The Mass is both communal prayer and a time for a most intimate contact with Our Lord, both aspects must be encouraged and fostered at every Mass. After all, when we say “and with your spirit”, we respond as a community, and also as individuals within the body of Christ. So it’s a “both-and”, not an “either-or”!
Of course praying as a community can’t imply losing or denying one’s individuality. This would be absurd and it wasn’t my point. By “collective prayer” I meant awareness of other people’s presence and disponibility to pray (with spoken words, chants and hymns) together with them. As Pope Francis says, we are taught to pray “Our Father”, not “My Father”, because none of us is an only child. If one goes to the Mass and tries hardly to ignore and avoid the others, his only purpose being to be left alone to pray in silence as much as he can, then the idea of community is an useless abstraction. At home, in my bedroom, I pray alone; at the Mass I pray with others. Nothing too complicated here.
My pastor has been trying for years and people still talk. Other than standing at the mic and yelling QUIET, I don’t know what else you can do.
Yes, so when we pray as a community, we also pray as indivduals, and vice versa. One does not exclude but fosters the other. So both praying as an individual in community, and praying and responding in community per se, are to be fostered in the liturgy. Any time we respond together in Mass, or praying quietly and individually alongside each other, we are praying in community as part of the liturgical action!
I encourage you to inform your priest, perhaps he would be willing to speak about this. If he is greeting people after Mass, he probably doesn’t see this behavior.
Just to note, the Orthodox do not use Gregorian chant (nor do Eastern Catholics). Gregorian chant is specific to the Latin church. In the Ruthenian church, we use Carpathian plainchant. The Russian Church (Orthodox and Catholic), uses a similar chant. The Greeks have their own tradition of chant, which is very beautiful, but definitely not Gregorian chant. We have certain hymns that are prescribed as part of the liturgy, but not in the sense that the western church uses hymns. Sometimes hymns are sung outside of the liturgy proper, such as during the incensing of the church right before the liturgy begins. Definitely no musical instruments.
Of course, and thank you for the correction! I wrote “Gregorian” mechanically - when we were kids, our priest taught us about Gregorian chant and it was very natural for us to compare it with the Byzantine one, as we were quite used to hear Byzantine liturgical music. (To this day, my soft spot is with the Byzantine chant, but this is really offtopic.) Thanks again for your comment.
May I step in and suggest it is where you go too. Sometimes it is more about ‘us’ and I think elizabeth was suggesting about wanting it to go this way or that way where as if we just open our eyes and our ears. Mass where we are at is beautiful and feel the presence of God right there if we allow Him in. That all we gotta do - it could be the worst experience ever but just got to allow God in and it becomes beautiful prayerful mass.
What a wonderful, insightful post! Thank you.
Does anyone else remember Sister Mary Elephant?
This is SO refreshing!
The above quote would have been directed at me not so long ago! Just half listening to the Liturgy, and only giving lip service to it. This started to change for me when a beautiful little Saint from Lourdes, and a certain Lady who appeared to her there entered into my world! (Love you Mama Maria!)
I feel that if your heart is on fire for Jesus, and you allow the Holy Spirit to burn inside you and work in you…then I believe that Mass will be an out of this world experience for you, especially when you receive Holy Communion! As a side, I particularly love the Tridentine Rite Latin Mass at St. Alphonsus Church St. John Neumann Shrine on Saturdays. It’s awesome!..and one beautiful Church to boot! 
This is just wonderful. Thanks so much for sharing this and encouraging all of us.
