Twenty-Third Sunday in Ordinary Time, C September 8, 2019
Fr. Albert St. John the Evangelist, Jeanerette
If you think I’ve been optimistic about what people get out of going to a Sunday Mass, then you’ve already realized something very important: Mass is not for beginners. Repenting from sin, putting effort into the same old responses every week, and “feasting” on readings we don’t always understand. Add to these the incredible belief that bread and wine invisibly turn into God himself, and you’d be crazy to think just anybody would “get it” after one visit. This is the deep end of the Catholic pool and most people don’t know how to swim.
Well, Jesus never meant for the Mass to be the first lesson. Think about it. The Eucharist was the last thing Jesus did before he died. And he first gave it only to the Apostles at a private event at night. The one time he did talk about the Eucharist in public, many of his disciples stopped following him. Then, for 100s of years, non-Catholics weren’t even allowed to come to Mass. Even the catechumens preparing to become Catholic were asked to leave after the homily. They still are.
So yeah, the Eucharist and the Mass aren’t meant to be accessible to everyone and there’s no point in acting like it. Many might say that their experience of the Mass does not reflect what I’ve talked about these past three weeks. For most of my life until college my experience of the Mass didn’t either.
That’s partly because the Mass has changed more in the past 60 years than it did in the entire 1000 years before. The meaning and substance didn’t change. It’s still readings from scripture and the Eucharist, but a whole lot of how we expressed it did. That caused confusion. In the midst of that a false assumption somehow got wrapped up with the Mass. It’s this idea that Mass should be everything.
The Mass is the source and summit of our faith, but it is not everything between. The Mass was never meant to be evangelization. It was never meant to replace bible studies, prayer groups, community gatherings, service projects, and social justice. But somehow, in many places, there was this idea that Mass should check all those boxes at once. So, instead of focusing on offering ritual worship to God, we focused on making Mass “accessible” and “engaging.”
That’s how so many parishes end up divided and fighting over the “style” of the liturgy. It’s why Mass attendance changes drastically based on the music and preaching of the priest. That’s why some people think we should stop saying the creed or why they get annoyed that I pray Eucharistic Prayer I, which is a whole 2 minutes longer than the shorter option. Especially in our culture – a culture that focuses on entertainment and customer service and individualism – it is really easy to judge a parish and the Mass by the standard of what I enjoy.
But Mass is a piece of heaven. It is not meant to be “accessible” by earthly standards. As the first reading says, “scarce do we guess the things on earth, and what is within our grasp we find with difficulty; but when things are in heaven, who can search them out?” There is an ancient concept in our faith that we must not forget. It is called the “purification of the senses.”
It’s fairly simply. We all suffer from original sin. That original sin makes it very hard to understand spiritual things. That’s why the first reading says, “the corruptible body burdens the soul.” We tend to get caught up in flashy appearances, exciting sounds, pleasurable sensations, delicious tastes, and sweet smells. Those things aren’t evil, but they are superficial. True spiritual realities tend to be invisible, quiet, still, and subtle. So, left to our own devices, we chase after superficial things and never understand spiritual truths. But, we aren’t stuck that way. That’s why we have Scripture and the Church. That’s why Jesus came. These teach us how to purify our senses to better understand spiritual things.
That’s why Jesus took on a visible body, used human language, and made himself into food. With training, with practice, and above all with grace, we can detach from the superficial pleasures of the world to better experience heavenly realities. The liturgy even uses our senses in spiritual ways with symbols, music, and incense. But to someone who has not purified their senses, who does not have a living faith, who has not calculated and accepted the cost of discipleship, the Mass can be boring. When the Mass is boring, we shouldn’t change the Mass. It means we should change ourselves.
I’m not saying sinners shouldn’t come to Mass – we must! Even great saints struggled to always love Mass. Still, we must understand that we don’t change God to fit ourselves but strive to conform ourselves to God. If Mass just caters to worldly, unpurified senses, we will simply leave people in a worldly, unpurified way of life. And we will deprive ourselves of the possibility for a deeper, more truly spiritual experience.
The Mass is not for beginners. It’s not meant to be everything. It is source and summit… a summit like the top of the tower in today’s parable. There is and should be a real effort and investment to build a foundation, to climb up to “getting it.” What will make this parish successful – what will make any parish truly successful – is not lowering Mass to fit the world, but laying a foundation and providing the steps from the world up to the Mass. That is where evangelization and bible studies and community events and social outreach come in. Let’s not waste energy making the Mass into something it isn’t.
Baptized Catholics still need to go to Mass every week. Even if they don’t “get it” yet, the Mass can serve as a goal, a reminder, a source of tension to say, “I still have a ways to go.” We all do and even just showing up reluctantly is a good step in the right direction. As a parish we will strive to celebrate the Mass the way the Church asks us to do it; not according to the opinion of this or that priest or bishop, but the living tradition of the Church, guided by the Magisterium. It may take some purification of our senses, but it is worth it. And there is room for a legitimate diversity in some aspects of Mass, but it’s not a free-for-all.
I’ve preached and focused a lot on the liturgy because it’s what I know and it’s something a priest is especially responsible for. But, it’s not all I’m ever going to do. After this series, I intend to focus quite a bit on things like evangelization and community and all the other stuff the Mass can’t do and shouldn’t try to do. In those areas, I am very open to trying new things and getting creative. Those are the places where I don’t have a whole lot of answers and where I can’t do it all myself. Don’t reduce your faith to 1 hour a week because you’re going to need more. Don’t stop with just going to Mass because the rest of the world is going to need more. I don’t know what that will look like… I don’t know everything it will take to build up the tower of faith in Jeanerette, but I’m willing to pay whatever it costs because I know I am not alone. I have Christ and I have all of you.