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Richard

A Baptist attends Catholic Mass online.

Instead of going to Church today I attended a Catholic Mass online. As part of getting to know Gods family, partly because I'm home alone and partly because I'm pursuing church membership in my baptist congregation and attending a wide range of services seems appropriate to me as part of that journey. Anyway thought I'd share my thoughts.

First despite the differences it felt like 'my people' with the same Lord. I like the liturgy and the response and call. Even the differences I'm about to mention, whilst being significant. I didn't feel 'oh I better hide in the theological closet, things could get ugly if they know what I think', (something I've felt when crossing progressive/traditional theological boundaries when visiting churches). The cultural context and long history is probably part of this. Anyhoo.. The differences.

- The high place of Mary. The Service started with a Hail Mary. Was later referred to as Queen. I have different Mariology, this felt inordinate to me.

- Reading from the Apocraphya. Whilst not a surprised I'm confused about the lectionary (we don't have one) I was expecting four readings similar to lectionary.library.vanderbilt. [lectionary.library.vanderbilt.edu]. I realise as I type this the Mass is from 28/11/2021 NOT 28/11/2022...

- Homily referred to Judgement and included purgatory and Hell. It's very rare I hear in sermons a about Gods Judgement. I can't remember the last sermon I've heard that referred to Hell (It came up in Bible study last month though). So kudos for going there. We don't believe in purgatory, hearing it referred to as a Mercy instead of as an act of Judgement/Justice was a surprise, but I'm ignorant on purgatory.

- I like the call and response. Interactivity is hard on a one way video stream. In my church we have a roving mike, Q & A, joint worship, doodling/note taking supplies on the tables and prayer (kinda-interactive, it tends to be one person at the front praying and it's hard to stay focused. Call and response would be great to use here).

- The use of saints. We don't refer to saints, they aren't part of our service. I feel this is a weakness on our part. That a connection to Christendom, how we got here. Our dead brothers and sisters. The closet we have to that is a wall of honour from WWI & WWII with names of people from our church and an accompanying book called names to lives and some photos in the church hall of the recent past and newspaper clippings from further ago. As a mental exercise I could imagine talking to a saint (eg: MLK what do you think of this?) but I can't imagine asking for them to interceed, when I could go straint to Jesus. I suspect this is a reflection of protestant Theology (Priesthood of all believers).

The mass: youtube.com/watch?v=VAo-thevNP

lectionary.library.vanderbilt.eduRevised Common Lectionarythe Revised Common Lectionary, a service of the Vanderbilt Divinity Library