Can we really be one body?

 

As we were preparing for our Holy Week liturgies, a colleague came up to me and said, “I think the Good Friday liturgy is so boring.  I mean, how many times can we sing Jesus, Remember Me?”   That same week, a parishioner came up to me and said, “I can’t wait for Good Friday.  That’s my favorite liturgy!  I could sing Jesus Remember Me all night!”   

As this example illustrates, we all perceive sights, sounds, indeed the world around us very differently.  With this in mind I often plan liturgies wondering, what moves people?  I myself have come out of Mass less than satisfied with the particular preaching that day only to hear someone exclaim to the priest or deacon, “Thank you, the words in your homily were exactly what I needed to hear today.”

What moves people?  The Holy Spirit moves people.  The Spirit moves as it wills, mysteriously and beyond the grasp of our intellect or imagination.   Because we are so different, it’s no wonder we pray during Mass for the Holy Spirit to make us one:  “Grant that we who are nourished by his body and blood, may be filled with his Holy Spirit and become one body, one spirit in Christ.”

In liturgy, especially our Eucharistic liturgies, it’s the oneness of the body that counts.  So, the next time you sing your least favorite song at Mass or think that some element of the liturgy was too dry, too long, too boring, too repetitive, too  (you fill in the blank).  Rejoice!  Chances are your brother or sister in Christ was deeply inspired.

O Lord, make us one in you.  Amen