Merry Christmas to all! The actual day has passed, but the season continues. Our house is still overflowing with the glorious (?) clutter of presents, foods, dogs, and bulging laundry baskets. (The dirty clothes came home to celebrate the holidays with us!)
After my previous grumbles about the ghosts of Christmas masses past, this year`s liturgical celebration was anticlimactic – but in a good way. The Christmas Eve mass was moved up to a very early 7:00 pm, and one of our daughters wasn`t going to be home in time. A quick decision was made to attend the Christmas morning mass together.
Our whole clan entered the church on Christmas morning, and immediately felt conspicuous. The sparse pews looked like a weekday mass. Eek! Where to sit…..hmm, at least we could all sit together. We slid into place, filling a pew and a bit. If we weren`t such a tight clan, we could have had a pew each. In the absence of the choir, the music was graciously provided by a married couple. They played a guitar and what I think was an electronic autoharp. Their gentle voices melded into glorious old time harmonies, reminiscent of small town dance halls. Ah….not bad….
Then a request was put out for children to come to the front and play percussion instruments for the recessional song, `Go Tell It on the Mountain`. But, there was only one child present. So, the request was put out to our `children`, who are only 19 to 27 years old. Our 22 year old, bearded son grumbled audibly….absolutely not! Since they didn`t come forward, the instruments were brought to them. Amid many giggles, elbowing, and guffawing, they proceeded to lay on the percussive sounds. And they laid them on thick! Put some rhythm sticks in the hands of a 22 year old drummer, and you`re guaranteed a good time. What I thought would be an embarrassing, horrific moment, ended up being a blast. We left mass grinning, with a great story to add to the family collection.
Tomorrow I`ll update you on the spirit of our liturgical celebrations. Spoiler alert….there were no `c and e` homilies. Merry Christmas!!!!
catholic dialogue 