This is a brief follow-up to a post that’s received some attention: this one, diving into the damaging impact of ego on liturgy, and how liturgical…expansiveness… feeds it.
Well, that goes both ways, doesn’t it?
For to tell the truth, the contemporary Catholic liturgical minister – celebrant, preacher, musician, planner – finds himself or herself in a bit of a pressure cooker these days, and has for decades.
Mass at that parish is boring….
The priest is so cold when he says Mass. He never smiles or makes jokes!
I just don’t feel that anyone even notices me when I go to Mass there.
It’s the same music every week!
All they do is new music that I’ve never heard before!
Do you see?
What is Mass, anyway?
Is it an act of worship?
Or is it a community-affirming prayer service?
There’s a difference, you know, and there’s room for both. Catholic tradition is filled with all sorts of paraliturgies and spiritual practices that meet all sorts of human needs: practices that do, indeed reflect the shape and identity of a local community, that incorporate popular and timely musical forms, the vernacular language and are directed at specific needs or situations.
The Mass, as an act of worship, as a re-presentation of Christ’s sacrifice, is not those things.
But in the messy and collapsed categories of the 20th century, along with the pressure of popular cultural and social expectations, those differences have been erased, and most of us have been formed to understand the Mass as a prayer service – a special one, yes – the most special one – but a prayer service, nonetheless, at which we are invited to bring and express ourselves and we expect to have those selves and all of their needs and differences acknowledged and affirmed.
And then, of course, there’s the whole entertainment factor.
Which, we must admit, has always been an element of Catholic liturgical practice. No question. But 20th and 21st entertainment is, in general, what popular entertainment always has been, and it comes with expectations – liveliness, humor, emotionalism, a particular kind of stimulation.
Add to that, it should go without saying, the post-Conciliar shape of the Mass, with its emphasis on options and inculturation and being the work of the specific community of people gathered there that should, ideally reflect that community……
So here we go. The table’s set for the banquet we call the Mass:
We’ve been formed to expect that this moment on Sunday morning is a time in which we are met as we are, so we can be in a moment in which God engages with us, in joy and love, where we are, affirming us as we are.
We are formed to believe that this engagement is dependent on the human factors involved: how open we are, yes, but also how powerfully the actions and words of the moment express those spiritual expectations. We’ve been led to expect that we can judge the authenticity of the spiritual moment by, essentially, how emotionally moved we are: how excited, how peaceful, how amused, how content, how welcome we feel.
It’s a valid Mass, in other words, if I feel what happens in that space affirms and satisfies my expectations.
Expectations being the equivalent now of spiritual hunger.
The trouble being that each individual’s conscious expectations that she brings to the moment are a mess cooked up from her own background, psychological, emotional and spiritual experiences and cultural and social framework.
The very, very short version:
The ego’s at work in the congregation as well and it emerges in that enormous, endless, exhausting pressure:
Meet my expectations.
Affirm my presence.
Entertain me.
And then I’ll know God’s been here.
Okay, here you go!
Charlotte was Both 
So true. Now in Poland we have a bunch of charismatic experts and based on the Toronto blessing you can find plenty of Masses with a prayer of healing. I was into this as well, but this is very tricky. There is still a Mass, but after we have a prayer, so no one can complain. But after seeing many people collapsing like a piece of wood on the ground I started to feel uncomfortable, but thankfully for me, I was praying in my heart that only Your Will my Lord, not mine. So I didn’t fall on the ground. And later on, I was thinking what about the Mass? Why prayer is more powerful than Holy Mass? The best part is that the priest says exactly who will be healed and what is the exact problem of this person. Yes, a Catholic priest. I needed some time to find the truth, but after this experience, I started to find more information about the Mass, and I’m grateful for this special grace.
Josef,
Yes, there are lots of shades of grey, aren’t there? As someone who considers himself “Charismatic”, the opportunity for different persons to exercise manifestations of the Holy Spirit, such as healing, is important within the correct context. Boundaries are important to protect the innocent!
So, logistically speaking, it is cool to have a healing “service” after Mass as everyone is already on “campus”. Yes, the priest can do so; however, the temptation to clericalism abounds when he does. And, yes, the temptation for sentimentality and emotionalism and “ego” abounds in Charismatic circles.
Most important, I think, is that the boundary “around” the Mass be preserved, which is what Amy is addressing in these blog posts. As one priest says, I expect to have a “Catholic Mass” when I show up Sunday morning. Yes, the rubrics have lots of wiggle room. Nonetheless, I think the challenge is to keep the Mass focused on the new Pascha and avoid “side shows”.
So sure, time for “healing ministries” after Mass is clearly completed but not during Mass. Same with tongues and other manifestations of the Holy Spirit (although I personally go “wobbly” occasionally during the Divine Liturgy :-) ).