I love you, you love me, we're a happy family . . .
I don't do the Catholic nerd thing very often, but I just came across this video of a priest in Aliso Viejo, California saying the blessing dressed as Barney the purple dinosaur during the "Halloween mass," in which the congregation was apparently encouraged to dress in costume and during which a "devil" served as a Eucharistic minister.
My husband is in the process of becoming Catholic. My question, after seeing this video, is why should he? We could have a better Halloween party at our own house -- and we wouldn't be inviting any creepy priests dressed as Barney.
To those who would criticize me as a scold and a party pooper, I say if you want a gay, abortionist church, go found one of your own. If you want to have a Halloween party, my radical suggestion is that you have it in the parish hall after Mass. Certainly there's room for joy and celebration in the Mass, but with all due respect to the joyful and celebratory among us, most aspects of our lives provide room for joy and celebration. There are far fewer parts of our lives that call for formality and reverence in the presence of the sacred. Why invade that space with Barney the purple dinosaur? Is it to make those who are uncomfortable in the presence of the sacred feel more at home? Shouldn't we all feel slightly uncomfortable in the presence of the sacred? Isn't that the point of the formality and reverence? The effect of Father Barney and his inanities, though, is to get the congregation to forget about the sacred altogether.
Well, I don't have to go to Mass to do that.
My husband is in the process of becoming Catholic. My question, after seeing this video, is why should he? We could have a better Halloween party at our own house -- and we wouldn't be inviting any creepy priests dressed as Barney.
To those who would criticize me as a scold and a party pooper, I say if you want a gay, abortionist church, go found one of your own. If you want to have a Halloween party, my radical suggestion is that you have it in the parish hall after Mass. Certainly there's room for joy and celebration in the Mass, but with all due respect to the joyful and celebratory among us, most aspects of our lives provide room for joy and celebration. There are far fewer parts of our lives that call for formality and reverence in the presence of the sacred. Why invade that space with Barney the purple dinosaur? Is it to make those who are uncomfortable in the presence of the sacred feel more at home? Shouldn't we all feel slightly uncomfortable in the presence of the sacred? Isn't that the point of the formality and reverence? The effect of Father Barney and his inanities, though, is to get the congregation to forget about the sacred altogether.
Well, I don't have to go to Mass to do that.
posted by Kate Marie | 12:19 PM | Permalink
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11 comments
11 Comments:
KM, your point is well taken and I whole-heartedly agree. That said, there's some twisted part of me that loves this story. I particularly love the absurdity of Satan administering communion. There's a sort of Fellini-esque quality about it.
The congregation should have just pointed at them and laughed until they felt silly.
KM's worried musings about a priest dressed up as Barney, the purple dinosaur, and conducting mass:
"My husband is in the process of becoming Catholic. My question, after seeing this video, is why should he?"
Well, KM, the Catholic Church is a bit of a dinosaur, isn't it? So ... when in Rome...
Jeffery Hodges
* * *
You're right, Jeffery. I have my Wicked Witch of the West costume already laid out for next Sunday. . .
WD, I understand your reaction. I laughed, too.
I guess the idea of healing the sick on the Sabbath or picking a grain of wheat would cause you to speak likewise. Your body is God's temple, not a building built by the hands of man.
John R., thanks for stopping by, but I'm failing to understand your comment. Is your comment a response to my post or to one of the other comments? Could you clarify and elaborate a bit?
If you're asking whether I equate healing the sick on the Sabbath with distributing communion while dressed as a Satan costume, my answer is . . . ummmmm, no.
My comment is in response to your post about Barney leading Mass. My comment was about the traditionalism people hold that church is sacred, much like how the Pharisees and Sadducees during Jesus’ time were wrapped up in the traditionalism of the Laws of Moses. They were upset with Jesus for both allowing his disciple to pick a grain of wheat and eat it (no work on the Sabbath) and with Jesus healing a man’s crippled hand (again, no work on the Sabbath). Where two or more are gathered, so Christ is there as well. That can be church, or it can be someone’s house, either locations are just as “sacred.” It's a traditional view to hold that only church is sacred and therefore should be revered, whereas the original churches were wherever people gathered. To a non-Catholic, the Barney suit is just as ridiculous as a Priest's suit.
You're correct that I'm a traditionalist in some ways, John R. For Catholics, the heart of the Mass is the consecration of the Eucharist. So, yes, a Christian church can be wherever people are gathered in Christ's name, but a Catholic Mass only happens with the consecration of the Eucharist. I won't apologize or concede to being a pharisee for believing in Catholic theology and doctrine.
On the other hand, if you'll read my post again, perhaps you'll note that I am decidedly not suggesting that the sacred can be found only in a church -- simply that when people gather in the presence of the sacred, they should observe a certain decorum in order to demonstrate that they understand and respect the significance of the occasion. Jesus's concern for preserving the spirit of the commandments rather than requiring a blind adherence to the letter of the law isn't synonymous with "anything goes." You can gather together in Christ's name in someone's home and be in the presence of the sacred -- so would it be okay with you if someone showed up with a "Jesus was wrong" (or worse) T-shirt or a porn magazine?
You're entitiled to think that the priest's robes are just as ridiculous as a Barney costume, but to fail to recognize the distinction between them seems to me a failure to understand the purpose of forms and traditions.
"To a non-Catholic, the Barney suit is just as ridiculous as a Priest's suit."
That's one heck of an unsupportable generalization, and I don't think it's true. I can't think of any non-Catholic branch of Christianity where a service or ceremony wouldn't be degraded by the presence of cliche-spouting cartoon characters created to appeal to infants. In fact, I can't think of a single non-Christian religion where a ceremony would be enhanced by the inclusion of commercialized emphemera--not even the loosest neopagan hoedown.
I won't claim to know what's in the hearts of others, but when I watch that video and see a churchgoer dressed like Jason the serial killer, I think I'm within bounds to question whether he and others like him really have gathered in the name of Christ in the first place.
KM, the video wasn't as bad as I'd feared. (I didn't see the "devil" distributing Communion.) But I did find it sad. Sad that so many people were in that church. That they hadn't voted with their feet and joined the next parish over. But then I've never encountered such a "fun" parish. Maybe it's hard for people to not obey and suffer in silence (offering up their suffering, as the Sisters used to advise us).
You must must must read, you will love, this book.
She doesn't only swim upstream against the sexual revolution/abortion current. She also fights viscerally against the gender-neutering of the words of Scripture and the Mass (she calls it "Neuteronomy") and the Vatican II, folk-musicky, politically- correctifying of tradition. She's very serious, but also funny about it.
Thank you for touching my life, by the way.
Amba, thank you so much for the book recommendation! It sounds wonderful and right up my alley. I've already put it on my Amazon wish list in preparation for my next book-buying binge.
I'm honored that you stopped by. Your discussion of abortion, which I linked to in the post above, was among the most moving that I've read on the subject. Thank you so much for that.
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