Chronic Murmuring

Catholic Visit

Keeping with my tradition of visiting other churches in town on weekends where Paige and Miles are out of town, I visited St. Joseph's Catholic Church on Prince Avenue this morning. I hadn't planned on doing that, actually, but because I was late leaving the house, I couldn't make the 10:30 service of my own church, Redeemer Presbyterian Church. The only other service I was able to attend was the 11:45am service at St. Joseph's, and since I didn't want to attend an evening service at a random church in town, I thought it was a convenient opportunity to worship at a Catholic church. So I went.

St. Joseph's is rumored to currently be up for sale. The first rumor I heard was that the lead pastor had secretly sold the property behind the backs of the congregation, and that the congregation was in an uproar about this. I later learned that this wasn't true, and that the property was neither being secretly sold behind the backs of the congregation, nor that it was official that it would indeed be sold. As of this point, I don't know what is going to happen there. I did read in the newspaper several months ago, though, that it was likely to leave it's place on Prince Avenue. If so, it will be unfortunate, as the Spanish-styled building is breath-taking in terms of its architecture. You can read more about the history of the church here if you want.

I know very little about Catholic theology except what I've read by Reformed polemicists. I make a conscious effort to suppress that knowledge, though, as I try to get a more in-depth sense of the current state of affairs in Catholicism. Having said that, I was surprised by the fact that I found very little of what I explicitly experienced in mass today to be offensive to me. As is the case with other liturgically-centered worship services I've attended, the worship service was saturated in Scripture. So much so that I found myself able to participate in much of the singing and recitations simply because I knew the Scripture being sung or spoken, despite not really knowing ever where I was in the procession of the liturgy. This is always the problem I keep experiencing when worshipping at a liturigical body for the first time. I never know what to expect, nor at what place we are in worship, nor which book I should be using. St. Joseph's did not pass out bulletins this morning, oddly, which only worsened that problem of mine. But, they did display the numbers of the hymns, and since I did have memorized most of the Scripture we sang and read, and because I can pick up a tune fairly easily, the discomfort and anxiety I experienced by the liturgy was far less than what I had experienced at a Greek Orthodox worship service, or even an Anglican one.

As I was saying, there was nothing that explicitly offended me by the service. Most of it seemed to be nothing more nor less than Scripture reading, scripture singing, and the experience of the sacrament. Whether this is wrong or not, I had decided to partake of the Lord's Supper this morning, despite knowing ahead of time that Catholics usually practice closed communion. Eventually, I will need to wrestle with the ethics of that, since I think they presume some self-monitoring on the part of the person taking the supper. But my own theological views is that it's not right for a baptized disciple of Christ to be denied the Lord's Supper, ever, except for situations in which the person is under discipline from a body. Since none of that applies to me, I feel more comfortable ignoring their presumption and taking the Lord's Supper. But if they had made some mention of closed communion, I had also planned to obey their wishes. Since they did not, I took it.

I am glad that I was able to, since mass is a very powerful experience. I prefer taking the eucharist by lining up and taking the bread from the priest/preacher at the front of the church, along with the other members, as well as drinking from a common cup. I feel that this is a more appropriate way to do things, since taking each on the pew, phenomenologically, seems to me to only reinforce the idea that communion is a private exercise. Communion in my mind is primarily a communal event, something which the act of standing in line and taking it together reinforces. Plus, it seems that changes in posture has an effect on one's understanding of the events around us, which is also why I prefer kneelers and points in the liturgy in which we all kneel together. Not only does it seem more appropriate to kneel when in the presence of our King, it also reminds me that I am in the presence of someone to whom I must bow and pay my allegiance. But these are minor points, and in some ways, may even be subjective and prone to change as I continue to change. Today I may prefer these things; but tomorrow I may not. At this point, though, I do prefer them.

The only complaint I had about the service was the blandness of the homily. The homily was on Jesus's family, and the priest noted that even Jesus's family had its problems. He gave as this example the story of Jesus staying behind, as a young man, to teach in the temple, and Joseph and Mary walking on without him, but believing Jesus was with them in the caravan. I wrote down the following points from the sermon (on my hand, since I didn't have a bulletin):

Give family the love they deserve. Do not let the freedom we enjoy among our family to become opportunities to mistreat them. Reserve your kindest words and actions for Paige, then Miles. Be reconciled with your family.

While these are all excellent points that I need to be reminded of, they are disappointing when one considers that they served as the core of the sermon itself. There was no mention, really, of Jesus Christ, nor of his love for me, nor of anything in the way of the gospel. The sermon amounted to not much more than good advice and morality. I would need to visit this church more to gauge whether this was an off day or not, but personally, I found that to be lacking.

But the good thing about liturgy is that it makes up for weaknesses in the preacher's presentation. Whereas in Presbyterianism, so much depends upon the sermon, this is not the case with Catholicism, Lutheranism, Anglicicanism nor Orthodoxy. In those four, from what I can gather and have experienced, the frozen nature of liturgy allows one to participate fully in the full expression of the gospel, each week. The fact that communion is offered each week only succeeds in deepening that experience. So, what I did not get from the sermon today, I did get from mass. And for that, I was strengthened in my faith and my willingness to follow Christ.

There were small things I thought were interesting. For instance, when mass was concluding, an altar boy carrying a large cross, composed of nearly 10 foot long wooden sticks and a facsimile of Jesus nailed to the middle, faced the crowd, then turned his back to us. At that moment, Jesus on the cross had his back to us, the congregation, and it seemed as though a throng of people were following him wherever he took us. Symbolically, it was interesting and effective. I realized that the service placed me behind Jesus, following him wherever he would go. The music was also excellent. This is another feature of the "high church" services I've attended that has impressed me.

I'm still not quite sure why I'm doing this - visiting all the different churches and traditions in town - but I see some value to it. Sometimes, I like to think of Christendom as being defined, not by geography and political entities as it had been during the Middle Ages, but by these disparate church traditions. So, just as a young man might go on a 6-month trek across Europe to see the world, I find myself wanting to do the same with Christendom. I visit these different traditions sometimes simply out of curiousity for what I'll find. Why do they do the things they do? What effect does it seem to have on me to do things this way instead of how I am accustomed to it? Ideally I would like to possess a more thorough understanding of each tradition's theology, but getting to that point seems unlikely in the near future. But one day, I will attend seminary (even if only through correspondence courses) and I will hopefully get a better sense of church history and dogmatics, as well as biblical theology, which I believe will help answer many of the questions I have about Scripture, church, and kingdom. Until then, I'll remain Presbyterian, probably haunt a few local churches outside my tradition, and be somewhat restless.

Posted by scott at December 28, 2003 01:22 PM | TrackBack