Wednesday, August 6, 2014

Living the Liturgy: Part 2

"This is my Beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased. Listen to him." - Matthew 17:5

These feast days of our Lord always make me somewhat sad, not because of the mystery celebrated, for that inspires my love, and not because of the liturgy of the day, because that makes me giddy, but because they often pass by without really being noticed. The Liturgy of this day, the Feast of the Transfiguration of the Lord, contains a second reading and its own preface, along with all of the other parts proper to Feasts. In spite of all this, in most places it will be celebrated as if it is just another day of the week, perhaps with brief mention made of its importance.

The problem, as I see it, is that mention may be made of its importance, but if that importance is not shown people will take little notice of it. This is where the importance of "living the Liturgy," as I have phrased it, comes in. Unless two things are done, my experience has shown that the Feast will pass by without the Faithful taking any real notice. The first, and more important, part is that the Liturgy will be celebrated with due solemnity. This means that it cannot be celebrated as simply another daily Mass. The Liturgy has inserted more solemnity, and these parts should be respected.

Obviously extenuating circumstances must be taken into account, such as the need for people to get to their jobs and an already full schedule for the priest. For these reasons, I will admit that great prudence and foresight should be exercised in regards to the Liturgical Year. Our society places little importance on the exercise of one's religion or the necessity of making sure one's spiritual needs are met. As Christians, however, part of our call to evangelize is to express the importance of these things. This is why I say, prudence and foresight need to be taken into account. We cannot simply refuse to work, for this will have extreme consequences on our life situation. However, if plans are made in advance it should be possible to schedule a special feast day Mass.

I'm not suggesting every parish needs to have one, however, in more populated areas, the local parishes could work together to try and create a schedule for such occasions to ensure that a solemn Mass will be offered for the faithful to commemorate the solemn occasion. In less populated areas, the peoples' schedules tend to be a bit more aligned with each other, so it is possible that an extra Mass could be offered on this day, if a priest is available and if the normal Mass time doesn't allow for more solemnity in the celebration.

The main thing to remember is that the Liturgy has already provided the means to highlight the importance of the Transfiguration, but unless the effort is made to actualize those means, the day will pass by like any other.

The second thing which needs to be done to live the Liturgy rests completely within our own power. We need to make the personal effort to make feast days different from other days. Many people only do this with Christmas and Easter. Obviously those days are the two centers of the Liturgical Year, and deserve the highest attention, but all feast days should be given some form of celebration.

Now, don't read what I'm not saying. We don't need to put the same amount of effort into celebrating the Transfiguration as we do Easter. We'd become tired out quickly, Easter and Christmas would lose their splendor and uniqueness, and we'd come to despise feast days for the amount of work involved (in addition to our daily work)! However, a little goes a long way; simple things make certain days special. For example, I always celebrate the Immaculate Conception by watching my favorite version of A Christmas Carol (the George C. Scott version). While I was in the seminary, the Immaculate Conception was also the day we decorated for Christmas (with the exception of the chapel of course). These two simple things made the day extremely special for me, and they required minimal effort. I also try to schedule dinners out with friends on feast days. This allows me to celebrate the day with others.

Small traditions are what make days special for individuals. I fear that we sometimes get the idea that we need to put a lot of effort into our traditions for them to have value. This is not the case at all. While some things do require a lot of effort, and we may value the end result for that effort, we need to remember the reason for the tradition, which should always be Christ. And this brings me to the most important part of living the Liturgy - prayer.

If we want to truly and authentically live the Liturgy in our daily lives, our prayer lives must do what the Father said in the Transfiguration, i.e. listen to Christ (Matthew 17:5). Part of this requires us to pray with the Church, which is His Body, and the public prayers of the Church are the Holy Mass and the Liturgy of the Hours, which follow the Liturgical Year.

We should ultimately make sure that our celebration of any feast day, whether it be the Transfiguration or Easter Sunday of the Resurrection of the Lord itself, is marked by prayer. Obviously, there are many legitimate and distinct forms of prayer, and many of them can work for celebrating the feasts days, while still maintaining one's normal spirituality. For example, if one is especially accustomed to the Rosary, one should still take account of the liturgical day. The Directory on Popular Piety says:

"Those who recite a third [now a fourth] of the Rosary sometimes assign the various mysteries to particular days....Where this system is rigidly adhered to, conflict can arise between the content of the mysteries and that of the Liturgy of the day....In cases such as this it can be reckoned that 'the liturgical character of a given day takes precedence over the usual assignment of a mystery of the Rosary to a given day; the Rosary is such that, on particular days, it can appropriately substitute meditation on a mystery so as to harmonize this pious practice with the liturgical season' (200)."

Thus, while the Glorious Mysteries are normally prayed on Wednesdays, as today is the Transfiguration, it would be most appropriate to pray the Luminous Mysteries. Those accustomed to praying litanies, may choose a litany best associated with the given saint's day, or a person might choose take a break from their current spiritual reading to read a meditation suited to the feast day. Through this we can effectively encounter Christ, Whom the Father bid us listen to, and truly live the Liturgy in our daily lives.

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