One Sunday, one Mass: what a thought!
It will be great to settle in with a community for the next few weeks with a different set of responsibilities. (Writing papers and keeping up on reading assignments rather than wrangling liturgical ministers and keeping up with students.)
Creighton seems to have a similar set-up as I serve back home: a parish that is also blended into a campus ministry.
I can go to Mass early and pray, anonymously, and not be asked about the sticky lock on the balcony door or what new procedure has been devised for cup prep this weekend or how we’re doing the Pentecost Sequence.
From my window, I see a few people strolling back from the church. Two guys in this one group of five are wearing ties. Must be coming from 8AM Mass. My “new” parish has already prayed two Masses this weekend, and I wasn’t there for either one of them.
None of these people are wearing red. I fielded a question about that at home before I left. My take is to pretty much leave it up to the individual to decide what to wear to church, even on Pentecost. I put up some red here–but only if you are reading today. We’ll have some ordinary time mixture up in less than fifteen hours.
I’m sure that among my readers, going to Mass while away from home is an expectation, not a vague thought. Ever traveled and found oneself in a parish on a major feast? Not Christmas I mean–that looks mostly the same anywhere. And Easter too. The next three weekends will house white feasts. By the time green emerges on Sunday, I will be back at home.
Catholic Sensibility 
My parents are 90, and for about the past 12-15 years, I am with them for Christmas Eve and Christmas, so I definitely have been “elsewhere” for Christmas. Sometimes, it was a penance. Like the second Xmas Vigil Mass at my parents’ old parish, which was a choirless, cantorless, 4-hymn sandwich, with the organist reading a book between hymns, a 30 minute fire-breathing homily for the C&E crowd, and everything thing else rushed through. We had to attend that Mass due to parental medical logistical needs. I eventually got my parents to attend the second Vigil Mass at the neighboring (older) parish, which had a better liturgical heritage off which to feed. My parents are no longer able to attend Mass for the past couple of years, so when I visit them in their parish of the past 7 Christmases (a territorial & university parish for a major SUNY univerity), I have my choice of poison (my preferred Mass is of Xmas Day, but family needs often dictate I must choose another slot). This year, the students did a fine job at the second Vigil, while a sudden snowstorm greeted us on the way out.
I spent 3 Sundays in May traveling. Easter 6 I was en route home via ferry, and went to Mass in SE Connecticut after the crossing. A rather obviously conservative pastor in a modern church building. Semi-erudite homily, but somewhat missing the point. The stunner, after the nicely chanted preface, was the Eucharistic Prayer – No II, but with part of the intro dropped, and the first three paragraphs of the second half omitted. The purification of the vessels at the altar took longer…..
No longer being in active liturgical ministry for two years now, I get around more than I used to. I have finally found a parish about 5 miles away that has a music-free early Sunday morning Mass (the alternatives within that ambit all involve purgatorial music ministries); it’s a large and active parish, and the pastor apparently has allowed different Masses on the schedule to have more distinct liturgical sensibilities. It helps that the parish is the last remaining redoubt locally of a couple of good confessors. So it’s gradually becoming my “backup” parish when I can’t go to my normal parish of choice (which itself its not unfree of issues) in the city core.