Coffee

Since my big-loss diet of almost two years ago, I’ve enjoyed being lighter. But I’ve also struggled with the aftermath: putting some pounds back on and taking them off again, confronting my pattern to eat to soothe myself, watching when I tend to gorge.

This past year, I’ve been drinking a bit more coffee. The young miss discovered coffee several months ago. I “recommended” one per day, max. Her average is about two a week, and sometimes those come home from school unfinished. For a while I drank those two-day old frappuccinos, but the things are just too darned sweet. It’s like coffee-flavored sugar water. I’d rather just spoon it out of the brown sugar jar and smell the real coffee brewing.

Coffee, I found out, is nearly calorie free. Until you start putting additives into it. This page gives an amazing rundown of those additives, including this bit of testimony:

For example, a cup of plain coffee has about 2 calories, but a large Lotta Caramel Latte™ shake from Cold Stone Creamery has a whopping 1790 Calories and a large Coolatta™ from Dunkin Donuts has 800 Calories! A person could easily consume hundreds of excess calories very quickly from speciality coffee drinks.

Good grief! Hold that Cold Stone Creamery LCL, lol.

I like the taste of straight-up coffee. But I also will put a drop of something into it about half the time. I like to track that each teaspoon of sugar is about 16 calories. Each tablespoon of cream is about 50. 2% milk is about 8–that’s about right for me if the brew is strongly bitter.

There’s a nice coffeeshop a block away from the parish center. It was my part-time office for about a month after the fire. It was then I found my limit on regular coffee is about a large cup a day. If I had a second appointment, I would have to do a green tea smoothie. That was probably a few hundred calories, but hey–I like to sleep at night.

 

Head of Christ

This is the face of Christ. Have you encountered him lately?

It seems appropriate that people encounter this Christian Petersen sculpture outside of our parish’s reconciliation chapel.

There was an interesting discussion on PrayTell touching on that personal relationship with Christ. I confess I didn’t follow it deeply. I think I caught some disparate threads …

Isn’t “personal relationship” evangelical Protestant lingo? Are we at ease with that?

Isn’t Ignatian spirituality all about that personal relationship? Did the evangelicals just steal it from the Jesuits?

My own sense is somewhat complicated. I think my first relationship with God was viewing him as a Father God. And I found the Holy Spirit appealing in a non-charismatic way.

But I did find using my imagination in prayer to be fruitful in my young adult years. I did image Jesus in my prayers, and over the years, I think I’ve finally arrived at a good relationship with the last person of the Trinity, the Second.

I think good art helps. Good art is incarnational. Jesus took flesh and lived among us, but that was millennia ago. The Word continues to come among us, but the main sense of our experience of Christ is through our ears. We hear the Word.

But good sculpture appeals to the eye. The parishioners here tell me that Christ’s head used to be mounted high on a wall. But with the 1999 expansion, it was removed to its present location:

This is the perspective from the head of the line for Saturday confession. The candle next to the door would be lit. Most months the food collection would not be there. It’s another encounter, I suppose: a reminder of caritas for the penitent. Part of engaging that personal relationship, one might say.

If you click on that wiki-page linked above to the sculptor, close to the bottom is an unfinished clay piece he did for a Newman Club meeting in 1951.

 

The Doctor’s Feast

It’s a good day to be Catholic. Our feast today is a saintly and worthy woman. One of our parish center rooms is named for her. So is the nearest campus ministry to our own. And so she is mentioned every time we sing the litany of saints.

Did you know that along with Francis of Assisi, she is the patron of Italy?

Happy Feast Day to our friends making disciples here.

Let her teach us:

Nothing great is ever achieved without much enduring.

 

Doing More With More

There was a fussy comment on a conservative Catholic web site a week or two ago about the way some of us liturgists go hyper when one person is signed on for more than one ministry at a single Mass. I was thinking about that as I was copied an email from a lector substitute for tomorrow who also happens to be on board as a greeter and usher for the same Mass.

These instances don’t bother me unless they become a habit.

Over the years and many parishes, I’ve known people who defined all their Christian activity in terms of liturgical service. And as a starting point, that’s not totally a bad thing. A willing believer and disciple must start somewhere. Nearly every active Christian worships regularly on Sunday. Many liturgical roles lend themselves to visibility. And visibility is a big part of how modern human beings engage in and with the world.

One observes a Communion minister or a lector and one knows what they do. A social justice committee, perhaps not so much. Is it about church social life? Is it about charity? Is it about politics? Or something else?

Even within the range of ministries I oversee, there can be a lack of clarity. At one art and environment meeting, a newcomer showed up. As I chatted with her, it became clear she was seeking a connection between her faith and the Earth’s environment. Not church building environment. An understandable mistake.

I think the liturgy is better served by having thirty to fifty people involved in thirty to fifty small tasks, and each of them doing their one task with attention, quality, and preparation. Three to five people in three to five jobs each–not so much. Sometimes everything gets done well. But sometimes not. The person who is reading the prayers of the faithful may have a brisk walk to get the collection started. And if the sacristan is also serving as a communion minister? What if there’s a spill and everybody’s busy? Not so good then.

One person/one ministry is not a hard-and-fast rule in my book. It’s a useful guideline. And when the semester draws to an end and people need a substitute, I don’t monitor those communications and throw up a red flag when a person lands double duty. I say a prayer of thanks. And hope the next person to get involved is as dedicated to worship.

 

Video Return Spot

Watch this video clip on our return to church this weekend. Jim, you can note the anitphonal seating.

Rather inconveniently, both basement sump pumps aren’t working fully just now. So there’s no running water for our lower lounge and classroom level this weekend. Unless we want to flood the storage room.

Also rather inconveniently, Iowa State’s huge VEISHEA festival starts tomorrow. Our parking structure is blocked off so that parishioners can park there for Mass later in the afternoon. Unfortunately, we could only move some stuff back into the upstairs church. Other items are still in storage downstairs, awaiting people and more time to sort through and assign a more permanent place.

Somewhere in storage, our piano lost the board that fronts the keys and its humidity control mechanism. Still playable. And freshly tuned. Just not all there.

I haven’t tested the electronic organ or the sound system yet. Crossing my fingers on those two.

Oh, and did I mention we have First Communion at the 10:30 morning Mass on Sunday? Fifteen children and their families.

This is shaping up to be a very exciting weekend.

 

 

Pews By Night

Pews and stacks of chairs, a lot to get organized by Saturday Mass.

A closer look on the south end of the nave:

The company is in tonight for an overnight cleaning session. Good workers.

 

Return of the Pews

Despite the rain today in central Iowa, the workers are hard at it getting our seating ready for the return Mass on Saturday evening:

 

Stain

The east balcony looks almost normal. However, the plants and furniture haven’t returned, nor the image of Saint Jude from the old Reconciliation Chapel.

It was a sunny Spring day when we did a walk-through of the building Monday. I captured this image of the place of the fire. The window has long been repaired. The carpet was spread and glued the other week. Aside from the buzz of workers, the building seems so peaceful these days, ready to be filled with people again. Look closer:

I was reading a bit more in the Ceremonial of Bishops on the community’s return from an act of desecration. The praenotanda includes this instruction:

Crimes committed in a church affect and do injury to the entire Christian community, which the church building in a sense symbolizes and represents.

The crimes in question are those that do grave dishonour to sacred mysteries, especially to the eucharistic species, and are committed to show contempt for the Church, or are crimes that are serious offences against the dignity of the person and of society.

A church, therefore, is desecrated by actions that are gravely injurious in themselves and a cause of scandal to the faithful. In the judgment of the local Ordinary, that are so serious and so offensive to the sanctity of the church building that divine worship may be celebrated in the church only after penitential reparation for the wrong done.

Reparation for the desecration of a church is to be carried out with a penitential rite celebrated as soon as possible. Until that time neither the eucharist nor any other sacrament or rite is to be celebrated in the church. But through preaching and devotional exercises the faithful should be prepared for the penitential rites of reparation, and for their own inner conversion they should celebrate the sacrament of penance.

People are still angry about “losing” the church building for nearly seven months. I’ve reported my own temper has flared short as of late. And I’m hearing more from people who are feeling no small loss and no small amount of bitterness toward the perpetrator and toward the slowness of the process. When a person is angry (as Jesus showed us here) it is hard to forgive, and even to seek forgiveness. The ritual of a return from a desecration of a Church makes this demand right off the top, as the people gather outside the building:

Brothers and sisters in Christ,
we begin this service of penance
by turning to God our Father
and asking him for the spirit of true repentance.
We have failed to remember his goodness,
we have refused to obey his commands,
we have dishonoured his name.
We must take care never to allow sin
to defile the Church of God,
which is the dwelling place of God on earth,
and the temple of the Holy Spirit.

This is one of those “these or similar words” passages. It is likely our pastor will use his own words. Not these. It’s not as though these words are untrue, or that our injured community isn’t in need of repentance, and a more faithful adherence to Christ and the Gospel. But is the return an appropriate time for this? Why, people will ask, are we focused on our own sins? What about the one who sinned against us?

For a pastoral liturgist, this is a struggle. My own human instinct would be to reject the theme of penitence entirely. Our parishioners will want to know, instead, if the perpetrator is sorry. And they will take satisfaction knowing the person is now in prison, serving a ten-year sentence for the act of arson. But if we don’t engage our culpability (general or even specific) then how will we have grown in this experience? Has the Lord called us to something better, greater, more godly? Or is this just something to “offer up” with a sigh of anger and bitterness? Another notch for the Culture of Victimhood.

Looking closer at the stain, perhaps it will be an opportunity for internal reflection. Our Liturgy Commission chairperson wrote on Facebook this morning:

The stain would be a permanent reminder of our time in exile. It adds character to the area and would be a story to tell future parishioners.

This seems right.

And defilement. Jesus also preached on that:

It is what comes out of a person that defiles. For it is from within, from the human heart, that evil intentions come: fornication, theft, murder,adultery, avarice, wickedness, deceit, licentiousness, envy, slander, pride, folly. All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person. (Mark 7:20-23)

One thing I draw from the ritual of return is the need to keep an outward focus. That sense is certainly colored by the new Pope. But brooding over injuries, curling up in a ball and licking wounds–this is understandable coming from my cat when someone steps on his paw. But we human beings, we believers, are called to higher things. If not on the day of return, perhaps the inner look will be one of examination, as the rite seems to point. But also we have the opportunity to rejuvenate our evangelical spirit, to reach out to others. To tell that story. To place Christ at the center of it. To call upon God’s grace.

 

Ghost of a Pew

Our cleaning company said they couldn’t ice-blast the “shadows” out of the balcony wall like they did for all the soot accumulation from last Fall’s fire.

This struck me as being slightly creepy.

The balcony floor was replaced totally–asbestos. The pews should be back any day. The church’s main floor is currently getting its layers of wax stripped off–everything down to the terrazzo. They have the Daily Mass Chapel (our north side) done, and the floor is stripped to the altar platform. That work is going slowly, but we’re still on target for a return a week from Saturday.

The diocesan liturgist sent me the relevant praenotanda from the Ceremonial of Bishops for the “reparation” of a church after a “desecration.” The archbishop said we could use as much of the rite as we wanted, and he delegated his role to the pastor. He will be in town for Confirmation Sunday. But he has been ill as of late, plus, still recovering from an auto accident last year. (Main reason why his resignation was accepted three years before he was required to submit.)

I’ll post a bit more on the ritual choices we’ve made for our return Mass on Saturday evening the 20th, and what we might do for the other Sunday liturgies that weekend.

 

Cleaning The Font

If all goes according to plan, the cleaners will hand us the keys to the church building in fifteen days. Will we make it? We’d better–all our temporary places of worship are booked solid Sunday the 21st of April.

The cleaning crew was hard at work in the baptismal font today:

It was nice to see granite. Whenever I’ve toured or snuck into the church these past months, all I’ve seen is the plywood covering it, protecting it from damage.

 

Nearly Midnight

I have a mixed heart today. This afternoon I heard the encouraging news of the Holy Father’s Mass in the Roman youth prison, which included washing the feet of young women and Muslims. Surely this must be throwing some of my sister and brother Catholics into apoplexy. I feel for them. I can imagine how it must seem to have a spiritual worldview come crashing down.

I remember well enough my confrontation with mortality when my brother died nearly two years ago in a highway crash. We learned a few days ago my wife’s sister is gravely ill. It is hard to get information all the way from Florida, and lensed through upset loved ones. But it seems the end is near. I remember being in denial about my brother, trying to convince myself I did not hear his wife quite right, and that I would arrive at their home and he would be fine. But he wasn’t. My heart could not steer my mind, not totally. My wife spent most of the day helping me prepare for the first two Triduum liturgies. I hope it was helpful. We didn’t talk too much about things, except over lunch.

Our niece did tell us that she read the Bible to her mother last night. And a tear came from her eye. Otherwise, she has been totally unresponsive to people. My wife debates whether to go now or wait, perhaps, for a miracle. The Triduum is here, the anniversary of her reception into Full Communion over thirty years ago.

This was the backdrop for me of our parish’s Holy Thursday Mass tonight. We were in our temporary location on campus at the Iowa State Center. Our open foot washing got off to a slow start. For a moment, I didn’t think anyone would come forward. It was the first year the young miss declined to wash and be washed. (Usually the three of us would wash each other’s.) But finally, people did come, and it went on for four songs.

The students opted to conduct a transfer procession from the auditorium back to our parish’s lower lounge. Ordinarily, I’d feel heartened by the public act of worship past a few blocks of fraternities and dorms to our student center. But no flowers were prepared, and no special lighting employed. Just a ciborium on the altar, and the “corporate” fluorescent lighting beaming down.

I feel mostly at a loss. Too much time away in exile away from church. Too much heaviness inside of me.

Where to go from here? Psalm 4 is one of my favorite Compline psalms. Verse 2 promises a path out:

Answer when I call, my saving God.
In my troubles, you cleared a way;
show me favor; hear my prayer.

Show me favor: that’s direct. The ICEL Psalter was a bit more insistent: “Be good to me.” Sounds like a Blues song. Dare we insist, “You better be good to me.”? What about this great tune? That sums up where I am right now, ’round midnight. Quiet and melancholy drift, and the occasional blast.

Verse 7 echoes my thoughts tonight:

Many say, “May we see better times!”

But that’s not the conclusion, the “Amen” of Psalm 4. Verse 9 is:

In peace I shall both lie down and sleep,
for you alone, Lord, make me secure.

There are nights when we can only lie down, and sleep does not come. I hope for both after midnight. I suspect the Lord will be good to me.

I realize I am not invulnerable. My brother was not. And now, my wife’s only sibling she has known. Certainly, the human body of Jesus was not, victimized as it was on Good Friday. What is the meaning, and where is the redemption in such suffering? We grow weary from the pounding of life’s events. It may seem as if God is not there. But if not, from where will hope come? On dark, troubled nights like this, I realize clearly I have nowhere else to go. So I will go, banging on the door. “Be good to me.” It’s nearly midnight.

 

Pope Francis On Liturgy II

What strikes me most about this image posted at PrayTell is the predominance of women, perhaps as many as four generations represented. Contrast that with the images of popes at liturgy–nearly all surrounded by men. Fawning men. Here, the focus is on the liturgical act. On Christ, if you will. Not on the celebrity. Even Peter got that right, fussing about the act.

From a Palm Sunday homily in 2008 (also via PrayTell):

Jesus goes out to meet people, instead of waiting for people to come looking for Him. He goes out to be encountered. Today is the day Jesus goes to be met and He enters the city. Many Christians today have also gone out, in the name of Jesus, to meet the sick in the hospitals[, etc.]…the Church spills into the street because today Jesus is the king of the street, as He was that Palm Sunday in Jerusalem. The place to worship Jesus on this day, more than a temple, is the street. There he was acclaimed, there He was blessed, there He was recognized as the Lord. Out in the street. Later, on Friday, in the corridors of power, among the groups of influence, He was bought and sold [i.e.,
His fate was debated and decided] But where the people are faithful, where the people are believing, out in the street, He was acclaimed.

I think we have a pope who is far from Benedict XVI’s vision, and that of my traditionalist sisters and brothers, that the liturgy itself serves as a seed for the world. And I mean the institutional face of that liturgy in its correctness, propriety, and sobriety. Note the disdain for the “corridors of power … the groups of influence.” This is not where Christ is to be acclaimed.

Instead, it seems the man wearing the fisherman’s ring will use the liturgy as a means to a greater end: the proclamation of the Gospel to the widest possible audience. Even in the US, consider the impact of an evangelical Palm Sunday–what that might be if the Church spilled out to make an impact on our worship spaces larger than that one Easter swelling? And we went out on Easter, too, and were not aimless and dishearted like those on the road to Emmaus. But we had a singular message to spread.

 

Pope Francis On Liturgy I

Let’s talk baptism …

When Cardinal Bergoglio was asked about the baptism of children whose parents were not married, he responded:

To us here that would be like closing the doors of the Church. The child has no responsibility for the marital state of its parents. And then, the baptism of children often becomes a new beginning for parents. Usually there is a little catechesis before baptism, about an hour, then a mystagogic catechesis during liturgy. Then, the priests and laity go to visit these families to continue with their post-baptismal pastoral. And it often happens that parents, who were not married in church, maybe ask to come before the altar to celebrate the sacrament of marriage.

I like this sense of hope and optimism.

My parish had a recent small controversy with the baptism at Sunday Mass of children of two couples, one unmarried and one in a same-sex union. It’s nice to know the Holy Father would support the view that “the supreme law is the salvation of souls.”

 

Pope Benedict’s Retirement Party

The students have planned a social after our weekly Thursday night Mass tonight. They’ve requested people bring cats. My cats don’t like to travel, so I brought a stuffed tiger from my very early childhood. Here he is posing with my “Joseph’s Dream” icon in the background.

We’re celebrating a votive Mass for the Pope tonight. The Scriptures are:

• Ezekiel 34:11-16
• Psalm 23
• 1 Peter 5:1-4
• Luke 22:24-30

What do you think? Over the top to have two readings about not lording it over others and leading by service?

How many priests will “forget” we have no pope and continue to mention “Benedict our pope” in the Eucharistic Prayer?

 

The Momentum of Non-Change

We’ve been fairly fortunate since our church fire to have consistent worship in one place on Sundays. Today, however, was the only exile weekend (late September to mid-April) in which our usual venue, the Iowa State Center’s Benton Auditorium, was booked. So we decided to do as much as humanly possible to promote the change. We were able to score the large hall in the student union across the street from our building. Worshipers were able (as they have been for the past three months) to leave their cars in our new parking structure, and walk across the street for Mass. The Knights also picked this weekend to welcome people back (temporarily) to Campustown with a pancake breakfast.

But as we hoped wouldn’t happen, not everybody got the message. It was on Facebook–all the parish Facebook pages. It was tweeted. It was on the banner all week at the parish web page. It was communicated in “traditional” ways–the post-Communion announcement and the print bulletin.

One of our more active students posted to Facebook:

This was not published very well …

I admit feeling a bit stung by that.

It’s a good thing modern Catholics, God bless them, don’t live in a catacomb-to-catacomb Sunday existence anymore. But they do have expectations of … what’s that monastic virtue? … stability.

It is a good thing to have a known, comfortable, and expected place to which to go to worship. Seven more weekends. Can’t come soon enough.