I have a very serious question, and I truly mean no disrespect. Way back when you were just starting up with the tradition of putting ashes on your forehead, did it ever occur to you that it might be good to know some solid reasons for doing a thing before you actually do it?
I’ve dabbled in a variety of different Protestant denominations myself, and if I am asked to do something that seems the least bit odd or different to me I will ask for a detailed explanation. This has led to a number of very nice conversations that took off from there into all sorts of interesting avenues. I can’t promise that I was 100% satisfied with every explanation I ever got, but I was always glad that I had the conversations and that we were able to connect over those types of topics.
I’m really, really not suggesting that you should demand answers about everything and be a disturbance or a contrarian. But I am suggesting that on general principle, it’s a good idea to find an uplifting, edifying, and informative way of finding out the perfectly good reasons for why you do certain things, while at the same time getting close to people who know a lot of really good information. And I’m also suggesting that it’s kind of silly to just do the thing, whatever it is, for any number of years or decades before you finally get around to doing what you probably should have done in the first place.
Think of it as a bit of a trade-off. Someone comes up to you (really friendly of course) and says, “You’ve never done this before, it’s new to your experience, go ahead and start doing this at certain times and in certain settings.” And then you would say, “That’s really interesting and I’m super excited about it. Of course I’m willing to cooperate in all of this, but first- or soon, perhaps- could you go ahead and explain the origins of this practice and the really good reasons for doing it?” And then you get your explanation. Information is given in exchange for participation, roughly speaking.
I think that makes a lot more sense than just giving your cooperation and participation in exchange for absolutely nothing. When you do that, you wind up walking through a deli and suddenly realize that you’re empty handed. Oh wait a minute, I should have figured out why I was doing this at some point- and it would have made the most sense to do that right when I was about to start doing it.
