Green Liturgy
Happy Earth Day!! Millions of people around the United States today are participating in activities designed to “galvanize the environmental movement.” This year, Earth Day falls on the 3rd Sunday of Easter, April 22nd. As thousands of environmentally conscious people gather on the National Mall in Washington D.C., millions of Catholics gather for Sunday liturgy which has been environmentally conscious long before Earth Day came to be.
Today we will be energized with the water of life in the sprinkling rite. We will profess our faith in the God who created heaven and earth. We will proclaim in song that heaven and earth are “full of God’s glory.” We will bless and eat bread, “fruit of the earth.” We will bless and drink wine, “fruit of the vine.”
The liturgy not only uses elements of our good earth, it teaches us how to be good stewards of the earth’s gifts. Water is blessed, bread and wine are incensed, oil is sanctified, altars made of material from the earth are dedicated and consecrated. These rituals tell us that God’s presence permeates the environment, that all of creation reveals the divine, that not the smallest component of our planet is to be taken for granted, and that all is holy and is to be treated as sacred. Made more aware of the holiness of creation, we are sent forth with the renewable energy needed for a sustainable earth. If we take our liturgy seriously, we celebrate Earth Day not only on April 22nd, but, every day of the year. Amen!!
Contests
These days everything is a competition. A look at the primetime television listings reveals that most of what we are watching is people competing against each other, from The Biggest Loser to Iron Chef America, from American Idol to The Amazing Race. Who would have ever thought the words “cupcake” and “wars” would be in the same phrase? These programs illustrate our current culture. We are constantly competing for the best or the biggest “something.” On one hand, these programs provide a distorted affirmation to us. They tell us that our competitive egos are right on track. On the other hand, if we put ourselves in the shoes of the competitors, we can see a deeper reality in these reality shows. We can empathize with the person who needs to lose 100+ pounds. We can aspire to have the vulnerability it takes to win a vocal competition. Our desire for imagination and ingenuity can be stimulated by those who win the Amazing Race or become America’s next Iron Chef.
Unlike reality TV contests, liturgy is not a competition. Because the liturgy commemorates the reality that Christ died and rose for us, it is a constant reminder that God is in our corner in the contest of life and that we need to be cheerleaders for each other, sharing one another’s joys and sorrows. Liturgy unites us so that we are all on the same team as these words from the second Eucharistic Prayer demonstrate:
Humbly we pray, that, partaking of the Body and Blood of Christ,
we may be gathered into one by the Holy Spirit
Partaking in the Body and Blood of Jesus is meant to make us less competitive and more compassionate. In this sense, liturgy raises the bar of competition in the area of justice. We could create our own reality TV show to see who could reach out the most to those in need. Now that would be worth watching! AMEN.
Easter Bread
Around this time every year, my mother and I would make Easter Bread. Easter Bread is a specialty bread, popular in Europe, that is made in different shapes and styles in honor of the Easter holiday.
I remember the delight of getting my hands all gooey in the dough and the energy it took to knead it.
After separating the dough into balls, it was time to cover it and allow it to rise. After a period of time, that little ball of dough would double in size, pushing up the dish towels covering it. It was almost as if the dough became pregnant. I’ll never forget my mother’s expression at the risen dough. “Ah!” She would gasp with excitement, “God Bless it!” As a child, I wondered how God had time to help our dough to rise, especially at this busy time of year. But I was delighted that divine intervention had somehow decided to mix with our human efforts. The aroma of the bread baking in the oven was heavenly. After the bread had cooled, my mother would give the bread away .
In the Ukraine, Easter Bread is called Paska, a derivative of Pascha, which means Easter. The word Pascha comes from the Hebrew word Pesach, meaning Passover. As the Jews celebrate the feast of Passover, commemorating the liberation of the Israelites from bondage in Egypt, Christians celebrate the feast of Easter, commemorating the death and resurrection of Jesus, the Passover or Paschal Lamb. Pesach is related to the Greek word Paschein, which means to suffer. This is one reason why Easter Bread is made at this time of year. It is symbolic of the dying and rising of Jesus
This is one reason ordinary bread is used to make Eucharistic Bread. In order to make bread, seeds must die in the ground to become wheat. Wheat must be ground in order to become flour. In each step of the process, there is a dying in order to become something new. In the Eucharist, ordinary bread is transformed into something extraordinary, the Body and Blood of Christ. By partaking in the Eucharist, we too are transformed. We become pregnant with possibilities, energized to knead the dough of life and to give ourselves away for the life of the world. Amen!
From "Help!" to "Hallelujah!"
Are these words part of scripture? True or false: “O God, smash their teeth in their mouths; the jaw-teeth of the lions, break, O Lord!” “O God, slay them… …consume them in wrath; consume, till they are no more.” Answer: True! These words are found in Psalms 58 and 59 respectively. In these psalms, the petitioners ask God to unleash God’s wrath upon their enemies. The authors of the psalms knew that life was marked by pain, suffering, betrayal and loneliness, and as these words demonstrate, they had no trouble laying bare their emotions before God whom they believed would act on their behalf. Centuries later, the psalms continue to offer us the language to speak of our deepest pain, our highest hopes, and everything in between. We can identify with the psalms because they reflect our own life experience. This is one reason we pray the psalms in liturgy. We also pray the psalms because Jesus prayed them.
This Sunday, we will sing the psalm which Jesus prayed on the cross: “God, my God, why have you abandoned me?” (Psalm 22) In praying this psalm, Jesus expressed a sense of abandonment. Yet a closer look at Psalm 22 reveals a happy ending--an ending which results not in death but in praise of God’s faithfulness: “Let the coming generation be told of the Lord that they may proclaim to a people yet to be born the justice God has shown.” What is it that causes this shift from utmost despair to profound hope? The psalmist remembers how God has acted in the past and comes to believe that God will act again. This transformation from fear to faith, which marks most of the psalms of lament, assures us that God’s faithfulness will prevail. When we feel as though we have been abandoned by God, that God is inattentive to our pain and sorrow, the psalms convince us that God will surely act again. The psalms help us to realize how dependent we are on God’s goodness. May we have the courage to pray as the psalmists, with gut-wrenching honesty, that even our laments may turn to praise. Amen!
Choices
Here’s a question for you: Who controls the TV remote in your house? No matter who it is, chances are they spend as much time channel-surfing as they do watching a program. The innumerable channels have given us countless choices. Don’t fancy those dancing feet on Dancing with the Stars? How about the fancy clothes on America’s Next Top Model? Not into The Voice? How about the voices on American Idol? The reality of the remote control is that we never have to endure one boring moment on television. We can choose to watch what we consider the most stimulating, intoxicating and exhilarating programs. The reality of Reality TV is that it has us so dazzled and distracted it becomes difficult to keep up with our own lives, let alone the Kardashians.
Unlike television, our lives aren’t always stimulating, intoxicating or exhilarating. In fact, life can be quite painful and we can’t simply change the channel when we encounter the pain of illness, a broken relationship, or the loss of a loved one. But, we do have choices. We can choose acceptance or denial. Denial, or the unwillingness to endure pain, perpetuates it. Acceptance, or the willingness to endure pain, leads to new life. The liturgy teaches us how to accept the pain of living. Each liturgy retells the story of a God who embraced the pain of the cross for our sake. Each liturgy retells the hope of resurrection. Each liturgy assures us that life comes from death. Each liturgy strengthens us to endure the daily dying that comes from living.
We first encountered this cycle of dying and rising in baptism. St. Paul helps us with its meaning. As he reminds the Colossians, “If you have really died with Christ to the principles of this world, why do you still let rules dictate to you, as though you were still living in the world?” What Paul seems to be asking is, why do we live as though baptism never happened? In other words, what if we lived as though death were already behind us? This is the reality of baptism, which calls us out of fear and into freedom. It’s to this reality that the Elect, who celebrate their third scrutiny this weekend, are being called. It’s this reality that we who are baptized are called to live. Lent is a good time to focus on that. So, put down that remote and reflect a while. Amen!