How does Catholic expression differ from country to country?

[wmscott]

Thanks to both of you (wmscott and Telstar). I am honored that you include me in your prayers and for responding to my post. I used to not touch Catholicism with a 10-foot pole out of fear and ignorance. Little by little I am finding out it is not something to be afraid of, unless you include reverential fear to the Lord.

And yet a reverential fear to the Lord is a good and healthy thing.

 

[Telstar]

And yet a reverential fear to the Lord is a good and healthy thing.

Amen!

 

[Holly3278]

I don’t really know a lot about the different cultures and how they relate to Catholicism. However, in some cultures like India there are Eastern Rites of Catholicism.

 

[PaulDupre1]

Those Filipinos that whip and crucify themselves on Easter might be something to note. I have never seen that in American Catholicism.

Read more:

news.yahoo.com/filipino-devotees-reenact-crucifixion-christ-093544016.html

My wife and I spend time in the Philippines every year. What you described has nothing to do with the mass. It is called a passion play; passion plays have been performed around the world for at least a thousand years.

This particularly realistic and gruesome brand of passion play has been roundly condemned publicly every year prior to Easter by the bishops and priests in the Philippines. But it is a private devotion, not performed on Church property, so there is really nothing the clergy can do about it.

Culture varies from place to place, but the Catholic mass is the same everywhere. I understand little Tagalog or Ilocano and speak even less, but I always know exactly what is happening during the mass because, except for the vernacular language, the mass is the same everywhere.

Paul

 

[Tommy999]

Thanks, Paul. It’s good to know there is consistency to the Catholic Mass throughout the globe.

 

[pablope]

My wife and I spend time in the Philippines every year. What you described has nothing to do with the mass. It is called a passion play; passion plays have been performed around the world for at least a thousand years.

Wow… Is your wife Pinay? What time of the year to you spend there and what part/province?

I miss spending Holy Week there…

This particularly realistic and gruesome brand of passion play has been roundly condemned publicly every year prior to Easter by the bishops and priests in the Philippines. But it is a private devotion, not performed on Church property, so there is really nothing the clergy can do about it.

 

[ericc]

Thank you for sharing your experiences, ericc. Sounds like you have traveled a lot to that part of the world.

Actually I lived in that part of the world except that my studies and work took me to the other side of the world!

 

[PaulDupre1]

Wow… Is your wife Pinay? What time of the year to you spend there and what part/province?

 

[KathleenGee]

Welcome to CAF, Tommy.

As Catholics have shared with you, the Church has liturgical norms set out by the Roman Missal. Likewise there are over 20 rites in the Church, that one could say, reflect one’s ethnic background…I am thinking of the Maronite (Lebanese) Catholic Church that is united to the Holy Father and all bishops. They have some parts of the Mass in Aramaic, the language Christ spoke, as well as Syriac. The music is different. The priest calls down God’s protection more times during the Mass than the Latin. But the structure, tone, intent is the same, the Liturgy of the Word and the Liturgy of the Eucharist.

The Eastern Church (Orthodox) is very similiar, their liturgies very beautiful, longer in duration. There are those who dip the Eucharist into the cup before giving Holy Communion.

Again differences will be in language, music, and customs that are celebrated usually at the greeting at the beginning of Mass and directed towards a particular theme.

The Anglicans and Lutherans follow the same liturgical readings as us during the year. I am not sure about Presbyterians and others.

If you were to go to Mass every day for three years, you would have heard the whole Bible. Cycle A the gospel of Matthew is covered that year. The following is Cycle B, Mark, and then the third, Cycle C is Luke’s gospels, The Eucharistic prayers are drawn from Sacred Scripture and St. John.

I was amazed at hearing the liturgy of St. John the Evangelist at a Marionite Church so many years ago, an ancient liturgical prayer.

When you go to Mass, you leave this world and enter into God’s space and time, so that one’s nationality, race, and ethnic origin is no longer, but our gathering united before the Lord where we extend Christ’s sacrifice. Here we are no longer living in linear time, but in the eternal time of God.

You can see different saints honored in different parts of the world. Then there are superstitious practices that are just that which happens outside the Church.

The Church’s presence and power is based on Jesus Christ. When people commit grave sin and practice superstition they are outside the Church. The remedy is the sacrament of Confession to return to the sacrament of the Eucharist.