It’s called contemplative prayer and non-verbal communcation. I disagree strongly with your no obvious connection between the priest’s prayers and the people’s prayers. It seems more education is needed in this area. And perhaps the DL as well.
No, I understand intellectually. I have studied the EF and know that there is a connection, it has just failed to connect with me on an emotional level. It is how I feel while there. I have no problem at all with the EF, it is just so different from the Divine Liturgy. It is not how I was formed, not how I learned to worship God.
How does it being a holy sacrifice preclude it being a service or a community gathering? The community gathers for a service, which is the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.
Okay but I’m wondering if the entire thread isn’t pitting the introverts vs the extroverts, for the lack of better categorization.
For the record, I’m an introvert. Strongly an introvert. An ISTJ, if you’re familiar with Myers-Briggs.
A priest celebrating Mass in the extraordinary form is no more engaged in contemplative prayer than the priest who celebrates Mass in the Ordinary Form. Mental prayer is the necessary preparation for the** gift **of Contemplation. " Mental prayer, (in the view of St. Teresa of Avilla), is nothing but friendly intercourse, and frequent solitary converse with Him Who we know loves us.” (Way of Perfection)
Points well-taken, except maybe for that communion of the saints part, which I’ve often objected to. But that’s me.For the record, I’m an introvert. Strongly an introvert. An ISTJ, if you’re familiar with Myers-Briggs.
Keep in mind that I don’t regularly attend the EF or the OF. Of the two, I prefer the OF, but I don’t go in for all the “extras”. Just give me the Mass.
I am terribly uncomfortable holding hands with strangers during the Our Father. God forbid they should try to hug me during the sign of peace! I sometimes attend Mass at one of those churches where they “turn and greet each other” before Mass. I purposely arrive late and I hate to be late. But I’d rather be late than have to have a conversation with a stranger before Mass. I sometimes even dread extended family gatherings because they are exhausting, even though I love my family very much.
I once read a protestant blog about how to build community in a church, and they listed “parking lot greeters” as “essential”. If I went to a church with parking lot greeters, I wouldn’t get out of the car. Seriously, I would just keep driving. It would feel so incredibly invasive to have to speak to a stranger before I could even get my bearings in a new place. It feels like an assault. When I arrive at my own parish, with just 20 families, all well-known to me, I’ve been known to sit in my car until other people have gone in, so that I don’t have to greet them immediately. (I do eventually greet them, as we have a community meal after the liturgy and I always stay. I just need time to warm up.) Before I found a regular confessor and built a relationship with him, Confession was torturous. I had literally bare my soul to a stranger. Yikes!
My introvert children and I confuse my extroverted husband daily. I get it. Really.
I still stand by the idea that Mass is communal by its very nature, but I don’t mean the sort of “forced” community, where you’re greeted at the door, asked to hold hands, hug people during the sign of peace, etc. Even I, as introverted as I am, understand that we need each other as human beings. We are born into a community, a family. We know that deprived of any sort of community, human beings suffer serious psychological damage. God himself is a Community. We are part of the communion of saints. Baptism, in addition to its effects on original sin, makes us part of a community of Christians. We cannot escape this fact of our nature. We need real community, not this fake, forced community that some call community.
This. at mass, we participate in the sacrifice of the eucharist not as individuals by as members of a community - hence communion (“with one”). When we are baptised, we are baptised into a faith community and, for infants, it is the faith of the community which is most important. Thus, the parish is a community of faith in which all the faithful are one body, meaning that “union with Christ is also union with all those to whom he gives himself” (to quote St JPII).
Both and but, more than this, it’s a participation in Christ’s sacrifice - the sacrifice of the mass in which Christ is really, truly, and substantially present
Here’s one source. thehandmaid.wordpress.com/2013/06/04/the-whole-triumphant-church-was-present/
What is your objection to the Communion of Saints part? I know you’ve mentioned your objection before, but I don’t think I really understand what you are objecting to.
Glad you asked that, as I was wondering too why someone who seems to be a devout Catholic would object to a teaching of the church.
Simply because it’s a presumption.
Do you mean that it is a presumption that we are a part of the Communion of Saints, or a presumption that the Communion of Saints exists? Or that the Communion of Saints is a community?
The first/former. We haven’t been judged yet.