S
spock2022
Guest
I used to work for the homeless in a United Church “inner city mission” for a very liberal United Church Minister, so you can imagine how interesting that would of been for this Catholic.
One of the things our Rev used to like doing was creating an altar space with a wine jar (or bottle) filled with condoms, needles, drugs, etc., that were daily parts of many of the homeless suffering from the addictions and sex trade cycle. He had people who were in various states of “sobriety” reading and taking part in a memorial…and we had one or two each month from people dying on the street.
The thing that occured to me was how these symbols touched the worship and prayer of the homeless and drug addicted…I have never seen so much authenticity in “crying out to the Lord” as I have seen with those whom suffer a great deal…and I could not help but feel the spirit of God in those “liberal, radical” ceremonies or rituals than I may have felt in a more regular mass or protestant church service.
It occured to me then that there is room to “create ritual” and to create poems, rap songs, etc, that represent our realities, ritual are basically symbols that represent our lives, our undertstanding of God and the connection between those two.
SInce this is a discussion place for 'spirituality" what are some of the non-traditional Catholic “rituals” that you have created for yourselves and what are there stories? That would be so neat…I have shared my story already…nothing too elaborate…just a small note to honour the creative side of loving our God.
Spock2022
One of the things our Rev used to like doing was creating an altar space with a wine jar (or bottle) filled with condoms, needles, drugs, etc., that were daily parts of many of the homeless suffering from the addictions and sex trade cycle. He had people who were in various states of “sobriety” reading and taking part in a memorial…and we had one or two each month from people dying on the street.
The thing that occured to me was how these symbols touched the worship and prayer of the homeless and drug addicted…I have never seen so much authenticity in “crying out to the Lord” as I have seen with those whom suffer a great deal…and I could not help but feel the spirit of God in those “liberal, radical” ceremonies or rituals than I may have felt in a more regular mass or protestant church service.
It occured to me then that there is room to “create ritual” and to create poems, rap songs, etc, that represent our realities, ritual are basically symbols that represent our lives, our undertstanding of God and the connection between those two.
SInce this is a discussion place for 'spirituality" what are some of the non-traditional Catholic “rituals” that you have created for yourselves and what are there stories? That would be so neat…I have shared my story already…nothing too elaborate…just a small note to honour the creative side of loving our God.
Spock2022