At Easter we hope to have many visitors—folks who’ve never been to Mass before or who only come once or twice a year like to join us on Easter morning. We’re happy to have them.
But tonight, it’s “just us.” A few welcome visitors, but mostly the faithful flock—those who turn up regularly for our celebrations, big and small.
The crowd at Easter is like a big wedding reception. Holy Thursday’s more like Sunday dinner.
Which isn’t to say the Church doesn’t take you all seriously! After all, the priest is instructed to give a homily “in which light is shed on the principal mysteries that are commemorated at the Mass, namely the institution of the Holy Eucharist and of the priestly Order, and the commandment of the Lord concerning fraternal charity.”
The institution of the Eucharist and the priesthood, and the Lord’s command to love one another.
That’s a lot of light to shed!
But I am not lighting up these things for a bunch of people sitting in the dark. You, faithful members of the parish family, already know what Jesus did at the Last Supper. You’ve heard his words “This is my Body” hundreds if not thousands of times.
You’ve lived the moment when He broke the bread over and over again, celebrating Sunday after Sunday “as a festival to the Lord” as the Lord commanded the Chosen People to do at Passover.
As for “the commandment of the Lord concerning fraternal charity” … well, you are the ones who have been helping to feed the poor, shelter the refugees, support prisoners, educate the young, and visit the elderly and ill. Do I need to connect these works of generosity and service to the Mass?
Our parish is centered on the Mass; it revolves around the Mass; all its charitable outreach flows from the altar, where we begin by thanking God for his gifts to us.
If there is one thing that I might say to you, the insiders of our parish, it is simply thank you. You know well that you carry much more than your fair share of the load when it comes to serving your brothers and sisters.
Pope Francis highlighted the service we give to one another in his homily for Holy Thursday this year. He said that we wash each other’s feet, we serve one another. One serves the other, without self-interest.
Christ’s action on Holy Thursday has been interpreted over the centuries as washing the feet of the poor, and that’s important symbolism for sure. The Pope himself washes the feet of prisoners each year.
But we have to start by washing feet of our fellow parishioners. If we imitate the example of Jesus, then we will have the kind of strong community that reaches out beyond itself.
As I said, we’re deeply grateful to the twenty percent who do eighty percent of the serving, donating, reading, and volunteering that makes our parish able to fulfill the Lord’s commands “do as I have done to you” and “do this in remembrance of me.”
Most of the twenty percent are here tonight. But if you’re someone who hasn’t found your place in parish ministry and service, I invite you to think about that this evening, and pray in the words of our Psalm: “How can I repay the Lord for his goodness to me.”
It’s not a so-called rhetorical question. God asks a small return on the investment he has made in us, the sacrifice of his own Son. What can we do to serve?
I won’t list the many needs of the parish in these difficult days. They are many. Just ask God what you can do, and then let us know you are willing. We’ll help you find a way to repay his goodness without strain or stress.
To the twenty percenters: you know as well as I do where your strength and commitment comes from. It comes from your participation in the Eucharist and your membership in this Eucharistic community.
But precisely because you love the Eucharist and the family of faith, you are also the ones most sad when family members and friends stop attending Mass. You understand completely that the Sunday celebration is “a perpetual ordinance”—a command Jesus has given every generation in every age.
How can so many of the young—and the not-so-young—turn away from this “thanksgiving sacrifice”?
I’m not sure of all the reasons—there are many—but I know it’s time we did something about it.
As I thought about it, I realized that getting people back to Mass or getting people to Mass is not the first step on our journey. For those we want to invite to explore Christian faith, the Sunday Mass can be confusing.
Nothing makes you feel like an outsider so fast as attending an event where you feel you’re the only one who doesn’t know what’s going on.
And if you’re a Catholic who stopped attending Mass a while back, you might be worrying that people are thinking “where has he been?” or might even ask you the question!
This Lent I was convinced that although the Eucharist must be the centre of our efforts at inviting people into or back to the Church, inviting them to or back to Mass isn’t likely to be effective.
That might sound contradictory. So let me explain what happened to me Saturday nights this past Lent. I sat in the church during a one-hour adoration event we called “Water in the Desert.”
Unlike Mass, nothing was expected of me or anyone else. The Lord looked at us from the altar and we looked at Him. I didn’t have to sing, which was good because I didn’t know the songs anyway. The music was like prayerful oil poured out from the loft.
A highlight of each evening was a parishioner’s personal story of faith. Each was unique but they were all powerful and moving.
Two things happened for me at this oasis. My otherwise dry and dreary Lent was renewed, at least for a time. Second, and most important, I became convinced that we need times of quiet reflection before the Blessed Sacrament to restore our weariness and prepare us to share fully in the Sunday Mass.
And there was something more. I felt the Holy Spirit saying that we need something like those Saturday nights to which we can invite the unchurched, uncertain, or unhappy. We need peaceful places that can introduce people to the Eucharistic mystery without making them feel it’s mysterious.
Some of the generous leaders of “Water in the Desert” seemed to have felt the same way, because they volunteered on the final night to keep it going monthly.
We’ll be telling you, faithful friends more about this in the weeks ahead. But on this holy night as we celebrate Christ’s gift of Himself, let us pray that we have fresh opportunities to share that gift with others.
If you are one of those already living the Eucharistic life, pray now that the Lord will show you whom you should bring with you when we announce our next peaceful time of adoration, song, and witness.
Giving others a chance to share what we celebrate is a more perfect act of charity than washing their feet.
And if you yourself are longing to get more out of Sunday Mass, pray now to find the commitment to join the first night of adoration when the date is announced.
As we offer tonight “a thanksgiving sacrifice” and “call on the name of the Lord,” we can be confident the Lord will hear our prayers.
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