Our priest is determined to make us suffer during this Holy Week.

[hedgehog]

So last night's Holy Thursday Lord's Supper began with him singing a solo hymn that had these lyrics :" These are holy hands, I have holy hands, these are holy hands V.2 These are holy lips, I have holy lips, these are holy lips..." Things went pretty OK from there; we had a Seder style Mass. Then, at the end, the alter server lit two candelabras on the main altar. The procession wound around the church and the Hosts were placed in a tabernacle that had been moved to the MAIN ALTAR special for the occasion. Meanwhile, the Pange Lingua from the misselette was replaced with a different hymn about the cross typed up on a handout sheet. To bad for the choir which had spent a lot of time practicing both the English and Latin versions of St. Thomas Aquinus's hymn.

So instead of leaving an empty church with the Hosts reserved in a side chapel, a custom mean tto evoke the dismay and loss at Jesus's arrest, we left the church lit up like it was a 40 hours service.

[Matilda]

1. Do you think he might have lost the plot?

It does seem very strange - everything off the altar, silence, the
host removed from the tabernacle, these things are the same everywhere,
because Christ is dead.

Do you think his mind might be affected by his poor health?

[hedgehog]

2. I think he is trying to be in a teaching mode.

I think he gets stuck between two contradictory impulses. For example, he wants people to go to Mass and he wants people at Communion, but if they go to Communion, that proves that they are taking Communion for granted and don't understand the Real Presence. Some of the stuff he does is good, some is way off target. The problem is that that he does everything unilaterally instead of consulting with people. What was the Liturgy Committee has devolved into him telling the music director what he's going to do at the last minute. I've noticed a lot of older priests wanting to go back to a focus on the cross rather than the Resurrection. So the verses for the Pange Lingua he chose for Holy Thursday were a meditation on the cross rather than on the Eucharist. For Easter Vigil, we got a sermon on the Eucharist rather than a sermon on the Resurrection.

Here's how Easter Vigil went:

When we got there at 3:30, I asked the usher where the candles were. He =was confused and told me that the candles wouldn't be lit until after the Gloria. A few minutes later, he was passing out used candles from last year minus the drip shields. I noticed that the Paschal Candle was already in its stand in the sanctuary. Our church has a row of of clear glass windows around the top, so at 4PM in broad daylight the priest came out and sat in the Sanctuary with the Gospel book in his lap. A little boy read out four questions about why this night was different from all other nights. So far, so good, but then we went right in to a (shortened) reading of Genesis, a single reponsorial Psalm, then a reading from Exodus. Then the priest stood up, carried the Paschal candle to the back of the church, lit the Paschal fire and then lit the PAschal candle. We all lit our candles, then he went up front and sang an extended version of the Easter Acclamation. (I know when he cut and added to the readings because my daughters were keeping track. His parts were lengthened, everyone else's were cut!) Then the ushers gathered all the candles from the congregation. There was a very short blessing of the Holy water minus the dipping of the Paschal candle. There were three Baptisms and two Confirmations, but the congregation was not asked to renew our BAptismal promises.

He was very pleased to bring the entire Easter Vigil home in 1 hour 26 minutes. The reception we usually have for the new members was omitted. We went home in broad daylight in a snow storm and I still feel cheated.

[AngryOldDem]

3. Wow. Just wow.

One comment:

>>>There were three Baptisms and two Confirmations, but the congregation was not asked to renew our BAptismal promises.>>>

Seems to me the renewal is an integral part of the Vigil (out of many, don't get me wrong). Also, I don't think I've ever heard of the Vigil being celebrated before sundown (but I saw your previous post on that).

It's sad when Mass is timed as if with a stopwatch, and the meaning of it all is gutted. Do others share your sentiments?

(P.S. Hope the weather gets better soon where you live...we won't see "normal" temperatures -- i.e. low 60s -- here until probably Saturday, and then they're talking about more "below normal temps for next week. This, in a word, stinks. :( )

[hedgehog]

4. The people I've asked have been rather dubious.

The music director is the only one he mentioned any of this to beforehand (at least as far as Parish Council and Liturgy committee are concerned)and even she wasn't told all the details.

I wouldn't like it, but at least I'd be more willing to accept it if Parish Council had been consulted ahead of time and given its approval. Most American Catholics are polite enough to put up with just about anything, but I suspect that there will be some discussion of this at the next Council meeting.

[UrbScotty]

6. Like AngryOldDem said: Wow.

Vigil at the church I attended began at 8:30 with the Ceremony of Fire. following that (to the best of my memory):

• Lighting of individual candles and procession into the darkened church
  
• First reading & Psalm
  
• Second Reading & Psalm
  
• Third Reading & Psalm
  
• Lights come on
  
• Gloria and Re-lighting of Easter candles
  
• Epistle
  
• Alleluia & Gospel
  
• Homily
  
• Blessing of Holy Water
  
• Renewal of baptismal promises
  
• Baptisms and confirmations
  
• The rest of Mass
  

Father said that the readings represented successive events in history (i.e. Creation, Israelis fleeing Egypt). The Gloria represented the birth of Christ, and the lights are turned on at that point to symbolize Christ's light coming into the world. I thought that was neat.

[UrbScotty]

11. Forgot the Exsultet (nt)

[Matilda]

7. If cutting time is so important,

he should move the four questions to Holy Thursday where they belong!

The questions are part of the Passover Seder, which Christ was celebrating at the Last Supper,
and it definitely belongs to Holy Thursday.

[UrbScotty]

5. At one of the chuches I attend...

...at the end of Mass Father carries the Eucharist up and down the aisles, then he places the Eucharist on the altar for adoration until midnight. At another church, they place the Eucharist in a side chapel and let it lie in repose for adoration until midnight, when they place it in a tabernacle.

[AngryOldDem]

8. I've seen it done two ways

At my former parish, at the end of Holy Thursday, the altar was stripped and the priest took the Eucharist to the Tabernacle and then left the sanctuary. This is quite powerful, because there is dead silence in the church -- the silence is overpowering, actually. The church becomes bare. The first time I saw this it nearly moved me to tears because it really drove home the signficance of Good Friday, as well as Holy Thursday.

At my current parish, there is a procession with the Eucharist from the church to the parish center chapel, where the Eucharist is kept in repose until Holy Saturday. To me, this is not nearly as meaningful, or reverent, as the above. It is somewhat of a walk from the church to the parish center, and there are hundreds of people. At the conclusion of the Holy Thursday liturgy there are several announcements about those not walking to the center waiting until the parking lot clears of pedestrians. (It was even **joked** about one year -- talk about diminishing the signficance!) Really, really out of place, disconcerting, and -- to a degree -- disrespectful. People generally treat it like the end of any other Mass -- talking, visiting in the pews, etc. I haven't made the procession but I've chosen to sit and meditate until the crowd thins out.

[hedgehog]

9. That's too bad that people don't understand the purpose of the procession.

When it's done properly, the empty church can be devestating.

[AngryOldDem]

10. The logistics just aren't there for it

Maybe this worked 50 years ago, when it was just a small clapboard church with a small membership (this is now the largest parish in the archdiocese), or it would work if people didn't have to walk some distance to get to the parish center. But it really, really takes the whole meaning out of it when hundreds of people try to file out through the doors nearest to the parish center. I find the whole experience jarring, if not irreverent. And of course, those who don't take part rush immediately out to their cars, some of which are parked close by to said center.

[hedgehog]

12. We're lucky in our church's layout.

Off to one side is a small room with a glass wall between it and the main sanctuary. It is used as a crying room on Sunday and a chapel the rest of the week. It's switched from one to the other just by turning the chairs. That's the room we use for the altar of repose.

I think you hit on another problem which the bishops are only aggravating. Given the artificial priest shortage, their response is to combine small intimate parish communities into monster impersonal mega churches. Once the congregation reaches a certain size, I think you lose touch with what's happening.

[AngryOldDem]

14. My parish has just been the victim of a huge population shift

When the church was founded (1950) this part of the county was rural. That has drastically changed. Plus, there's a city just across the county line that has literally exploded over the past decade, and there are only two parishes within proximity of it -- thus the huge surge in membership.

There was talk a couple of years back of building a church in that town to take the strain off the two parishes here, but shortages (both human and financial) will make sure that will never happen.

To add to it, my parish has always had the reputation of being one of "show and glow," and sadly, it's the truth in a lot of cases.

[Matilda]

13. When the Blessed Sacrament is taken to a side chapel,

the Tabernacle is left open, so everyone can see that Christ is not present on the Altar. That
also drives home the lesson. The sacristy lamp on the main altar should also be put out. And
people don't genuflect to the empty Tabernacle, they should just bow their heads. Everything has
a meaning, and it's sad that some priests don't seem to be fully aware.