104/365 I'm going fishing

He stands there pompously proclaiming the gospel--he can even make Simon Peter sound like an effete snob: "I'm going fishing!" is said like one might tell a 4 year old that one is about to eat one's broccoli and one is very proud of this fact and thinks the 4 year old ought to do the same. A false excitement.

Not at all like the Sunday three years ago when Fr. Bill read this, visiting that Sunday (also a first communion Sunday, I remember). "I'm going fishing" was read with this tone of mixed regret, disgust, and a sort of hopeless helplessness. That Sunday (and I was not a big fan of Bill usually, especially when his homilies turned dark and dreary and filled with depressing poetry) I heard Simon Peter and understood. I could live and breathe in that moment of humanity. I've never read this passage the same way since.

But this time, the deacon stands there with his hands folded like how you'd teach a 2nd grader to go to communion, like a precious moments statue of a small child praying, and he's reading this gospel like he's telling a story to small children who just wouldn't understand. Not just "I'm going fishing" but all of it afterward when John points and says it's the Lord and Peter jumps into the water to get there. Peter, and I know I'm not original for saying this, is for me, the most human character in the gospel stories. He blurts. He says what's on his mind right then. He broods and lies and runs ahead to find the ending of the story. I love him. And so I found myself standing there remembering how this story goes instead of listening to it.

"Peter do you love me?" he says, syrupy. Christ is not some blond blue eyed soft around the edges greeting card. Look, oh look, Dick, look at Puff. Look at Puff. Puff is funny. Funny, funny Puff. THAT'S the tone. Finally. I remember children's primers and first grade attempts at inflection and that's what's going on at the ambo. Look, congregation, look at Peter. Funny, funny Peter.

I think about Peter, who would be drenched, standing on the shore eating bread and fish, with all these words in his head and nothing to say and then that question: Peter do you love me? In front of all the people he's supposed to lead, but why, why is he the leader? Stop asking me these questions. You know the answers.

The gospel of the Lord. We sing the Alleluia and I watch the deacon begin to withdraw from the ambo and Fr. Miguel meet him halfway at the altar. At least I won't have to go relieve Mike in back and take Leo and sit outside and ignore the homily. Funny, funny deacon. Sit, deacon, sit.

132/365 Rumination on an old Worship meeting

I don't remember the exact words, but it went something like this. It was last Easter season, or maybe the one before that, and Miguel had just read the gospel for the coming season for us to reflect on before we started our meeting (which seems to happen, and then not happen, depending on the month, or maybe on the attendance--sometimes we reflect, but other times he reads, or has someone read, and then that's it. And sometimes that's good). It was, I believe, the gospel when Thomas isn't in the upper room when Christ appears, and he doubts, and then is proven wrong and all that.

Resurrection became the topic. Hildegard mentioned something along the lines of resurrection being a mystery, how Christ was resurrected but changed--he wasn't the person he had been before. The disciples didn't recognize him on the road, for instance. And then Hazel at the end of the table, who rarely spoke up about anything, just sat listening (and sometimes I think judging, but maybe that's just me being terribly self-conscious), said, "OF COURSE he's the same person. He's flesh and blood. He ate fish on the beach!"

At that moment, and pretty much every moment since, I thought about how ridiculous that statement seemed to me. And then I though about how much I didn't care. About how my faith isn't bound to what form Christ appeared in after his resurrection. For that matter, the resurrection isn't too key to my faith. Voskreseniya. It's a mystery I don't spend much time thinking about.

But what I have spent too much time thinking about was this interchange between Hazel and Hildegard. Why is the fact of the gospel story so important to some and so inconsequential to others (not that I think it's inconsequential, but I think some folks can debate, doubt, reassess, and grow in ways that others just can not)? I wanted to cry out at that meeting, "Why? Why does that piece matter? When you are considering the Word made Flesh, why are we so concerned with the latter part? What about the words?"

But of course, it being Worship Commission, I did not.

133/365 Sing Alleluia

Sr. Hildegard sent an email. Notes from her discussion with Fr. Miguel. We weren't having a Worship Commission meeting. And that was fine with me. Everything on the notes looked normal: plans for Corpus Christi, thoughts about Trinity Sunday, and so forth. But there was one thing.

Sometime long ago in the deep memory of our parish (meaning, about 10 or 15 years ago, tops), we started singing Alleluia after the gospel. Before the gospel, too, of course, but then when the reader said, "The Gospel of the Lord," we didn't reply "Praise to you Lord Jesus Christ." Instead, the piano picked up the tone and we sang the Alleluia again. Unless we were using that one setting that went on a long long time, this went fine and without a hitch. But lately it started making folks wonder: why are we doing this?

Lynn insisted that we did this because LOTS of people did this. Everyone else who'd ever been to any other mass anywhere disagreed with her. Bev said we did this because it started some Easter season and never went away.

Sounds like time to question, to me at least.

Why should we do this? What purpose does it serve? Anything that happens in a liturgy should have a purpose. We shouldn't do things simply because they are pretty or because it seems right. It should have a reason.

We decided, back in January, to drop it for Lent. And to always drop it if the reader didn't sing the "Gospel of the Lord" part. Because that was seriously awkward, like the choir was suddenly present when they weren't before. Like we were late or something. Jarring.

It went away for all of Lent.

It came back for Easter Season, because the Alleluia is especially prominent during this season. And it was good. It was. It set things apart.

But there's something about the forced rest of Ordinary Time that makes me happy. Simpler music, simpler decor, simpler things. Atrium calls it the Growing Season. We let things settle into our souls and gel. We count the Sundays off and grow like our gardens. It's lovely.

So I caught this email after Lynn had already replied with: I have been to other liturgies lately for a variety of celebration. They did not sing the alleluia. I miss it. I would be very sad to see us stop this practice.

Which is fine and good. Then Rachel, a new parishioner whom I would really like to see stay on Worship Commission, wrote: I agree with reciting the Alleluia in Ordinary time - makes singing it more effective during "special" liturgical times.

Then I wrote: I prefer not to sing it all the time because it becomes just one of those things. I like having it stand out in the Easter season.

Bev wrote: I really don't have a strong opinion about singing the alleluia after the Gospel. I lean toward not doing it during ordinary time, but would want to sing it before the Gospel.

And then Fr. Miguel sort of tied it all together by saying: Of course we’d sing the Alleluia Gospel Acclamation before the Gospel... my question was just about singing it after the Gospel, as we had gotten into the habit of doing. Let’s plan on not singing the Alleluia after the Gospel once Ordinary Time begins, but saving it for the more festive seasons of the year.

Seemed done, at least for now. The nice thing about a liturgical year is that if this Ordinary Time seems wrong without it, we can go back to it next time. But then Lynn decided to not let it lie. That's a big surprise. She wrote:

I would really like to discuss at a meeting this thing about the alleluia. It is something that makes the Gospel stand out. It also makes the joyfulness of the community alive throughout the year. There are so many other things we do during Easter to make it special. People respond to common responses by rote no matter what is printed in the worship aide. To lose the alleluia during the rest of the liturgical year will make it more difficult to reclaim during Easter. We are a signing community so let the people sing. It seems to me this response only became awkward because we had a deacon who couldn't sing.

O, she just makes me so tired. I can already envision this meeting. And I just hope it doesn't come to fruition, frankly. I think we've spoken pretty clearly, and more talk is not going to make it more clear.

Our next meeting is mid-June. So maybe at least it will be "set" for Ordinary Time. I just can't stop thinking of the Lyle Lovett song, "She's Already Made Up Her Mind."

So now she's sitting at one end of the kitchen table
And she is staring without an expression
And she is talking to me without moving her eyes
Because she's already made up her mind