(The Furrow, March 2001, pp.169-171)
Recently I concelebrated Mass on a weekday with a curate in a parish in a small town. He introduced the Mass simply and briefly, and he had something to say. He sang the Lord, have mercy, the Holy, holy, holy, the Our Father and the Lamb of God. The congregation joined in, in desultory fashion.
He gave a homily, which made one single point, drawn from the readings, and applied to ordinary life. Like the introduction, it was concise, not moralistic but inspirational and uplifting. He then said the Prayers of the Faithful from a book, but adapted them. We had the Sign of Peace.
One thing was obvious about the Mass, and that was that he had prepared it. But what I noticed most was something which I find difficult to describe. He said Mass in a way which I can only call by the word “integrated”. It was part of himself. He was at one with it, and it with him. He was relaxed without being casual. He was reverent without being pietistic. He taught without being didactic.
When we return to the sacristy afterwards, the clock on the sacristy was straight in front of me and I noticed the time. The Mass had taken forty minutes. I never felt it, it passed so quickly.
I have often asked myself before and since about our daily Masses. I feel we murder them, partly because of being tyrannized by the clock. Whose clock? Is the people’s the excuse and ours the reason? We say Mass on “automatic pilot” anxious ‘not to hold people up’. Is there not a risk here, and perhaps more than a risk, of “dumbing down” the Mass, and reducing it to the level of the lowest common denominator, of saying Mass without praying it? Are we right to do that? If that is what people want priests to do, does that necessarily mean that we should do it? How long will people continue to come to a Mass said by the short cut? How long will they find that it nourishes them?
Mass with everything
Along with this concern is another that is related to it. It is the use of the Mass on any and every occasion where some kind of community prayer is called for. We “put on a Mass” for this and that event. But perhaps some other forms of prayer might be more appropriate, if only to take account of the presence of people who may not be Catholic or may not be “practising,” in terms of sacramental life. Such alternative prayer forms take more time and effort on everyone’s part, whereas the Mass is ready made, it is there in the book.
In recent years, a lot has been done in parish missions to develop alternative liturgies for evening sessions. There are all sorts of paraliturgical ceremonies, or sacramentals, and they add a lot to a mission. Generally they demand a lot of preparation to begin with, though not for ever after. But little of that development seems to have carried over into the ordinary day-to-day life of parishes.
I think it would be good if it did. The Mass is the summit of the liturgy. But a summit cannot exist without a foundation. Having the Mass every day, without a foundation in other forms of community prayer, is a bit like having a Christmas dinner every day. (The Jewish Passover from which the Mass is derived was held only once a year.) I fear that what may happen, if we continue on our present course, is that we will “burn out” the Mass and then we will be left with nothing. We have all our eggs in one basket.
Multiplying Masses
We have too many Masses. In one Irish town of about 20,000 people, of whom perhaps half “practise,” there are some thirty-two Masses between Saturday evening and Sunday evening. Inevitably this means a fragmentation of congregations so that there is a scattering of people at many Masses. This makes it more difficult to create a sense of prayer. It also means that some priests are required to say more than one Mass, perhaps two or three or even more, on a Sunday.
What effect does that have on the priest’s own appreciation of the Mass? Personally, I do not find it possible to pray more than one Mass a day. More than that, and I’m operating by rote, as if on an assembly line. I resent that and feel belittled by it. Saying Mass here and there, running round like a fire brigade, filling gaps and coping with emergencies, being dropped as if by parachute into a congregation with whom one has no other connection, is unsatisfactory. And that is the best one can say for it. It runs a great risk of turning the Mass into something merely functional, something that we “do”, rather than the expression of our relationship with God.
From the people’s point of view, doing the above does nothing to prepare them for the days – which cannot be far off – when they will have to run Sunday services themselves. From the priest’s viewpoint, it risks de-personalizing the Mass and diminishing his regard for it. It can contribute, too, to burnout among priests.
I’m not the first person to have made this point about multiplying Masses. It does seem, though, that, as a body, we priests are unable to bring ourselves to face this question and to deal with it in a way that is pastorally responsible. Nobody wants to be the first one to “cut out” a Mass. Is that fair to the people? Is it fair to the Mass? Is it fair to ourselves?
Maybe God is doing for us what we seem unable to bring ourselves to do. Maybe the numbers, age and health of priests are imposing a solution on us. Would it not be better, though, to develop a solution, in an adult and intelligent way, while we still have the opportunity of doing so? Waiting for events to impose decisions on us leaves no room for manoeuvre, no flexibility, no capacity decide what is best. We could do better.