A Mass Less Ordinary

Mar 6, 2012
Elizabeth Scalia

One of my brothers goes to mass every day of the week, but he does not attend on Sunday.

“I love the mass,” he says, “and I can’t stand missing it for a day. But I just can’t take those Sundays. I can’t.”

That is ultimately between God, my brother, and his pastor, but I sympathize, a little. He is a gregarious sort while I am an introvert, but we share a dislike for busy, noisy, overstimulated worship. Not an early-riser by nature, I will nevertheless often rouse myself of a Sunday to catch a 7 AM mass, because it is the only one offered without bellowing cantors and music being crammed into every spare second of the worship, disallowing any possibility that one might be surprised and shaped by a bit of sacred silence.

Stipulating that many will perceive a “get off my lawn” note to that—and I know this because I have been accused of not understanding that one aspect of the mass is to aid the church in “being community”—I don’t think my brother and I are particularly cranky people. We love the mass, and we are not looking for private, or impersonal worship; we get that mass is a communal endeavor. But an element of the extraordinary—of a hushed awakening to something great—has disappeared from our modern masses, and the hyperactivity that has replaced it can sometimes rub our nerves raw.

I think what my brother and I are missing is the sense of reverent anticipation that used to precede Sunday mass when, in the spare minutes before the processional, people used to kneel and collect themselves; they gathered their thoughts, remembered an intention, let go of what was frivolous and finally sighed a big, cleansing, quieting breath in preparation for the great prayer of the mass. If people spoke at all, they whispered; they were reverently aware of Christ present in the tabernacle and considerate of their neighbors at prayer. the rest image    

When yoga is more reverent than Mass