Bishop Barron's the Mass Weekly Topics Display
St. Catherine of Siena Liturgical Renewal Effort: September 2018 – May 2019 Join us in our many activities!
BISHOP BARRON'S THE MASS This video series provides a once-a-month way to slowly digest and discuss a renewal of our practice of the liturgy. All are invited to our "viewing parties" held in the chapel with refreshments and discussion immediately following in the gathering space. See the website for a complete calendar of events.
WEEKLY TOPICS These topics are a way for us to more regularly, once a week, dive into important aspects of the liturgy from start to finish. We will present a one-page explanation of each topic in three ways: 1. We will read it to the congregation immediately before mass starts, at every mass; 2. It will be printed in the weekly bulletin; 3. We will post the entire series of topics on our website.
DISPLAY COMMUNICATIONS You will see several banners for display in the entrance and gathering space, emphasizing our renewal effort. This artwork will be used as a graphic on the bulletin and the website.
SPEAKERS Several nationally known speakers will help us kick off and continue the renewal effort. Tim O'Malley will speak on September 13th and serve as our kickoff speaker. We will engage a second speaker for some time around March 21, 2019.
BOOK GROUPS All are encouraged to start or join book groups. See the back of this flyer for our book recommendations. Parish council members and our priests will jointly lead open-invitation book groups for each book.
SOCIAL MEDIA NUGGETS The Campus Ministry will promote our weekly topics, sayings from the book group texts, and events to underscore the renewal effort from Sept 2018 – May 2019.
PETITIONS AT MASS Every week, Parish Council will offer a petition for the deepening of our relationship with Christ through the liturgy. St. Catherine of Siena Newman Center Fall 2018 Book Club Recommendations This fall, the Parish Council and Campus Ministry are leading a parish-wide effort of deeper reflection on the meaning of liturgy. The books below are recommended for book clubs. Parish Council members will also be leading weekly book clubs open to everyone.
Easy Bored Again Catholic: How the Mass Could Save Your Life by Tim O’Malley We want the Mass to entertain, make us laugh, give us foot tapping music and sound-bite theology, and get it done in under an hour. Yet every Sunday many of us tune out. Author Tim O’Malley, in a series of easy-to-digest reflections on every part of the Mass, challenges us to turn the idea of boredom on its head, calling boredom the good boredom that opens us to the quiet interior space where we can encounter God a sweet gift. It is there that full participation in the Mass becomes possible the potential to be transfixed by a ritual, to contemplate the readings, to savor the Eucharist. To be fruitfully bored again. OPEN BOOK CLUB: Mondays @ 7pm with Fr. Lukasz
Medium The Lamb’s Supper: The Mass as Heaven on Earth by Scott Hahn This book describes how the early Christians’ key to understanding the mysteries of the Mass was the New Testament Book of Revelation. With its bizarre imagery, its mystic visions of heaven, and its end-of- time prophecies, Revelation mirrors the sacrifice and celebration of the Eucharist. Written in clear, direct, enthusiastic language, bestselling Catholic author Scott Hahn’s new book will help readers see the Mass with new eyes, pray the liturgy with a renewed heart, and enter into the Mass more fully. OPEN BOOK CLUB: Tuesdays @ 7pm with Fr. Marcin
Difficult The Wellspring of Worship by Jean Corbon, OP For those not afraid to dive into deeper theology, Jean Corbon’s watershed book explores the poetic, transcendent language of the Church, especially the Greek words describing the liturgy. The primary writer of Section 4 (On Prayer) of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, Corbon’s deeply theological and accessible writing has been praised by St. Pope John Paul II and Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI. This rewarding read is sure to positively influence and deepen your understanding of the liturgy and God. OPEN BOOK CLUB: Tuesdays @ 7pm with Fr. Jacek Week 2: What is the Liturgy?
At the beginning of our six-month journey to be er celebrate the liturgy, we must ask ourselves a ques on. What exactly do we mean by the word “liturgy”? We o en think of this term and the word “mass” to mean the prayers and rituals we do here on Sunday – what Protestants would call a “service.” But is that all it is?
Christ became man to open up a true communion with God. His mission was not to simply give us a new philosophy, new gestures and new prayers to say together. The pagan world in Jesus’s me had plenty of rituals already. We Catholics believe that God humbly became man in order to share his very self, his deep mysteries, his boundless love for his crea on.
Liturgy is what God established for us to have a rela onship with him. The mass is our deepest celebra on of the liturgy. I’d like to repeat that. Liturgy is the very means God established for us to have a right rela onship with him, and the mass is our deepest celebra on of the liturgy.
One of the books currently being read in our Newman Center book clubs is called Wellspring of Worship, and in it the Dominican author, Jean Corbon, writes poe cally about how liturgy is like a river flowing from and returning back to God. You can imagine that if you step into the river of the liturgy, you are carried by its current, and when you emerge, you are in a new place. Liturgy is transforma ve.
Does it inspire awe in you that we have access to the creator of all things right here in this chapel? And yet, do you ever find yourself distracted or dozing off? I would like to re-ignite my amazement over the liturgy we celebrate together. L et us today allow ourselves to be awed by the fact that God is present here in the prayers, readings, and Eucharist.
Week 3: Sanctity of the Chapel
Father Romano Guardini, perhaps the most influential Roman Catholic writer on the renewal of liturgy, wrote his important book Spirit of the Liturgy in 1918. He writes: “The primary and exclusive aim of the liturgy is not the expression of the individual’s reverence and worship for God. It is not even concerned with the awakening, formation, and sanctification of the individual soul as such… In the liturgy God is to be honored by the body of the faithful, and the latter is in its turn to derive sanctification from this act of worship.”
It is hard for modern Americans like us to think that something we are going to do isn’t about us – that this thing isn’t even concerned with our individual long-term benefit. We live in a world where we make thousands of choices each day – most of them driven by what gives me some type of benefit. Of course, we believe that going to mass DOES give us some benefit in the end, but this isn’t the GOAL of the liturgy.
So why do we participate in the liturgy? In Guardini’s words, it is to be a part of the greater body of souls, the Church with a capital C, that honors and worships God. Nothing more - it’s simply to worship the great creator.
The first step is to enter the chapel, the special sanctuary of Christ and the liturgy, and stop thinking about ourselves. This takes effort. We often see those we know and love, and want to say hi, maybe share a story from our week. But this is what the gathering space is for – before and after mass. The chapel is a place specifically made to honor and worship God, to unite ourselves with Christ’s great sacrifice. It looks different than other spaces – everything in the room is oriented to the sacrificial altar. The ceiling is raised as a way to bring our prayers closer to God. The Blessed Sacrament is kept in a place of honor in the tabernacle. Where else in our world do we encounter such a markedly different space?
How can you and I today consider and honor the special place of the chapel? Each week, as we enter this space, we are given the opportunity to shed the cares and preoccupations that chain us to our daily worries. We have the chance to turn our complete focus to something so much greater than ourselves. Week 4: Entering the Chapel and Blessing Ourselves
Do you ever wonder what to do with yourself before mass starts? Are you the type of person, like many of us, who likes to time it just right and get to mass just before the entrance procession? If we see mass as another appointment during our week, this makes sense, but if we begin to revere this time to actually encounter our Lord, the short time before mass can become an important moment, not to be rushed.
When we Catholics enter our sacred space – this chapel – we perform three important actions that we call rituals. We bless ourselves with holy water, we genuflect before the tabernacle, and we say a silent prayer to prepare ourselves for the mass. I invite you today to think about how these rituals prepare you for the awesome liturgy that’s about to happen, and to do them intentionally each week.
It’s no accident that the holy water is located in the baptismal font. When we dip our fingers into this water and bless ourselves, we are re-affirming our baptism in the Catholic Church. We mark ourselves with the sign of the cross upon which Jesus made his sacrifice, and acknowledge that we belong to God. After all, I did not baptize myself in the Church – it is the power and gift of God to bind us to Him. What goes through your mind when you bless yourself with holy water? Most of us probably recite “in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,” which is appropriate. But we might also add “I leave myself outside this chapel and offer all I am to you, O Lord.” We are putting aside any idea that we belong only to ourselves and our desires – that we, together with everyone else in the chapel, must constantly re- dedicate ourselves to God. Week 5: Genuflection and Silent Prayer
When we enter the chapel, we perform three rituals: we bless ourselves with holy water, genuflect, and say a silent prayer.
When we genuflect towards the tabernacle, we acknowledge that the sacred body of Christ resides in this house. The Church teaches that we bend the right knee for this genuflection (although both knees when the Blessed Sacrament is exposed during the consecration). It’s not meant to be a cursory gesture of belonging, like a secret handshake in a club, or something Catholics just do. This is meant to represent our true attitude of reverence before God, a posture of dependence upon Him. This is an excellent time to practice being humble in the presence of our creator. In our chapel, the tabernacle exists in the Blessed Sacrament Chapel, which is the direction in which we genuflect. It’s also respectful to bow before the altar when crossing in front of it in acknowledgement of the sacrificial meal that takes place there.
Our third ritual before mass is to say a silent prayer to God. Why would we say a silent prayer when we’re about to spend an hour praying to Him? This time with God can be special for each one of us – before we enter the liturgy of the mass collectively. You might choose to thank God for the incredible opportunity to be a Catholic and encounter him in this space. You might choose to ask for His help in calming your mind and spirit in preparation for this holy encounter. Or, you might simply continue your daily dialogue with Him, acknowledging that this encounter with him is special, elevated, and different from the rest of our everyday existence.
Week 6: Silence
I hope you don’t mind if today I talk to you about silence. Some of you might be thinking, why silence? It seems, well, rather boring, doesn’t it?
There are three main reasons we are taught that there is a benefit to silence. First and most important, when you calm your mind and spirit you can hear the voice of God and observe Him working in others. After all, we have to stop talking in order to listen to someone else. God is constantly at work in the world and He is constantly speaking to us. Sadly, we are often not quiet enough to hear or even notice.
Second, the practice of silence involves a healthy self-restraint. I’m not suggesting that any kind of self- deprivation is good. Keeping ourselves from doing something we want to do only makes sense when it’s done to put someone else first. Especially if that someone else is God. For example, we could all stop watching cartoons tomorrow, but that type of restraint is meaningless. Restraint is only meaningful spiritually if it is done in order to leave space for God to act in our lives.
The third reason silence is beneficial is that the Bible and the saints warn incessantly about the evil power of an unguarded tongue. In this vein of thought, silence is a way to practice good, prevent evil, and benefit the soul.
So, silence is both a bit of an internal struggle and a way to turn outward and listen more intently.
Do we need to be silent all the time in the chapel? Of course not – we are all asked to sing our praise to God with songs at mass and to speak the prayers and responses of the liturgy. But I invite you to practice the restraint needed to avoid talking or whispering when in the chapel – before, during, and after mass. This self-restraint provides God with the space to act in the Liturgy. We have a lovely gathering space and endless activities where fellowship is encouraged, so please also use these opportunities.
One final note for families with children: it’s inevitable that children cannot practice the same self- restraint it takes to stay silent. Speakers and chairs are available in the gathering space for you to still participate in the liturgy while respecting the silence of the chapel. And for all of us, it is important to allow for the occasional noise that might surface in the chapel and keep our focus on the right worship of God.
PAUSE
Please join us in the chapel this coming Thursday night at 7pm for the screening of Part 2 of Bishop Barron’s six-part series, The Mass. Week 7: The Entrance Hymn
A wondrous thing happens when the priest, processional cross, and other ministers appear in the doorway of the chapel and begin to walk toward the altar. We break into song. Why do we do this? Imagine if you started every meeting at work with an entrance hymn to the board room. Or the whole movie theater broke into song right when the movie started (Rocky Horror Picture Show notwithstanding). The difference of course, is that Christ is here. Surely in the form of the Blessed Sacrament and in the very Word of God we will read, but also as He said in Matthew’s gospel “where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them.” We are singing to Him.
How else can we possibly greet our Savior? Together, the priest and congregation start the celebration of the liturgy by singing out in one voice to Christ. After all, we came here to be with Him.
Shown in the earliest records of the Roman Catholic Rite, an entrance hymn was sung as the priests and liturgical ministers came to the altar from the sacristy. Early Christians sang part of the psalms – a tradition the Church continues to this day. You’ll see in your Breaking Bread missals a bolded verse at the beginning of each Mass, before the readings. This is called the Introit, which simply means Entrance, and in many Catholic churches around the world, this is either sung, chanted, or spoken as the entrance hymn.
I invite you to wholeheartedly join in the entrance hymn at this mass and every mass. Know that you are singing directly to Christ as his servant. We all sing together, millions of us around the world, drastically different from one another in language, shape, color, and politics, yet joined as one Church. We sing together every Sunday, opening our liturgy in song, as befits a King. Week 8: Greeting
The priest’s first words of greeting for us at mass, after he has bowed to the altar and stood in front of his chair, recognize us as his brethren in faith. Our response is to bestow a blessing upon him: “and with your spirit.” With these words, which we repeat throughout the mass, we recognize the special role our priests serve as the “mouthpiece and heart of Christ.” They bear the awesome responsibility of having Christ, actually present here in this mass, work through their hands and respond to their prayers in the consecration of the bread and wine. This mystical union of the priest, our prayerful congregation, and Christ is the way we commune with God. All of us are caught up in the liturgy thanks to the action of the Holy Spirit.
Thus, “and with your spirit” refers to the priest’s human spirit, the spirit of Christ who works through the priest, and the Holy Spirit who is active within all of us as we celebrate the mass.
I invite you to consider and recognize this mystical relationship when you greet and bless the priest by saying, “and with your spirit.” We participate more fully in the liturgy when we pour our hearts into this phrase and see that it is not just another “hope you’re doing well” and “right back at you” conversation. Every sentence, ritual, and gesture of our Catholic mass is purposeful and prayerful.
Week 9: Penitential Act
The part of mass after the priest greets us and we bless him with “and with your spirit” is called the penitential act. Being penitent means showing that you are sorry for having done something wrong – in this case, having sinned against God. Our penitential act is one in our hearts, and the priest invites us to examine ourselves in a moment of silence.
The purpose of this self-examination is to acknowledge our shortcomings and our need for God’s mercy. It is not to make us feel bad about ourselves. Quite the contrary: it can be a joyful, freeing feeling to put yourself completely at the feet of our God who never tires of lifting you up and bestowing upon you every blessing.
When we join together to pray the penitential act, we level ourselves – no one greater and no one lesser than the person next to them. It’s not by chance that we pray again as one Church like we did in our entrance hymn and we will continue to do throughout the liturgy. The liturgy acts upon us as a new people in a new covenant with God. Our degrees, achievements, losses, and disappointments no longer matter when we clean our hearts before our God and acknowledge Him as king and master.
These are the words that we pray: “I confess to almighty God and to you, my brothers and sisters, that I have greatly sinned, in my thoughts and in my words, in what I have done and in what I have failed to do,
You and I are asked to use the moment of sacred silence in the penitential act to be honest with ourselves about how utterly dependent we are on God.
Week 10: Kyrie
After the priest greets us to open the mass and we scour our hearts during the penitential act, we sing or speak the familiar chant, Kyrie Eleison. This simple chant is loaded with meaning and tradition. I invite you to consider this meaning each week when you chant the Kyrie.
Kyrie Eleison is a Greek phrase that translates as “Lord have mercy.” The phrase is ancient. It is found in both the Old Testament and New Testament, and was also commonly used in reference to secular emperors. This ancient way of paying homage took on new meaning in the Christian Church. Our three- part chant prays for mercy not from a single emperor, but from our Holy Trinity. The first kyrie eleison is prayed to God the Father, christe eleison is prayed to Christ, the son, and the final kyrie eleison, is to the Holy Spirit. These three are united in one heavenly chant for mercy.
This chant is truly the culmination of the penitential rite: after we have all acknowledged that we are sinners and seek humility before God, we chant the Kyrie. We allow our voices to express the only thing that a humble, powerless servant could: Lord, have mercy. We don’t ask for mercy because we’re afraid our God will viciously harm us if we don’t beg. This is an act of self-emptying, of actively putting ourselves at the Lord’s mercy, just as Christ did on the cross. It is an act of trust, an act of love.
One last thought: does it seem random to you that we use a Greek phrase in our English mass? Well, we use other languages too, like Hebrew when we say Amen and Alleluia, or Latin when we say Sanctus and Agnus Dei. These foreign phrases are monuments of prayer given to us by people of different cultures and times. Thousands of years before Christ, people seeking God found the vocabulary of phrases like Kyrie Eleison, but these words only revealed their true power and precision when Jesus came into the current of history and changed it forever. In Christ, communion with God surpasses the limits of languages, cultures, and time.
Week 11: Gloria
Sometimes we say something so many times without thinking about it that we can forget what it really means. Take the Gloria, for instance. Does anyone remember who first sang the Gloria? It was a multitude of angels. Luke tells us that at the birth of Christ, angels appeared to the shepherds and sang, “Glory to God in the highest; and on earth peace to men of good will.”
Let’s consider that for a moment. When God took the form of mankind, even in the most humble of circumstances, the heavens erupted. The angels realized what a miraculous and seminal moment in the history of humanity this was. It is a joyful, exuberant song, but also one inflected with awe and wonder. This isn’t the type of praise you give a co-worker for a job well done or your favorite athlete for being so great. This is a thunderstruck praise, reserved for someone beyond our comprehension.
If you really listen to the words we sing, you’ll notice that we unapologetically proclaim how Christ is a true game-changer in the history of the world. He takes away the sin of the world, he is the Lord God, Son of the Father, the only Holy One, only Most High, yet together with the Holy Spirit and God the Father. The Gloria lets us joyfully sing our faith and the mysteries it contains in a concentrated nutshell.
So, whether plainly spoken or sung with much ornamentation on a feast day, I invite you to praise God and Christ without reservation, like the angels first did when he graced us with his presence in human form. Week 12: The Collect (CAH-lect)
After we jubilantly praise God like the angels did in the Gloria, the priest says “Let us pray.” You might have noticed a slight pause after he says this. I’ve sometimes thought maybe this was when the priest was finding his place in the missal and we were just waiting for him to read. But something altogether different is going on.
This conclusion of the introductory rites of the mass is called the CAH-lect, although spelled like “collect.” The “let us pray” in fact opens a moment of silence. This is the moment where you consider your gifts and intentions for the mass. It is called the CAH-lect because the priest then collects all of our prayers and intentions and prays aloud on our collective behalf from the missal.
The introductory rite, from opening blessing to the collect, shows us how we are called to bring our whole being to the liturgy: voice, heart, and mind. It shows us that we are equal each other in the face of God’s presence, that we become one Church with one voice, but that we also maintain a personal relationship with God and can offer our personal intentions to Him.
I invite you to listen for this moment of silence after the Gloria and use it as a time to silently present your intentions to God.
Week 13: The First Reading and Why We Pray with the Old Testament
As we know, the Liturgy of the Word usually begins with a reading from the Old Testament. Does it sometimes seem that the God of the Old Testament is completely different than the one in the New? The God of wrath vs. the God of love?
While attractive, these suspicions are also misguided. The Old Testament is the time God enters history to prepare humans for the fullness of truth. It is also the time when humans discover God’s endless patience despite the infidelity of his people. The human authors of the Old Testament share truths about God as He reveals himself over time. These inspired words always come in a certain context – a particular time in the history of the Jewish people. God’s people change over time, they are sometimes joyous, sometimes despondent, and they often show us God through the lens of their quest for nationhood. But God does not change. He is, by definition, unchanging.
So why we have this focus on the Old Testament? The Second Vatican Council’s Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation, Dei Verbum, says it best: “God, the inspirer and author of the books of both Testaments, in his wisdom has so brought it about that the New should be hidden in the Old and that the Old should be made manifest in the new. For, although Christ founded the new Covenant in his blood, still the books of the Old Testament, all of them caught up into the Gospel message, attain and show forth their full meaning in the New Testament and, in their turn, shed light on it and explain it.”
We begin to see how he whispered to us of the coming of his Son and shared the power of Holy Spirit long before it was bestowed on the apostles at Pentecost. I invite you to listen intently to the first reading to hear how a people not yet ready for the world-altering reality of Jesus Christ still yearn for the same God as we do.
Week 14: Liturgical Seasons and Advent
Happy New Year!
Yes, you heard correctly – it’s the start of a new year for Catholics. Our liturgical calendar year starts today – you’ll see new chapel decorations and new missallettes in the pews; you’ll hear new readings appropriate to the season; and you’ll be asked to fill your waking moments with new contemplations during this Advent season.
We have six distinct seasons in our liturgical calendar: Advent, Christmas, Lent, the Pascal Triduum, Easter, and Ordinary time. This rhythm of seasons is the liturgy celebrated in time. It is the reflection of eternity in our time. Our seasons teach us lessons about our faith and, what’s more, our very faithfulness to them becomes the way to live with God every day of every year.
Let’s consider for a moment how Advent is structured as a way to start our year on sound spiritual footing. It’s helpful to contrast it with the secular new year that happens on January 1st. Our society celebrates New Years with a big party, lots of carefree carousing to say goodbye (or maybe good riddance) to an old year and plenty of optimistic resolutions for the new year. In the end, however, we’re celebrating nothing but the relentless wheel of passing time.
Advent, on the other hand, begins not with a party, but with a call to penance and a watchfulness. We are called to prepare our hearts for something that happened over 2000 years ago, yet mystically happens yearly through our ritual celebration as a global Church. We are preparing spiritually to encounter the awesome glory of a God who deigned to come to earth, show his vulnerability, and somehow, paradoxically, teach us the true meaning of transcendent power.
How do you prepare yourself to encounter such a God? With a stinging hangover? With a sense of optimism about everything you can accomplish by yourself this year? No – we prepare ourselves with penance for our countless sins, a re-commitment to good works for our fellow human beings, and the burning coal of belief in the redemption offered by our God. Our new years’ resolutions as Catholics are ones common to all humanity – an internal scouring of our self-importance, misdeeds, and unworthy thoughts. We prepare the way of the Lord so that we can receive Christ the child in the manger and Christ the King who returns at the end of time.
I invite you to consider how Advent can mark a true, more meaningful new year for you, and how you can embrace the fundamental call of preparation in this season to set the rest of your year and your life on sound spiritual footing.
Week 14: The Psalm
After the first reading, we encounter the responsorial psalm. How do you normally experience it? Do you sit reflectively and listen to the music? Do you speak, chant, or sing out with the psalm? Whichever the choice, this part of the mass calls out to us.
The psalms are the ancient Jewish prayers used in the temple. These prayers demonstrate a simple and honest yearning for God that emerges from the heart of humanity. These are the prayers that were taught to Jesus as a child, and he used them to pray to God throughout his ministry, until the moment of his death on the cross. The apostles and early Christians continued praying the psalms.
In the mass, it is called a responsorial psalm for a few reasons. First, the lectionary provides a psalm that is related to the first reading (and thus also to the gospel), so that we can respond in prayer to the themes presented in this reading. Second, the psalm in the mass is structured as a dialogue, where we respond to the cantor.
It is good to remember that the psalm is both a reading during the liturgy of the Word and, importantly, a prayer as it has existed over millennia of our faith tradition. Whether you speak, chant, sing, or silently pray the psalm during mass, I invite you to consider the yearning for God inherent in the psalm and let that same yearning grow within you.
Week 16: The Book of Gospels
You may have noticed that the Book of Gospels is carried with much reverence during the liturgy. This is because it contains the Word of God. The book is first brought in procession and placed upon the altar. This is Christ’s entrance within our celebration. A second time, the Book of Gospels is carried in procession before the gospel reading, when it is taken from the altar to the place where it is read aloud. This, like the Eucharist, is one of the ways in which Christ is present among us.
Our Catholic Lectionary for Mass teaches us that “The Church is nourished spiritually at the twofold table of God’s Word and of the Eucharist; from the one it grows in wisdom, and from the other in holiness.” Christ is offered to God and to us at both the altar and the pulpit. This is why the Book of the Gospels is processed to both tables.
I invite you to see the movement of the Book of Gospels in the liturgy and consider how Christ is being offered at multiple altars in our celebration.
A note about the pulpit: have you ever heard the word “ambo”? It comes from the Greek word ambon, which means step or rim. Early Christian churches modeled this special structure, where the gospel is proclaimed, after the mountains we find in the Bible. In the Old Testament, Moses speaks with God on Mount Sinai and receives the Covenant from the Lord. In the New Testament, Christ is transfigured on the mountain and God tells his disciples: “This is my beloved Son; listen to him.” How appropriate that traditional ambos, which are elevated and have several steps leading to them, commemorate the mountain of Transfiguration where we are being instructed to listen to Christ.
More modern churches like ours use a less ornate pulpit. All three words – lectern, pulpit, and ambo – can be used, but ambo is the more proper term for the place where the gospel is proclaimed.
Week 17: What is the Living Word of God?
The Book of Gospels is the central element of the Liturgy of the Word. We should not mistake the physical book, however, with the living proclamation of the Word of God. The book contains the holy word, but it is the act of proclaiming and hearing the proclamation that is the living Word of God – Christ present with us. This fundamental aspect of speaking and hearing within the river of liturgy was revealed after the Resurrection. Saint Paul tells us, “So faith is from hearing, and hearing is by the utterance of the Anointed One.” In other words, our very faith begins in this event.
The holy Word of God spoken by our human mouths is an essential part of the liturgy flowing through us. Hearing these words in our heads and our hearts is the reception of the flowing liturgy. The liturgy is not simply reading texts from the missalette. I invite you to try to let yourself be fully submerged in the divine words spoken aloud; to consider the moment of the gospel reading as more than a written or even oral tradition. It is the active, living presence of Christ and our faith working in us.
Finally, the Book of Gospels acts as the connection between this part of mass and the Liturgy of the Eucharist. Christ is offered to us as wisdom in the Word just as he is offered to us in body in the Eucharist. The Lectionary of Mass reminds us that the divine word read in the liturgy “has as its one purpose the sacrifice of the New Covenant and the banquet of grace, that is, the Eucharist.” In this way, the Liturgy of the Word and the subsequent Liturgy of the Eucharist are actually one single act of divine worship.
Week 18: Making Room for Christ During the Gospel Reading
For the past two weeks, we’ve reflected on how the gospel proclamation is the living Word of God. This week we will discuss how we greet Christ and make room for him in our hearts.
Just as in the presence of a guest of honor or a king, we stand to greet Christ as the Book of Gospels is carried to the ambo. We are giving our attention and reverence to him. Often, incense and lighted candles accompany the Book of Gospels at this time.
The whole congregation greets him with song, as we do in our opening procession. This time, our words sing directly to him. We use the Hebrew word Alleluia, which translates to “All Hail to Him Who IS.” Remember that in the Old Testament God tells Moses to tell the children of Israel, “WHO IS has sent me to you.” God has no name that would limit him, but simply is He Who Is. Therefore, we proclaim, Allelu – “All Hail to” – ia –“Him Who Is.”
After we finish singing, the deacon or priest announces the reading, and we respond, “Glory to You, Lord.” We then mark ourselves with the sign of the cross on our heads, our lips, and our hearts. This act is a prayer that the Word may enlighten our minds, cleanse our hearts, and open our lips to proclaim the Word of the Lord. All of these rituals mark the important moment when Christ lives in our liturgy, but it calls for a true openness on our part. When the gospel is spoken and I am open to receive it, the seed of the Word of God is planted in my heart.
I invite you to consider the great mystical interaction with Christ that is made available to us during the Liturgy of the Word. Rather than seeing this moment as another time to passively absorb information, consider how the eternal words in our Holy Book are given life by being proclaimed during the liturgy; how this holy proclamation – the deeds and words of Christ on earth - are transformed from mere words and sounds to a force within us and a mystical union with God. Week 19: The Homily
Sermons have an important place in Christianity. Consider the Sermon on the Mount, where Jesus instructs us, or the evangelism of the apostles as they establish a new Church. Throughout the history of the Church, sermons and homilies were used to instruct its members, root out heresies, and educate about doctrines. Sermons have also been the battleground for political disagreements between Protestant and Catholic churches over the centuries. In America, in particular, our politics and religious experiences have been profoundly impacted by evangelical preachers since the late 1600s. Perhaps this is why we sometimes expect an oration on current hot topics during the homily.
We must make a strong distinction, however, between preaching the way it appears in Protestant communities and the homily that appears in the Catholic mass. Often, the main point of Protestant services is the sermon. For Catholics, Christ is actually present upon our two-fold altar and ambo. The Word of God and the Eucharist are very real, tangible ways He lives within our liturgy.
So how does the reality of our liturgy impact the homily and the role of the person giving it? A Catholic priest’s homily is part of a greater liturgy and paschal sacrifice – it is not the point of the mass, but a single part of it. Pope Benedict wrote that a homily “is meant to foster a deeper understanding of the word of God, so that it can bear fruit in the lives of the faithful.” It is based in the readings of the day and is meant to deepen and personalize what is revealed to us in those readings. It is not meant as a time for entertainment, a time to learn more about a particular priest, a time to hear political messages, or a time to learn something that is not contained in the Word of God.
I invite you to see the homily as time we extend, ponder, and make personal the holy Word of God revealed in the readings. I also invite you to consider the greatness of our liturgy as an encounter with God and not to judge the mass based on the presentation of the homily. It may be a helpful tool for us to incorporate the Word of God in our lives, but it is not the crux of our liturgy. Week 20: Profession of Faith
After the homily, we end the Liturgy of the Word by standing as one people and responding to what we’ve heard in one confident voice of faith. This profession of faith, or credo, takes the form of the Nicene Creed, which was formulated in the year 325 AD. It is a condensed prayer containing all that we believe as Catholics – a potent declaration of who we are.
Why do you think we take this moment during the mass to proclaim together the tenets of our faith? If you consider that the time of the homily is the most intellectual moment of the mass, when we ponder the revealed Word of God and personalize it in our lives, the credo is a wonderful counterpoint to this intellectual pursuit. It reminds us that our faith is not something we’ve thought up or contrived by intellectual means. By proclaiming the mysteries of how God has revealed himself to us, we remind ourselves and recommit ourselves to the action of the liturgy – a spiritual movement back to God. We plunge ourselves back into a river of mystery and revelation that is the core of our celebration and indeed our entire being.
The credo is a response to the prayers, readings, and homily in the first part of mass, much like the Responsorial Psalm. It affirms our acceptance of what we have already encountered and what we will encounter.
I invite you to proclaim with confidence the Nicene Creed during mass – not from a perspective of knowing its mysteries intellectually, but of humbly accepting the wondrous revelation of who God is. I invite you to consider how your voice is joining two thousand years’ worth of believers, and how it is this core of beliefs – not anything political or worldly – that makes us the Church. Week 21: Mysteries of the Creed
Let us take a moment to explore what we actually say in the Nicene Creed. This great, collective proclamation of our faith that occurs after the homily nicely summarizes our most important beliefs. It has four paragraphs: one for God the Father, one for Christ, one for the Holy Spirit, and the final one for the Church.
We begin with one God, the Father, the creator of everything, even things we cannot see. It’s easy to breeze through this, but if we really listen to what we’re saying, we could radically change our approach to life. How often do we feel responsible for creating everything in our own lives or in those of our children? This much-needed dose of reality and humility can be revitalizing for our self-important times.
The paragraph prayed to our Lord Jesus Christ is the longest. It recounts that his nature is fully God and fully human. This inscrutably generous gift of God’s incarnation is so central to our faith that it is the only moment we bow our heads. By becoming a man, he revealed his true nature to us, he rent asunder the divide between humanity and divinity, and offered us a portal through which we can commune with him. We end this paragraph with a strong statement about the end times – that he will come again in glory to establish a final kingdom without end. Again, try to soak in the life-changing reality of what you proclaim: Christ’s second coming is the goal not just of our lives but of all eternity.
The third paragraph affirms the role of the person of the Holy Spirit in the life of the world and our personal lives. The final paragraph asserts that the universal Church started by Christ offers us belonging, forgiveness, and ultimate salvation in Him.
I invite you to recite the Nicene Creed in a new way at mass. It is a prayer – a powerful moment of unity we pray with each other, and also a way to re-introduce ourselves to God. It offers us a radical antidote to an otherwise meaningless world. Dwell on the carefully chosen words and allow their meaning to resonate within you all week long. Week 22 – Processions
What are we doing when we process in mass? Processions have been a part of human societies as far back as the historical record can see. They have been used for political, religious, and celebratory reasons. God established a special meaning for procession in the hearts of his Chosen People when he promised them a land of their own. The exodus from Egypt to Israel was a decades-long procession from darkness to light for the Jews.
But event of Christ that ruptured human history created new meaning for procession. The letter to the Hebrews gives us a clear explanation of about how significant Christ’s death and resurrection is: “we have the confidence to enter the Holy of Holies by the blood of Jesus – by a way fresh and living, which he opened for us through the veil, that is, through his flesh.”
This is what we celebrate when we process as Christians. Our procession may be from the gathering space to the altar at the start of mass, in a funeral procession, or on a path throughout campus when we pray the rosary during Holy Week; but our movement is always to God. Our processions are a form of prayer – our yearning to be with God in the Kingdom, our movement toward Him.
It’s no coincidence that the crucifix is often carried at the head of processions. This is because Christ is our guide and Savior. He opened the way to Heaven for us – without him, our processions would only ever celebrate the futile striving for human greatness.
I invite you, every time you notice a procession during the liturgy, to remember why we move in this way: it is prayer in physical form – a communication to God that we are here for Him. The fact that we do it visibly, unashamed to honor the Lord publicly, is an important act of evangelizing for our modern world. Week 23 – Offertory
After we finish the Creed and the Prayers of the Faithful, we transition from the Liturgy of the Word to the Liturgy of the Eucharist. Even though it might feel like “mass intermission” as we settle back into our chairs, the Offertory is actually a profound time in the mass for all of us. This is the moment we bring our personal offerings to the liturgy.
First, the baskets passed through the pews collect our financial offerings. Remember that early Christians would literally contribute all of their money and possessions when joining the community. While our practice is not nearly so radical, we hold in our hearts Jesus’s words in Luke’s gospel: “Be wary and guard against all greed; because one’s life does not consist in the abundance of one’s possessions.” Our money will certainly make a practical difference for the Church and her service, but on a personal level, it affirms our faith that the treasures of this world are nothing compared to what awaits us in the Kingdom of God.
Second, we offer the bread and wine that will be sanctified at the altar. In early Christian communities, these would come from their own ovens and cupboards. These gifts mark an important contribution: the work of human hands, from our community, ready to be transformed. We offer these in the third procession of the mass, when they are given to the priest.
Finally, we can make a spiritual offering at this time. With the echoes of the powerful Creed in our heads, we can offer our entire selves to the awesome Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. I invite you to say a silent prayer of submission during the Offertory at mass; to re-commit your entire person and spirit to God so that you can be sacrificed along with Christ at the altar. We have the amazing opportunity to completely give ourselves to the Lord, to allow our carefully constructed personas to be transformed in Christ during the liturgy. Week 24 – Incense
From the early days of our faith tradition, incense has played a special role as an offering to God. In the Book of Exodus, the Lord gave Moses instructions for creating incense and a special altar for burning it. This incense was made from hard-to-procure, sometimes costly ingredients, with the sole purpose of being burnt, that is, offered as a gift. God tells Moses, “it shall be for you most holy,” and prescribes that every morning and night they should perform “a regular incense offering before the LORD throughout your generations.”
That explains why David the psalmist writes “Let my prayer be counted as incense before you.” His hope is that his prayer can be seen by God to be as valuable as incense.
Why might God delight in incense? Perhaps because it engages us in a novel way. It perfumes the air with a sweet and spicy smell. It visibly rises as a white smoke that diffuses throughout a space. All of this from a small spoonful of inert pebbles thrown on coals. As such, it reminds us of the parable of the mustard seed. Jesus said, “The Kingdom of God is like mustard seed that a man took and sowed in his field, which is the smallest of all seeds, but when it grows it is larger than garden-herbs and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the sky come and dwell in its branches.” Like the mustard seed, incense can be seen as a symbol of our faith and of the Kingdom. God delights in how we might engage our senses in this offering, envision how our faith can grow towards the kingdom, and offer ourselves along with the rising smoke.
In medieval Church art, incense often appears alongside angels and the saints, and in this way it also symbolizes the merging of the visible and the invisible, and the mysteries of our faith. The hazy smoke, while exciting our senses, reminds us that we cannot see or grasp everything clearly, and that faith and true sight is much more than what our senses and intellect can show us.
I encourage you to consider the holy aspects of incense when it is used in the liturgy. It is a vibrant, ancient connection to God.
Week 25 – Introduction to the Eucharistic Prayer
Our liturgical reflections have reached the point in the mass when we turn our attention to the meal and offering made at the altar. We will spend the next four weeks examining the parts of the Eucharistic Prayer. This part of mass, when the priest does most of the talking while we alternately kneel and stand, can sometimes feel boring and we might “check out.” With these reflections, our goal is to re-invigorate our interest in the Liturgy of the Eucharist and to become active participants in every aspect of what’s going on.
At Baptism, we all received a share in the priesthood of Christ. According to the Constitution on the Liturgy of the Second Vatican Council, this baptismal priesthood makes full participation in the liturgy of the Church both the right and the duty of all the baptized. The priest is essential to the celebration of the liturgy because his ordination gives him the special character that enables him to act in the person of Christ. The priest’s role does not, however, take away from our own participation.
Active participation, as encouraged by the Second Vatican Council, is as much an attitude of the spirit as it is kneeling, standing, responding, and singing. This attitude of the spirit can fill us as we listen attentively and are silent at moments in the mass.
The first aspect of the Eucharistic Prayer for us to contemplate is that all our prayers are offered to God the Father, not to Christ. This is because Christ’s passion, death and resurrection are once again enacted and offered to the Father by Christ Himself in the person of the priest, and by all present.
I encourage you to listen intently during the Eucharistic Prayer and join Christ’s offering to the Father together with the priest. As we contemplate Christ’s real presence during the liturgy, our union with him in this mystical offering to God the Father is more and more revealed to us.
Week 26 – The Preface
During the Offertory, the priest prepares the altar and himself for the Liturgy of the Eucharist. We see him lay out the corporal, chalice and purificator, and wash his hands. He prays over the offerings, asking that the Lord accepts our sacrifice at the mass. He then begins a section of the Eucharistic Prayer called the Preface with the Great Introductory Dialogue where he invites us to participate.
The priest’s greeting, “The Lord be with you,” expresses more than good will – it is a prayer that we bring the Lord into our hearts and recall our baptismal sharing in the priesthood of Christ. Our response, “and with your Spirit,” announces that we are speaking to the priest but also Christ. The priest reiterates this call by saying, “Lift up your hearts,” and we commit ourselves by saying, “we lift them up to the Lord.”
During the final part of this Great Introductory Dialogue, the priest says, “Let us give thanks to the Lord our God,” expressing his unity with the congregation in this sacred action. Our response, “It is right and just,” is not just an agreement with what is about to be done, but also the determination to take part in the solemn thanksgiving.
What follows is a part of the Preface called the Praise and Thanksgiving. The reasons for giving thanks to God are infinite and ultimately inexpressible, and the Church has prepared more than eighty Preface texts, each one drawing its inspiration from evidence of God’s goodness. This thanksgiving is not the routine gratitude of everyday life; it is profound spiritual gratitude offered by Christ to the Father. It is our privilege, through the priest, to enter into this solemn thanksgiving of Christ.
I encourage you to participate intentionally during the Preface and consider how we are praying directly with Christ to God the Father, bringing our hearts to him, and thanking him for his love and actions in our world.
Week 27 – The Sanctus
To continue our deep-dive into the Eucharistic Prayer, this week our liturgical renewal reflection centers on what we call in Latin the Sanctus, or in English, the Holy, Holy, Holy.
When the priest finishes the Preface to the Eucharistic Prayer, his conclusion sounds more or less like: “And so, with the Angels and all the Saints we declare your glory, as with one voice we acclaim:” This is the moment we sing Holy, Holy, Holy. Like the Kyrie, our praise is threefold for the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. We make a point of acknowledging that we are not alone in our hymn of praise: the angels and saints sing with us, lifting our song to God. The Sanctus also recalls the entry of Jesus into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday: “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, Hosanna in the highest!” We are signaling our anticipation of Christ’s presence with us at the sacrificial altar.
The Sanctus serves both as a conclusion of the Preface and as a bridge to the important prayer to the Holy Spirit that follows. After the Sanctus, we kneel. As with any gesture or song in the mass, this moment is deliberate and meaningful. We are kneeling because we are now going to ask for the Holy Spirit to descend upon our celebration. Kneeling is the appropriate position for us when we encounter the holy action of God.
I encourage you to reflect on the fact that we are joining voices already in ecstatic, constant praise of God – the angels and saints. Like them, we can be in awe of the gift of Christ given to us again and again at the altar that is our way of accessing the divine liturgy during the mass.
Week 28 – The Epiclesis
We left our reflection last week with us kneeling right after the Holy, Holy, Holy. The prayers offered by the priest and us at this next moment in the Eucharistic Prayer are called the Epiclesis (ep-ih-KLEE-sis), which is a Greek theological term that means “invocation” or “calling down from on high.” The priest says in the second Eucharistic prayer: “Make holy these gifts, we pray, by sending down your Spirit upon them like the dewfall.” This poetic reference to the dewfall hearkens back to the manna that God bestowed on the Jews in the desert – the heavenly meal that gave them life. We are imploring the Holy Spirit to sanctify our gifts at the table and transform this meal into a heavenly one.
What does this mean, to sanctify our gifts? What do we really mean by transforming this meal?
This is at the heart of our Catholic faith – that the humble host and wine actually become the body and blood of Christ. I’m sure you’ve heard this before. The technical term for it is transubstantiation. What’s happening here is a mystical transformation, in other words, something miraculous accomplished by God. You might be thinking that it looks and tastes like a host and wine, but remember that this is the pinnacle of our celebration of God’s redeeming entry into humanity. God sent Christ to the Church for this very reason. Everything that Christ was and is floods in during this thrilling moment when he exists, alive in our presence on the altar, ready to be sacrificed again.
I encourage you to consider that the prayers during the Epiclesis truly transcend our time and place. We find ourselves singing with angels and saints and, as kneeling supplicants, inviting the Holy Spirit to sanctify the gifts at the altar. Nothing else in our week will rival the sacred moments that we encounter during the mass.
Week 29 – The Institution Narrative
Last week, we discussed the moment of the Eucharistic Prayer called the Epiclesis, when we pray on our knees for the Holy Spirit to descend and transform the gifts on the altar. This week, we will discuss the Institution Narrative and Consecration, which immediately follow the Epiclesis.
The holy words spoken by the priest are those of Christ as recorded in the gospels: “Take this, all of you, and eat of it, for this is my Body, which will be given up for you.” And “…the Blood of the new and eternal covenant, which will be poured out for you and for many for the forgiveness of sins. Do this in memory of me.” When the priest elevates the host and the chalice, it is a moment for us to gaze at this humble offering that mystically becomes the body and blood of Christ. Then, with the priest, we can all bow in solemn observance of the great mystery of the liturgy alive in our midst.
These elements of the Eucharistic Prayer – the epiclesis, institution narrative and consecration – are the heart of the mass. This is when we re-enact the physical gift Christ gave to the cosmos with his personal sacrifice.
St. Justin Martyr writes around 150 AD, just a few generations from the apostles, “For not as common bread nor common drink do we receive these; but since Jesus Christ our Savior was made incarnate by the word of God and had both flesh and blood for our salvation, so too, as we have been taught, the food which has been made into the Eucharist by the Eucharistic prayer set down by him, and by the change of which our blood and flesh is nurtured, is both the flesh and the blood of that incarnated Jesus.” It is the clear teaching from the apostles that what we eat and drink is the flesh and blood of the incarnated Jesus, and as St. Justin Martyr relates, it nurtures our own bodies as well as offers us salvation.
I invite you to pray earnestly with the priest during the institution narrative and the consecration; also to observe the solemnity and power of this moment when the liturgy is quite literally bursting into our lives.
Week 30 – Mystery of Faith
Last week, we discussed the Institution Narrative and Consecration, when we pray with the priest the very words Christ used in reference to the bread and wine at the Last Supper. Immediately following the consecration, the priest invites us to “proclaim the mystery of faith.”
We respond with the Memorial Acclamation, which has four formats: 1. Christ has died, Christ is risen, Christ will come again. 2. Lord, by your cross and resurrection you have set us free. You are the Savior of the world. 3. Dying you destroyed our death, rising your restored our life. Lord Jesus, come in glory. 4. When we eat this bread and drink this cup, we proclaim your death, Lord Jesus, until you come in glory.
Notice that in each of these, we proclaim the kernel of beliefs that make us Christian – that is, Christ’s death and resurrection – but we also have an eye on the Kingdom. The end of the acclamations pray for Christ’s return in glory, and remind us that the liturgy is not only – or even primarily – about this world. We re-enact Christ’s life, words, and sacrifice not just to remember his work here on earth, but as a way of faithfully waiting for his return.
In other words, we don’t just honor a man who set a great example for us and did great things. We fundamentally believe that he is God and he will come again. In fact, we’re anxiously awaiting it. As Christ said in Matthew’s gospel, “you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect.”
I invite you to respond to Christ’s words in the consecration with vigor. To proclaim in your heart and with your mouth not only in his death and resurrection, but also your belief in his triumphant return, which may happen at any moment.