, your unworthiness. But in the Mass, with the blessed sacrament, your soul is nourished and simultaneously you're giving God the highest possible worship that man is capable of offering. Yes, you're full of sin. But to whatever degree you can offer God true, perfect and holy worship, you're doing it in the Mass. And that's any Mass.

But the silence and the intimacy of daily Mass drives those things home clearer than you can possibly imagine.

Third, and finally, there's clarity of purpose. I've been known to bail on weekend Mass a few minutes early so that I don't have to fight it out in the parking lot with the inevitable gridlock.

That's another non-issue with daily Mass. The lack of traffic in the parking lot means you can stay after Mass for as long as you want. There's not another Mass starting anytime soon to push you out the door. You can bask in the glow of Our Lord's presence, pray in His presence and do your other devotions.

And when you're ready. Not before. Not after. When you're ready you can gather your things and wander casually out the door. There's no rush. There's no competition. You can enjoy the silence and the peace of having just offered God your absolute best worship and absorb the contentment of those things.

I made a few casual observations during the daily Masses I've attended so far. One of them is that it tends to be the same bunch of people who attend each day. Not to flatter myself but I suppose those who attend daily Mass are the "hardliners". Certainly the others in attendance have a very serious air about them.

I've said in previous entries that generally only about 10% of Christians are truly committed to the faith. Catholic or non-Catholic, only one in ten truly abides by the faith to the best of their ability.

That number might be less accurate at one of the FSSP parishes like the one I attend as it's a more specialized type of worship. I do, however, believe the 10% number is true in general.

Receiving the sacrament is a much faster process, obviously, with such a small number of people there. It's generally over after maybe five minutes. And obviously only the priest will administer it in the traditional Rite. When I go to Novus Ordo parishes, I always sit in the section where the sacrament will be administered by a priest but that's already taken care of at my FSSP parish. Nobody but a priest will ever administer it there, no matter how long it takes. And with daily Mass it just doesn't take very long.

Mind you, nothing's perfect in life. Daily Mass is invariably low Mass. I love high Mass the most but it's just not practical to do that for daily Mass. So there's no incense and there's no chanting.

But there's also no Sign of Peace either. I'm not exactly a people person so to me it's actually a relief to not have to mingle with strangers. This is likely a character flaw on my part. And perhaps it's something I should work on. But in the here and now, I like keeping my distance and my silence. Some people say that it's better to be thought anti-social than to keep your mouth shut and remove all doubt. But distance is my tendency.

All of this is an incredibly long way of encouraging attendance at daily Mass. Go when you can. I realize we all have to work for a living and so daily Mass may not fit in with everybody's schedule. Heck, it's probably not going to fit in with my schedule much longer.

But there's simply no matching the serenity and contentment of offering God your very best on a completely voluntary basis.

Now excuse me, I'm off to daily Mass.

An Evangelical Responds

One thing I've noticed over the course of my life is that I don't get to make any decision for free. What I mean by that is if I were to decide to double-knot my shoelaces, somebody would come along and demand an explanation as to why I dare have the temerity to not single-knot like everybody else does.

It extends to everything. My career choices, my romantic life, my hobbies, everything.

Coming from a Protestant background as I do, there's no reason to think religious issues should be any different.

I recently shared an article about Sola Scriptura on Facebook. I've made similar arguments myself, both on this blog and in other venues. Simply put, I find Sola Sciptura to be a logical dead end. If the Bible is one's sole source of religious authority... who put the Bible together and what gives them the authority to decide what is and is not canon?

Shouldn't the Sola Scriptura approach be to decide one's personal canon for oneself - or do Protestants already do that?

I wasn't necessarily expecting an outpouring of support, you understand. I just thought it was food for thought and left it at that. But that wasn't good enough for one Facebook friend.

I should pause here and say he and I aren't really "friends" at all. We have mutual friends from my old days at Southern Baptist Church #2 but we have no real relationship between one another.

The only reason he friended me on Facebook is because of the aforementioned mutual friends. He sent me a PM to ask why I never attend any SBC Church #2 functions or attend services there in spite of the fact that I remain a member of their Facebook group. I answered him as well as I could. "The answer I don't attend church there is because Catholic."

In reply I received a sort of invasive series of questions from this guy regarding my faith and Church membership. It wasn't exactly rude but it did seem a little nosy. Our brief correspondence wrapped up with an invitation back to SB Church #2 for some "ecumenical dialogue".

Now, I might've been born at night. But it wasn't last night. I'm next door to positive that if I were foolish enough to show my face at SB Church #2 again, quite apart from seeing a lot of faces from SB Church #1 (my original cause for leaving SB Church #2), I'd be immediately set upon by well-intentioned dunderheads demanding an explanation to some list of Questions to Ask Catholics someone Googled. I have no idea how this blog comes off but, trust me, I'm not apologist. This is a setup.

No thanks.

Besides, SB Church #2 only has services on Sunday morning. If my Sunday morning wasn't occupied by work, I'd attend Latin Mass at my FSSP parish. So no matter what, I'm not going back to SB Church #2. I love the people there but the Catholic faith is where I was always meant to be.

To get back on task though, this guy posted a series of comments to the Sola Scriptura article I shared. It ended up becoming a bit of a back and forth discussion between the two of us. Near the end (or is it merely a pause?) he shifted the subject from Sola Scriptura to Sola Fide.

In essence, he jumped from "the sole source of religious authority" to "the sole source of salvation". Which may be an interesting discussion to have some time. But that isn't the discussion at hand.

All of which is a very long way of saying this objector is the latest in a long line of opposition I've encountered. What makes this situation somewhat unique is that it comes from a complete stranger. Which I found to rather amusing in an aggravating sort of way.

Considering Anglican Use

RCIA with the priest from the FSSP parish has been going along nicely. Still, he raised a few good points on Friday night that I've tried to ignore.

The fact is my Mass attendance sucks. There's no nice way to say it so there it is. I've been to the low Mass in Latin a few times but basically my attendance has really dropped off, especially in the past several weeks.

Now, to be fair I DO work on weekends. And that makes it kind of challenging to go to Mass and fulfill my obligation. Difficult. But not impossible. If I'd really wanted to go, I could've.

But there is no Mass in Latin at a realistic time and location to make going on Saturday or Sunday feasible. And obviously I'd rather not go to the Novus Ordo Mass.

Now, that's not to be taken as anti-Novus Ordo or anything. I'm just saying I prefer Mass in Latin, and, apparently, would rather not go if it's not in Latin.

A conundrum.

But then I had a realization a few days ago. As far as I could remember, my office HAS to be fairly close to this one Anglican Use parish I know about so I decided to check it out. And sure enough, it's ridiculously close to my office. So I could go there after work on Saturdays and fulfill my obligation. And it wouldn't even be all that hard to get there either.

Now, as I've said, I did indeed leave the Anglican church. And the reason for that is because it's not the church Our Lord founded. It's not that I don't like it. Quite the opposite! I love it. I believe that Anglican liturgy is one of the finest around. But you're either in communion with the Pope or you're not. And if you're not, why should I bother?

That's what makes the Anglican Use parish so cool. Best of both worlds! So my plan is to get an idea of their dress code. See, my office has one of the most lax dress codes you've ever heard of. The thing is that after a while, "casual" becomes the dress code. So if you show up to work dressed like you're about to go to church... well, that's not a good thing, now is it?

So what I'll probably have to do is bring a change of clothes with me to work so that I can fit in at both places. People have to make sacrifices greater than that to go to church all the time so I shouldn't complain.

I'm actually really excited about this. I've always believed the Anglicans have a lot to contribute to Catholicism. My only regret is that I can't attend an Anglican Use parish nearer to my home. But at least I've got the FSSP parish nearby.

It's hard not to feel really blessed right now.

My Catholic Year- The Traditional Latin Mass, The Ancient Way

How about a REAL update on My Catholic Year?

I said in my last post that I'm not terribly interested in bickering over liturgy. What I'm convinced of is that evangelical liturgy (and yes, they DO have a liturgy; their refusal to put it in writing doesn't change the facts) is weak sauce and often hypocritical. Beyond that, your liturgy of preference is between you and your God.

That having been said, I went to the Traditional Latin Mass this morning at that FSSP parish this morning and HOLY CRAP!!!

When I was slumming it with the Anglicans, I REALLY enjoyed the High Church services they did. It wasn't as High as it might've been but I figured it was still pretty good. But if you've ever been to the TLM before, you know that it blows the doors off the Anglican liturgy, duct tapes them back on and blows the doors off again.

Anglicanism ruined me for evangelical Christian worship. The Traditional Latin Mass has ruined me for every other liturgy. THIS is what I want from my worship. It all feels so ancient and reverential and, most of all, AUTHENTIC.

With all due respect to Pope Paul VI, I have no idea how or why the Church could ever go from the TLM to the Novus Ordo. Having now been to both, I can understand why people are so partisan about it these days. I don't think it's worth the grief and bloodletting it's caused over the years, you understand; I'm just saying I understand why people can get so fired about it.

From the standpoint of communion, part of why the TLM works for me is because it's primarily in a dead language. Yes, the homily and related matters are in whatever language they're in. But by and large, the Mass is in Latin. Apart from the mystery aspect of it, there is (or would be) solidarity in knowing that basically all of us are having basically the exact same Mass in basically the exact same way. It'd be as mysterious to me as it is everywhere else in the world.

Obviously that isn't how things are right now. I'm just saying it'd be nice.

I've never questioned my decision to join the Church. But at the same time, I've also never been more positive of where I'm supposed to be.

Apart from that, I made plans with Father Charles to meet later this week. My work schedule has changed so I probably won't be able to make it to Mass on Sunday for a long while (which I'm not happy about, especially now, but it's the hand I've been dealt) but he said he's willing to meet with me one-on-one and go through the Catechism with me so that I can pick up basically where I left off in RCIA.

Besides all that, I have every Thursday and Friday off from work now so I can still go to Mass on those days. Being as Father Charles is hopefully going to be my mentor through this whole process, I'm thinking my lack of attendance on Sunday won't be a major problem for him. My guess is that it'll be a fairly Low Mass on those days (although I'd love to be wrong!).

Just heard a major rumble of thunder outside so I guess I'd better call it a night.

My Catholic Year Update

Man, been a long time since I updated this thing. As usual, there's not been much to say so I didn't bother updating. Until recently, that is, when a few interesting things came down the pipeline. So now's not a bad time to talk about some of that stuff.

For one thing, as I've said again and again, I haven't been able to attend RCIA at the Catholic parish I've mentioned a few times because of my work schedule. But we recently did a shift bid at my office and so my schedule has changed. My Thursday nights are now free. It's my Sunday mornings that are unavailable now.

No, it's not an ideal situation since RCIA requires Thursday nights AND Sunday mornings to be free. But it changes the equation at least a little.

Another thing is that I decided to wash my hands of the Catholic parish I'd been attending. I love the Church and I submit to her authority, don't get me wrong, but it really felt like they weren't even TRYING to meet me halfway on this. They have a model and they're sticking to it no matter what.

My decision to find a different parish coincides with moving to a slightly different part of town. There are two different parishes nearby. One is part of the FSSP. The FSSP's big claim to fame is their preference for the Latin Mass. I've written about the Latin Mass before but I've never really been to one before. But I really like what I know and what seen of it.

I must be honest though, there's an incredibly High Church Anglo-Catholic parish near my new apartment and it was VERY tempting to start going there. I rationalized that I really tried to join up with the REAL Church but they didn't seem interested in having me.

In the end though, that seemed like an excuse. I like Anglican liturgy more than the language and liturgy currently employed in most Catholic Masses, it's true, but that's not a good justification for turning my back on the Church. Ultimately, communion with the Church founded by Our Lord is more important than liturgy. Besides, I figured I could find an FSSP parish and try my luck with them.

So that's what I did today. I called the pastor of that FSSP parish, explained my problem and the impression I got from him is that he's surprised that this tiny problem has gotten as big as it has (and he's not alone on that either). But no matter what, he said he'd be open to meeting with me and working through the Catechism of the Catholic Church with me in lieu of a standard RCIA arrangement.

Just like that! He said that to a total stranger like me! How awesome is that? The guy couldn't pick me out of a police lineup if his life depended on it but he agreed to help anyway.

I'm still in the process of getting things sorted out in terms of moving from my old place into my new apartment so all my nice clothes aren't in my closet yet. So there's probably no way to manage going to the Latin Mass tomorrow. But I can definitely work it out next week.

There have been some hiccups along the way. This whole process turned out to be a lot bumpier than I was originally expecting. But I'm making progress here and that's ultimately what counts the most.