I have been really enjoying going to mass more and more, and find my time there to be of great comfort. I've been trying to put my finger on what exactly is driving this - was it the music, the homily, the Packers gear people wore? I could never come up with it.
Then Father Don came up with this post, and brought it all home to me:
The well-done celebration of Sunday Mass can be, even in some rather incidental ways, a reminder about otherwise neglected aspects of ordinary human life. The effort and dignity the woman puts into proclaiming the first reading; the beauty and richness of the baritone voice leading the singing; the time spent in greeting others and wishing them peace; the reverences made to the book of the Scriptures and to the altar; the individual attention in the distribution of communion -- all these speak of the value and dignity of human beings, of human life, of all the visible as well as invisible elements of human life. One is reminded for an hour or so at least that the earth and our fellow human beings are valuable in themselves apart from the opportunities for gain, for advancement, apart from what they can do for us. One comes away from such a service refreshed and renewed, one's youthful excitement and delight in creation restored. The general and easily banal affirmation of God's love for the earth and humankind becomes in this setting something genuine and specific, referring to each human being there. Besides affirming the place of God in our lives, worship can celebrate the goodness and worth of every element and person in God's creation. At the center of it all is our remembering that "God so loved the world that He sent His only-begotten son into the world to save it" (1 John: 4:9-10).
Thanks Fr. Don. Again.
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