Easter Season Peevishness- 7 QuickTakes

Christ is Risen!...yes, not saying "Christ is risen!" is my first pet peeve...

1. Christ is still risen! We fasted for weeks- and Easter is only a day? Come on people! I know you are really tired from Holy Week (priest-husband has been ill since right after the doings on Sunday, as usual), but let's not fast more than we feast. Feast in your own way, but feast.

2. A spoken exultet!? We have all year to prepare for this most glorious of traditions in the Western-rite. If priest or deacon is unable, plan ahead and find a cantor who will do it justice. In the 'spirit of Vatican II,' help your priest with this if it was a disaster this year.

3. An off-key Alleluia sung by one person?! If the choir is going to Cancun during Holy Week and Easter, plan ahead. Make up a sign-up sheet. Perhaps some people don't want to make a year commitment to choir, but they would be able to sing during our high holy days. Also, it is probably good for the parish priest to rotate volunteer positions so that not one person 'owns' a certain activity- so parish life doesn't become "Mr Smith always puts up the Lenten desert scene. Mrs. Smith always arranges the flowers, etc."

4. No organ or trumpet? or for us Eastern-types- no cantor? Again, plan ahead (Christmas is coming up!)- and hire good musicians for big feasts. Put it in the budget. Statistically, churches have triple the numbers for Christmas and Easter- let's be faithful and pastoral and professional and maybe some of these people will come back.

5. A homily on the pagan origins of the Easter bunny? Come now, Father, is that really the best you can do? Leave the potentially irrelevant, fun stories to the bulletin and knock your homily out the park! Minister to the faithful and the twice-a-year-churchgoers alike. Might as well give the people something to really think and pray about. You have a vocation, not a job...so on to number 6...

6. Dear Father...please don't complain at the pulpit how tired you are. We know how tired you are because we are tired as well. We want a beautiful Liturgy, and you are the human who can gift us with it. Use your faithful lay people for appropriate work throughout the church to help you with the busy work, but so much of church life is simply up to you. Your faithful lay people are praying for you. We ask for a faithful and dignified priest who celebrates his vocation- not just does his job.

7. Easter egg hunts on Holy Thursday morning...and the like...it is really difficult cultivating the domestic church when society as a whole has no respect for tradition...my advice to myself is just keep trying, keep my head up and plan Easter parties for after Easter!

many more quick takes at conversiondiary.com

PrettyHappyFunnyReal & BRIGHT

Pretty

 from journey to the old country last summer- can you imagine American churches with icons painted on the outside?

Happy

 it's almost warm enough to swim!

Funny

 vegetables from the Great Fast...need veggies...too much meat...

Real

 prayers of supplication for a friend who has left the Catholic Church

and

Bright

Christ is risen! 

Christos Anesti! Christos Voskrese! Cristo ha resucitado! Al Maseeh Qam! Hristos a Inviat! Krisztus feltámadt!Christos harjav i merelotz! Pikhirstof aftonf! Christus resurrexit!

 and yes- I am still having camera trouble...better luck next week (?)

In Search of Easter: Part Two

...continuing a guest post by the Western Rite Sister in the South (as opposed to the Eastern Rite Priest’s Wife in the West)

After a mere five hours of sleep (this is the standard amount of sleep for every parent in the U.S. preceding Christmas and Easter mornings), hubby and I both arose to light candles and welcome the most important morning of the year, commemorating the most important day of history! Dad brewed the morning joe while I searched the computer on youtube for some good time Alleluia tunes.  Keith Green’s Easter Song filled the kitchen, “Joy to the World, He is risen!  Alleluia!”  Sipping cream-infused java and praising the Risen Lord woke our sleepy heads upstairs.  What a beautiful family morning!  Chocolate, marshmallows, jelly beans and patience with younger siblings abounded. 

I searched for the  Alleluia Chorus on youtube, the perfect Easter song to sing.  On the computer screen, there appeared a random group of people chowing down in a food court in a mall somewhere.  Suddenly, the strains of Handel could be heard over the loudspeaker.  People noticed in mid-munch and then resumed eating.  A young woman seemingly on a cell phone stood up at her table and sang the first stanzas of “Alleluia, Alleluia”.  She was joined by a scarf-clad tenor across the court….it was clearly a set up.  A beautiful random act of kindness kinda thing put on by a marvelous choir posing as shoppers, workers and store owners.  It is what is known as a “flashmob.” One by one, even the innocuous bystanders joined in, and so did we.  It was truly inspiring.  Our family was filled with Easter joy as we changed into Sunday best, which had been flung wrinkled on the floor from the night before, and filed into our mega van.   

As we entered the church, the perfume of lilies greeted our noses.  AAH….the sensuality of Catholicism is like no other!  The pews were filling in with much welcomed guests….OK folks, you’ll wanna come back after this nuptial feast!  The organ began to bellow….here it comes, kids; belt ‘er out!  And then…. That was it.  Most choir members were out of town.  The minor chord Alleuia intoned by a single cantor.  Standard homily (and this pastor was also hitting the hay early, he’d had a long week too).  An off-key One Bread, One Body for Communion.  They must have run out of incense and holy water as well, as none were to be found.  We ended with a barely audible Jesus Christ is Ris’n Today. “This is like a funeral Mass,” commented my usually effervescent husband.   

We drove home past several churches, expelling crowds of beautifully adorned congregants beaming with joy….some roofs seemed to be bumped off their soffits from the choruses inside.  I started to miss my old Protestant days.  But no—we have the contrast of Lent, and an entire season of Easter…..  We kept our disappointment to ourselves, as chocolate bunnies and computer games seemed to satiate the souls of our young.  As long as they could get back to our Saturday Family Movie Night with Don Knotts, our kids knew that Lent was over.  But, how to help them remember that Easter had begun?  It can’t just be 'back to business,' we are a changed people!   

We would just have to fend for ourselves.  It is kind of like filling your own plastic eggs if Mom and Dad are just too tired to do it.  Maybe a few pastors don’t realize that they act like lazy parents who buy the prepackaged Walmart basket, never realizing that their parish family needs 'optional' traditions that elevate the Resurrection. Lent cleans me out, and Easter fills me up!

In Search of Easter: Part One

a guest post by the Western Rite Sister in the South (as opposed to the Eastern Rite Priest’s Wife in the West) 

It was a tough Lent.  Well over forty days of sacrifice riddled our family; one child only wrote in cursive, one gave up chocolate milk at school, others gave up any screen time game playing.  We attended daily Mass, knelt in the dark and prayed a decade of the rosary nightly, not a sweet made its way to our table and nary a Netflix movie flickered on the set.  Lent had invaded our domicile, and it was wonderful!  The bread dough crown shed its toothpick thorns and sat naked on the table come the Holy Triduum.  We were poised and ready to greet Our Blessed Lord on Easter. 

Our oldest sons spent hours preparing for the Liturgies of the Triduum during Holy Week.  As each Liturgy commenced, our anticipation grew as we readied ourselves for the Lord to rise.  Washing feet.  Instituting the Eucharist and Holy Orders. Interceding for the whole world, venerating the Cross.  Silence.  Sadness.  The tabernacle was barren.   

And then, the Easter fire was ignited.  The Pascal candle was lit, Christ our Light.  Our little candles were lit, Thanks be to God.  Gradually, the darkened womb of the church was illuminated by individual living flames, like stars in the inky sky.  With seven children, our pew blazed forth brightly—baptized souls illumining a dark world.  Ahhhh.  Quiet, beauty, mystery--and recalling the faithful throughout the ages that have gazed into those dancing flames.  Our sensus fidei recollections were abruptly interrupted by the flipping on of the artificial lights, eclipsing the tiny flickers.  A fellow parishioner pointed at the missal , which directed,  “the church lights now are turned on.”  Blow ‘em out, folks—let’s move along into the 20th century!  Yup, we wouldn’t want to be getting too religious now, would we? 

The obligatory three Old Testament readings were read; heck, we all know the creation story inside and out, why bother reading it again!?  When the Gloria arrived, the sanctuary candles were lit, only it didn’t make much difference due to the the 60 watt Reveal bulbs glaring brightly.  Thank you Jesus for dying and rising to save me.  Thank you Jesus for showing up during hasty liturgy.  Oh Jesus, forgive me for my irritation during Your most sacred rising…..Not even a thurible of incense graced the sanctuary.   Father had a long week, and wanted to get to bed.  He said so in his homily. 

We fumbled into the dark muggy Alabama night, wondering what just happened.  Our bodies ached with hunger, as did our souls.  Where was Easter?  We did what any good Catholic does in a crisis—reflected on the Angelic Doctor, St. Thomas Aquinas.  Grace builds on nature.  Our nature was famished, and this called for food and a plan of action! 

We drove back home after binging at a Chinese Buffet (the only night that Mom doesn’t require the consumption of vegetables before hitting the tapioca or icecream machine!) in silence.  The Easter bunny’s midnight run ended at half past one.   As I was attempting to fall asleep, many thoughts plagued my mind.    We fast, pray and give alms.  We strip the church and cover statues.  The priest and sanctuary wear violet.  Shouldn’t the Easter season do the same?  The explanation we parents give to our kiddos about fasting and sacrifice are balanced with the uber-feasting of Easter.  We fast together, we party together!

Liturgically, our parish does Lent well.  We don’t even have to put up with the ever popular “desert scene” that hits sanctuaries everywhere in the West out here in the South.  But when it comes to Easter, it is merely a return to Ordinary time.   Liturgically speaking, with the plague of the dreaded “option” in the missal, the Easter season seems no more a high feast than a nice optional memorial where the priest opts to change his vestment for a change.  Give me the smells, give me the bells!  Hey, if you want to get charismatic about it, this is the time to do it brother!  Let’s sing that Alleluia with vigor and joy!   

I was craving some celebration!  Easter needed to invade our family the way Lent had.  The Resurrected Jesus needed to be adored in Liturgy the way we reflected and adored His Passion in Lent.  We opted not to despair of a singular anticlimactic liturgy, and resolved to chalk it up as an isolated situation.  Falling asleep, we decided to try again at the morning mass at another parish to get some much needed Resurrection caffeine.

part two will be posted soon...

Bright Monday, Bright Tuesday

Christ is risen from the dead

By His death, He trampled death

And to those in the graves He granted life!

source: comeandseeicons.com

Easter continues until Pentecost, so we continue to sing Christ is risen throughout the Divine Liturgy. We continue to greet each other with Christ is risen- indeed He is risen. We have fasted for 40 days, so the Church balances that with feasting for at least an equal amount. The Great Fast and the Easter season are the most important moments of the Christian's life as a 'spiritual seesaw.' 

The Byzantine spiritual life is always mixed with joy and sadness- we continue to sing Alleluia during the Great Fast, we dwell on His death even while we are singing of His resurrection, we celebrate the triumph of the cross during fast time, His shroud is decorated with flowers. I suppose we do this because to completely focus on one aspect would be too sad. Whenever we look at the crucifix, we must remember the resurrection because that is the 'happy ending' that we all aspire to. To fully appreciate the Risen Lord and what He did for us, however, we must commemorate His death as well.