This past weekend I took my annual pilgrimage to Conception Abbey, a Benedictine monastery, with several young adults. My friend Gabe and I have been taking kids to the Abbey for several years, concentrating on older high schoolers and college-aged folk. This year we had 5 attendees who were all college-aged, and it was a new experience for 4 of them.
Catholic spirituality and worship tradition is very different from what most of those attending are comfortable with. We had 4 Disciples of Christ and 1 Seventh Day Adventist in our group. But they dutifully attended the praying of the hours, the 5 times that the monks get together and pray and chant, mostly from the Psalms, with one celebration of the Eucharist. We happened to be there on the weekend when they were celebrating the Feast of St. Benedict, and this was even more "out there" than anything they had ever experienced. The Eucharist celebration was a high mass, with incense and sung responses to everything. We were forewarned by our monk host, Brother Cyprian, that this was the "big show", and it was.
I was raised in the Roman Catholic church, so for me incense and candles and signs of the cross from forehead to chest to shoulders is a soothing thing. It takes me back to the piety of my 8 year-old self who was very proud to kneel straight and to know all of the proper responses (which, I believe, were still in Latin at the time.) I can still pretty much recite all of the English responses to this day, and can recite the Creed. I find it all rather "Zen" since I kick into auto pilot. It's only when I think of what I'm saying that I can become uncomfortable. Do I really believe that Mary was a virgin? I think it's possible; I'm rather agnostic to the idea actually. Do I believe that Jesus "descended into hell"? Who's to know? There are lots of reasons why I'm not a Catholic anymore. But I still find attending the Mass and chanting with the monks a time for experiencing a richness of feeling that I ascribe to a greater awareness of God's presence.
But my daughter is exactly the opposite. Since she has always been DOC, and her encounters with the Catholic church have largely been at funerals and weddings, she has no use for the "smells and bells", the repeated chants, the automatic responses. Instead of feeling any closeness to God, she feels repulsed by what she assumes is the judgmental attitude of those who refuse to serve her the Lord's Supper. I can't say that I blame her. But there are other DOC's (Gabe is one for sure) who enjoy this little trek back to the middle ages, with robed monks and chant and ancient rituals. He's never been Catholic. Perhaps its his age. Yet one of our attendees was a returnee for her 3rd time, so obviously there are others who appreciate these things.
I think its the way that we're wired. I suppose it might be possible to acquire a taste for differences -- I developed an appreciation for Protestant worship when I let go my preconceived notions of what worship should be based upon my childhood. But I also think it might be a lot like broccoli. Some of us hate it all our lives, some learn to tolerate it, others actually love it. But it's all about how your taste buds are set upon your tongue, about textures that you find appealing, about the pleasure you get in chewing certain things. The same thing is true in worship.
Most everyone I know says they find God in nature. I agree as well. But there is also something very good about people coming together to worship. It exponentially charges the atmosphere I think, as long as we feel like we're on the same grid with others. But if we're not, perhaps we just feel like a lonely triple A battery out there alone, with no recharger.
It's just about how we're built.
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