For me, I see it as a place to come together with other Jesus-followers to worship the One True God. It's a place I want to hear the Word of God proclaimed and explained and applied to my life. It's a time set aside for gratitude to God for His many blessings. It's a sense of belonging in a community of believers. It's a place to be challenged to strive to love God more deeply, to follow Him more closely, and to serve Him more intentionally. It's a place that stands counter-cultural to the society at large, where God's eternal truths are proclaimed unapologetically, and where the message of Christ is not shied away from for fear of upsetting those who see church merely as a cultural club, a place to be reminded of God's love for them without them actually having to do anything in return.
When I think of church, I think of worship. And when I think of worship, I think of reverence, sanctity, holiness, praise.
When asked to boil down His message into a nutshell, Jesus said: "'You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.' 'This is the great and foremost commandment. The second is like it, 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' 'On these two commandments depend the whole Law and the Prophets" (Matthew 22:37-40)
Lately, I have been discouraged by the disconnect between what the secular society preaches as the gospel of social justice, and the often silent or even contrary-seeming stance presented in the gospel preached at church. I have found that some churches seem better at the "love your neighbor" part of Jesus's command, and other churches seem better at the "love the Lord your God" commandment. And before you go there, let me point out that there is a reason Jesus didn't just say "love your neighbor, and thus you will show your love for God". These are related but separate actions.
God Almighty deserves direct praise and worship from us, not merely mitigated through good works towards our neighbor through various social betterment programs. This is the holiness of the gospel of Jesus that I so crave but find wanting at so many of the churches I have visited. We as Catholics claim to believe in the real presence of Jesus in the Eucharist, yet in the past few decades, we have removed many of the traditional markers of reverence for His presence. We no longer line up kneeling at the altar. We dare to take the Host into our own hands to self-commune. We can't really say we fast even if we observe the meager one-hour pre-Communion "fast" because really, that's how long it takes us to go from the breakfast table to our cars to church and by the time Communion time arrives, we haven't eaten in an hour. (Where's the sacrifice in that?) Everyone is expected to go up for Communion regardless of the last time one has received Sacramental Reconciliation.
No amount of talking or writing about the real presence of Jesus is going to convince people that He is in our midst if we don't actually show this by our actions. We are a liturgical church. We expect ritual, so what is our excuse for removing the most important rituals we had surrounding the Eucharist?
But on the other hand, our church is not quite where I would envision it ought to be when it comes to loving our neighbor. Are Catholics generally very good about serving at soup kitchens, helping the homeless, and assisting with Pro-Life issues? You bet! The only problem is that there are a lot of other groups of people that get left out in the dirt. Members of the LGBTQ community are only welcome in theory, but being gay or transgender is considered a dirty word to be avoided in Catholic circles. The same applies to issues of race and equality, especially when it comes to calling out the white privilege that many of us enjoy at the expense of our Black and Brown siblings-in-Christ. Lately, too, nationalism and patriotism have risen to the level of virtue, leading to isolation of the immigrant and refuge in our midst.
And so here I am, a twice-over revert to Catholicism, desperately wanting to follow Jesus with fellow believers who are committed to leading lives of virtue, holiness, and holding each other accountable, while at the same time refraining from judgment when it comes to the perceived virtue or holiness of others. I remember Jesus saying something about specks and logs in eyes that seems relevant here (see Matthew 7:5).
And so I embark on what promises to be a long, arduous, and trying spiritual journey not to find God, as I have done in the past, but to better serve Him. My desire for holiness pulls me in one direction; my desire for justice pulls me in opposite directions. One place I'm pretty sure I cannot remain is where I am. The Lord is either calling me deeper into my Catholic faith (secular Franciscan? Traditional Latin Mass?), or out of Catholicism and into Eastern Orthodoxy. Perhaps there is a third option, for I believe in an omnipotent God, and I also know that His ways are not my ways, and His thoughts are not my thoughts (see Isaiah 55:8-9).
Only time will tell where the Holy Spirit leads. I trust the process.
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