The yearning to belong is something I can remember as far back as kindergarten. I never felt normal, because according to the world's definition, I've never been. And probably nowhere have I been more keenly aware that one thing (me) is not like the rest (them) than in my Church. That has never been more true than it is now.
If the presidency of Donald Trump and the ensuing pandemic have highlighted one thing, it's that the Catholic Church, like much of America, has its fair share of hypocrites.
I jokingly refer to my journey as one of cradle Catholic to trash to Trad to trash again. It's irreverent for me to refer to myself, a child loved by God, as trash, but the truth is that there are those folks who'd rather kick me to the curb than make hard choices, face tough questions and have honest dialogue. It's black or white, wrong or right, and absolutely nothing in between.
If I'm going to be honest, I must admit that I do prefer a more traditional form of worship. Even when I left the Church and wandered in and out of Protestant denominations, I was always more drawn to classic architecture, music and liturgy than guitar songs and burlap banners. In fact, if I hadn't become part of an Anglo-catholic congregation for awhile, I'm not sure if/when I would have returned to Roman Catholicism. As fate had it, it was through an Episcopal priest that I learned about the Carmelite Monastery. Once I set foot in that chapel, I knew I had to come back EVEN THOUGH I felt like an alien among the usuals.
I was late for Mass on that first visit, the Feast of the Archangels, because I couldn't find the place. I arrived just in time for the Kyrie of the Missa de Angelis, the whole chapel enveloped in a cloud of Cantica incense. I had never felt my soul so stirred in any place of worship and I thought this must be what entering Heaven is like.
The congregation was made up of large families who arrived to Mass by way of cars or vans peppered with bumper stickers touting Fox News, praying the Rosary and voting against politicians who supported abortion rights. Most of the women wore veils as did all of their daughters, and everyone patiently knelt on the marble floor or unpadded wooden kneelers, without a complaint. Everyone received Holy Communion on the tongue, and there were signs throughout the chapel reminding the laity to protect the sacred silence and practice modesty in dress. When I tried to describe the congregation to a friend, the only word that came to mind was militant. Yet at least at worship, there was nothing militant or defiant about anyone. They were enraptured by the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.
I came back to the monastery the next day for Vespers, and then for Mass on the final day of the Triduum. I passed the Turn on my way back from the Avila Bookstore and was astounded that people seemed to know the nun to who the voice belonged on the other side of the enclosure. How does one get to know Carmelite nuns, who live under the most austere conditions and have so little interaction with the public?
I was captured by the mystique of the place and started looking for any excuse to visit. Some weeks later, I went to Confession and starting attending Catholic Mass again.
I was mesmerized by the Trads, but felt a keen distinction.
For one thing, I wouldn't be caught dead watching Fox News. For another, I identify as pro-life but could not bring myself to stand on the sidewalk of a clinic trying to shame women out of an abortion or worse, hold up signs warning them they'd get breast cancer if they went ahead with terminating the life of their unborn baby. I did pray the Rosary every day, even before I officially returned to the Church, but I wasn't committed enough to pray it on my knees on an unpadded kneeler and not complain about it. Maybe I just wasn't holy enough to be one of them, and this was borne out for me by the fact that no matter how generous I was to the nuns, I would never be chosen to clean the chapel or drive the sisters to doctors' appointments. I figured the Carmelites had a sort of sixth sense they used to root out imposters and while they would always be polite, they wouldn't be welcoming.
No matter. We were blessed to have a priest assigned to our parish who loved traditional liturgy and he offered Mass in a way that felt perfect to me. For our parish's patronal feast day, he arranged to offer a Missa Cantata in Latin. I'd been to the Novus Ordo where the ordinary of the Mass was sung in Latin, but never to the Extraordinary Form. I loved it because it was quiet, it was reverent and for the first time I actually prayed the Mass. Some months later, the Extraordinary Form became a regular Sunday occurrence.
I didn't understand at first the resentment many of the parish's longstanding parishioners felt toward the EF. Very few, if any, made up the EF congregation. I attended both Forms of the Mass, and felt like I had a foot in two camps, not really belonging to either. The Ordinary Form folks seemed more inclined to works, whereas the EF congregation was focused on faith. However, the OF folks liked to chit chat before Mass, whereas the atmosphere at the EF was more conducive to prayer. Neither congregation was made up of bad people, but you wouldn't know that listen to either "side" talk about the other.
I was never the kind of Catholic who felt the need to influence the liturgy either by way of my own or the participation of other women. When I was asked to be an Extraordinary Minister, I said yes. When my daughter was asked by the previous pastor to be an altar server, she was eager to do it and I was happy to let her. I didn't miss this kind of participation at the EF and I wasn't miffed by the fact that only men and boys could be servers. Still, there was always a whiff of misogyny in the air, and the attitude to "just leave it to us men." Never was this more clear than when the pastor was reassigned and his replacement wasn't interested in offering the Traditional Latin Mass.
I sent an email to the archbishop, asking if he would consider either another pastor or another church where we could hold the TLM. I could tell right away that in the eyes of the men, I'd done the wrong thing. Why? We didn't have any kind of Latin Mass community council. Rather than fret over what was to happen to our little congregation, I did something about it, and I don't regret it to this day. Soon we had a new, thought far from ideal home. I didn't go to the Novus Ordo in my own parish because I could not tolerate the way the new pastor offered Mass with its focus on welcoming everybody and what seemed like a disregard for the central point of the Mass - the Liturgy of the Eucharist. But the new place was to be no walk in the park.
First off, the photographer, who happened to be my youngest daughter, was dismissed from her duties without a word of thanks or anything else for that matter for her prior service and replaced by a young man. Second, I nearly had my head taken off when I suggested to one of the chief misogynists that we could probably get a parking permit from the police to park on the street during services, since we didn't have a lot. I'd never seen anyone turn so vicious IN A HOUSE OF GOD in all my life. This was a person who had all the postures and responses down pat but seemed to have left his Christianity home when he came to Mass. And it wasn't the first time I'd felt his teeth in my jugular. He wasn't the only one.
At one of the few Sunday socials we had, the topic of the March for Life came up. I noted to myself that among those who were at the reception, only the men had attended. When one of them insisted that only Catholics made up the pro life movement, I pointed out to him that a group called Feminists for Life, which is both secular and apolitical, had a heavy presence. He said he wouldn't trust any group with name "feminists" in its title. He also said they were new and then I informed him they in fact were not and were around long before anyone named Abby Johnson was on the scene. I was dismissed with a wave of his arrogant hand as some kind of nitwit who didn't know what she was talking about, by a college student with seminary aspirations, who was young enough to be my son.
I've always said there is a fine line between piety and sanity and some of these folks proved it every time I was in their presence. Not all of them, but some were just beyond the pale. I can remember the time one gentleman happened to attend a Novus Ordo Mass and in his effort to avoid the female extraordinary minster, butt in front of me so rudely I had to remind myself where I was and in Whose Presence. Another time, the priest opened the Tabernacle after Mass and the final dismissal as most of us were headed to the exit. A young father dropped on his knees right in front of me and I went tumbling over him, never receiving an apology or even a word of concern for the fall he just caused.
When a minor illness that required a hospital stay occurred and I wanted to attend Mass closer to home, I pretty much stopped going to the TLM, at least with that congregation. My eyes were seeing what they were seeing and my ears were hearing what they were hearing, but they seemed so holy that I figured it was me and I didn't deserve to be among such Saints. But there would be more revelations. I'll expound next time.
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