Our Response

Almost two thousand years ago, on the night before He died, Jesus of Nazareth celebrated the Passover meal with His disciples.  They gathered in an upper room in Jerusalem for a ritual meal that commemorated an event that at that point was over 1,300 years old – the night the Angel of Death passed over the homes of the Hebrews and their liberation from slavery in Egypt.  The ritual was set and done exactly the same way in every village and town throughout Judah.  That is until Jesus departed from the well-known ritual, took bread into His hands, said a blessing over it, broke it and gave it do his disciples, saying, “Take, eat; this is my body” (Matthew 26:26).

We can only wonder what the disciples thought as they received this bread He declared to be His body.  He then took the cup of wine, the last of four consumed during the Passover meal, and told them that it was the “blood of the new covenant” (Luke 22:20).  Jesus declared a new covenant between God and humanity.  It is the New Covenant that we celebrate each time we come to Mass.

What is our response to the command of Jesus to take and eat and, take and drink?  Our very eternal existence relies on our answer, for without Christ we are as good as dead.  The Angel of Death still treads the earth bringing fear to those who do not believe in eternal life.  

Our society considers itself to be very sophisticated and scientific.  Most take literally what they learned in high school biology, that we come into existence in our mother’s womb, and when we breathe our last breath, our body immediately starts to decay – and we cease to exist.  But we know that’s there more to it; as the Pslamist tells us (Psalm 139),  we were known to God before we were knit in our mother’s wombs, and because of our belief in Christ, we do not cease to exist when our body fails!  Our faith in God teaches us that there is life after death.

There may be other things that seem more important than going to Mass and receiving the Body and Blood of Christ, and indeed they would be if this life were all there is.  But for the chance of eternal life, the reality for the true Christian is that getting to Mass, and receiving the Body and Blood of Christ, is well worth every effort that it takes. In fact, it is among the most important things we do in our earthly life.

Pray for Peace

Pope Francis called for a Day of Fasting and Prayer for Peace in Syria, the Middle East, and the world to be held on September 7, 2013, the vigil of the birth of Mary, Queen of Peace. The Holy Father reminded us that "peace is a precious gift, which must be promoted and protected" and that "all men and women of good will are bound by the task of pursuing peace."  If this is the first time you are hearing the Holy Father’s message, you are encouraged to pick a day this week to fast and pray.

The Bishops of the United States send this message to all the faithful:  “We are anguished by the terrible suffering of the Syrian people and again affirm the need for dialogue and negotiation to resolve this conflict that has wrought so much devastation. The use of chemical weapons is particularly abhorrent and we urgently pray for the victims of such atrocities and for their loved ones.  And we applaud the work done by those bringing humanitarian aid to people affected by this crisis and pray for their efforts to ease the suffering of our brothers and sisters.

“As our nation's leaders contemplate military action, it is particularly appropriate and urgent that we in the United States embrace the Holy Father's call to pray and fast for a peaceful end to the conflict in Syria and to violent conflicts everywhere. Pope Francis has exhorted "the international community to make every effort to promote clear proposals for peace, …a peace based on dialogue and negotiation, for the good of the entire Syrian people."  

“Last Friday, our Conference of Bishops reaffirmed an earlier message of the Holy Father "that the path of dialogue and negotiation between all components of Syrian society, with the support of the international community, is the only option to put an end to the conflict."  We urged "the United States to work with other governments to obtain a ceasefire, initiate serious negotiations, provide impartial and neutral humanitarian assistance, and encourage building an inclusive society in Syria that protects the rights of all its citizens, including Christians and other minorities."

The Pope and our Bishops urge us to witness to the hope we have in peace through prayer and fasting.  We are also encouraged to contact our representatives in Congress and the U.S. Senate and let them know that the only intervention we support with Syria is diplomatic.

Labor Day

Labor Day is not the end of Summer – that comes three weeks from now.  Labor Day is not a day off from our labors.  Labor Day celebrates the American worker and is an opportunity to take stock of the ways workers are honored and respected. Earlier this year, Pope Francis pointed out, "Work is fundamental to the dignity of a person.  It gives one the ability to maintain oneself, one's family, [and] to contribute to the growth of one's own nation." Unfortunately, millions of workers today are denied this honor and respect as a result of unemployment, underemployment, unjust wages, wage theft, abuse, and exploitation.

Even with the economy producing at, or above, pre-crash levels, it has not improved the standard of living for many people, especially for the poor and the working poor, of which there are more with every passing month.  More than four million people have been jobless for over six months, and that does not include the millions more who have simply lost hope. The reality is that a person aged 55, or above, who lost their full-time job during the crash may never work full time again.  For every available job, there are often five people actively vying for it.  The lack of jobs pushes wages down as does the fact that most of the jobs created since the crash have been in the low-paying service sector. 

In the wealthiest country in the world more than 46 million people live in poverty, including 16 million children. The economy is not creating an adequate number of jobs that allow workers to provide for themselves and their families.

Jobs, wages, and poverty are interrelated. The only way to reduce the widening gap between the affluent and the poorest people in our nation is by creating quality jobs that provide a just compensation that enables workers to live in the dignity appropriate for themselves and their families.

At the end of Mass we are commanded "Go and announce the Gospel of the Lord." We leave with a sense of mission to show one another honor by what we do and say. On this Labor Day our mission takes us to the millions of people who continue to suffer the effects of the current economy. Labor Day is an opportunity to take stock of the ways workers are honored and respected and to work at changing unjust economic systems.

This 3-minute is based on material from the US Catholic Bishop’s 2013 Labor Day Statement.  To read the complete statement go to http://www.usccb.org/issues-and-action/human-life-and-dignity/labor-employment/labor-day-statement-2013.cfm.

Finding Fault?

Some of us play an intellectual game at Mass of finding fault with the way the Mass is celebrated.  We may be motivated to do this out of a false sense of piety born from a desire to have everything perfect.  But the Mass is not a place for us to sit back like movie critics and to find fault; rather, it is a place to encounter Jesus Christ.

Some of those who encountered the Son of God during His earthly ministry complained about His lowly estate.  When our Lord took on our human nature, as Saint Paul says, He “emptied himself, taking the form of a servant” (Philippians 2:7).  Part of this lowering was being raised in Galilee.  Galileans were considered uneducated and backward by the religious elite in Jerusalem.  Recent Bible studies have revealed hints that Jesus was thought of in this way by some of His contemporaries.

We can see this in the Scriptures themselves, when our Lord’s Aramaic is not as perfect as the Jews living in Jerusalem would have spoken it.  Examples of this are citied in the Lord’s use of “talitha kum” [tah-lee-tha koom] for “little girl get up”; the words He uses mistakenly mix the masculine with the feminine grammatically.  It is also hinted at during His crucifixion when He cries out, “Eli, Eli, la’ma sabach-tha’ni?”[E-lie, E-lie, lah-mah sah bahk thah nee]  We are told it means, “My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46).  But those residents of Jerusalem heard him say it and did not understand, and thought He was invoking Elijah.

This might scandalize some of us who expect that if God were to become human, He would be perfect in every way.  But a reading of the Gospels shows us that God truly lowered Himself, from being born in a stable to having “nowhere to lay his head” during His life on earth.

If we are waiting for the perfect priest to say the perfect Mass for us, we will miss out on the great graces our Lord wishes to bring to us.  The people who experienced Jesus walking on the face of the earth had their excuses.  “Surely this man was of little consequence,” they would have said to themselves, “there was nothing special about him.”  And so they missed the opportunity of an eternal lifetime – to meet the Son of God.

We, too, can miss Him when we play the same game.  It might be the priest celebrant, the choir, the worship space, the people around us.  But being a critical spectator of the Mass distracts us from the gifts God wishes to bestow upon us during the sacred act of the Mass.

Go and Make Disciples

It is very possible that you may not know what “Mass” means.  After all, you probably have always heard the Mass said in your own language.  But “Mass” is derived from the way the Mass was ended in Latin.

“Mass” is an English rendering of the Latin term “missa.”  In Latin the Mass ends with “ite messa est,” which translated into English means, “Go, it is sent,” the “it” being the Church.

Because of the familiarity of the ending, the celebration of our Lord’s Supper eventually became known simply as “Mass.”  There were actually two dismissals in the celebration – one in which those who were not fully Catholic  but wanted to be, known as Catechumens, were dismissed right after the homily, and the dismissal at the end, when all the fully initiated Catholics, the faithful, were dismissed.  There were two “Masses,” namely the Mass of the Catechumens and the Mass of the Faithful.

The fact that we call this greatest of Christian prayers the “dismissal” points to the essence of what it means to be a follower of Jesus Christ.  Our Lord calls us to Himself and through His saving act invites us to a unity with God the Father through the power of the Holy Spirit.  Jesus makes communion with God possible.  But following Jesus does not stop with communion, for once He has united us to Himself, He then sends us forth with a mission – a dismissal.

“Go” is one of His final words to His disciples as He ascends into heaven in the Gospel of Matthew when he commissions them to make disciples of all the nations.  So, the very way every Mass ends with “go” is at the heart of what we come to the Mass for – to be empowered by God and sent forth again.

Saint Peter spoke up for the apostles in John’s Gospel when Jesus asked his disciples whether they wanted to leave Him like those who couldn’t bear it when He said He would give them His flesh to eat.  Peter said, “Lord, to whom shall we go?  You have the words of eternal life; and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God” (John 6:68-69).

The “go” that is the very meaning of the word “Mass” receives its meaning from our communion with our Lord Jesus Christ during the Mass, where we come to know Him.