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Catechesis on the Liturgy: The Church Building, the Greeting, the Penitential Rite

(See previous chapter in this series)       (See next chapter in this series)

Homily
Sunday, September 17, 2006, 24th Sunday of Ordinary Time, Cycle B
St. Joseph Parish, Detroit

            The Holy Mass is the principle way in which we as Catholics worship the Father, that is, by the celebration in the assembly of the sacrifice of Jesus Christ in the Holy Eucharist.

            Today’s Gospel is a good lead in to the topics of today’s homily, which is the next installment on the catechesis on the holy Mass, because of Peter’s repentance. Indeed, after Peter professed his faith (Mk 8:27ff.), Peter failed Jesus terribly by rejecting the cross. We too have often rejected the cross in our lives, and so we need to repent when we begin the Mass. Appropriately, today’s reflections will deal mostly with the penitential rite. But not exclusively.

            11. We will discuss the location of the Mass, that is, the Church; the biblical greeting; the examination of conscience; the “I confess” or confiteor, and the Kyrie or “Lord have mercy.”

The Church Building

12. A Church is “a house of prayer in which the Eucharist is celebrated and reserved, where the faithful assemble, and where is worshipped the presence of the Son of God our Savior.”[1] Church buildings are “not simply gathering places, but signify and make visible the Church living in this place, the dwelling of God with men reconciled and united to Christ.”[2] Therefore, a Church building should look like the living Church: it should express the essence of the faith, it should be filled with icons of the saints[3]; our Language, Latin, should be seen in it; it should be centered on God’s presence in the Eucharist in the most evident ways; and it should be disposed to prayer and to lifting one’s soul up to God, and it should be filled with beauty.

In times of persecution, we have used homes, catacombs, fields, anywhere for the Eucharistic worship. Military chaplains have always offered Mass wherever the soldiers need it. Priests who travel celebrate Masses where they can. But the principle place for the Mass is a Church. The other sacraments are celebrated in the Church, such as baptisms and weddings. And allow me a digression regarding weddings in Churches.

Young people today are more frequently entering into marriages outside of Churches, as on beaches, or in forests, or in someone’s back yard. These are invalid marriages, except should the couple enjoy the express and written permission of the bishop to have the wedding outside the Church. and those who enter them knowing the Church’s law on this matter do not enter into a marriage but into adultery. The case of invincible ignorance is different however, and today such ignorance is widespread on this point. I say this especially for young people considering marriage, for the good of their marriages and their souls.

The Biblical Greeting

13. That said, let us turn our thoughts to the beginning of the Mass. Starting the Mass, the priest steps to his chair, a special place just for the priest in the sanctuary. The priest’s chair “should express his office of presiding over the assembly and of directing prayer.”[4]

From there, after the sign of the Cross, the priest does not address a jovial “good morning” to everyone, nor crack jokes nor digress about the weather. The greeting with which he begins the celebration of the Great Sacrifice is taught to him by the Church: “The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, be with you all.”

This, as many of the prayers and words the priest says during Mass, is no spurious invention: it is word for word a verse St. Paul wrote in one of his epistles in the New Testament (2 Cor 13:14). And so the Church is ever ancient and ever new.

The Examination of Conscience

14. In the  Liturgy of the Mass, by which the Church expresses and “shares in Christ’s priesthood…, which is both prophetic… and kingly,”[5] we must recognize the indignity of our behavior towards God and men. Sometimes we have not lived our faith by good deeds to our neighbor, by faith in God, by obedience to the Church, as recommended by St. James in today’s reading.[6] We are all sinners! If anyone here not a sinner, you’re dismissed, you can go, you don’t need a savior; the rest of us are sinners, however, and that’s why we’re here, to frequently repent from our sins. And we rejoice, it is sinners for whom Jesus died! And so we examine ourselves. The priest therefore invites us, after the greeting, to  take time to examine our conscience, and we don’t rush, so our inventory of our sins is complete and sincere.

The Confiteor

15. This silence is broken by the priest when he starts the prayer on behalf of all, “I confess, I confess!” or “Confiteor” in Latin.

It was a prayer originally prayed in private by the Pope when he started Mass, in ancient times. Eventually the custom became for the priest to pray it, and the congregation, too, but separately one after the other; now we pray it at once together. [7] The “dialogue” aspect of it is retained to this day, by the priest’s prayer alone, “May almighty God have mercy on us, etc.,” or the “Misereatur.” Just after the year 1184, the congregation confessed not only “to you my brothers,” but to the Blessed Virgin Mary, to St. Michael the Archangel, to St. John the Baptist and to the apostles Peter and Paul.

We strike our breasts three times (sadly only once when this prayer is prayed in English by our current text, a real impoverishment). We strike ourselves in sorrow for our sins. We do so thrice to show the superlative degree, in paradoxical and infinite contrast to the six winged Seraphim,[8] who sing “Holy, holy, holy,” to the thrice Holy God and Trinity. It is as if one strike is to show our renewed love for each one of the three Persons of the Holy Trinity, whom we have grossly outraged by our pathetic sins… sins which we spuriously dub “small,” “unimportant,” or maybe even pay no attention to them.

The Kyrie

            16. Having confessed our sins publicly to one another, to the Church militant and triumphant both, our hearts are moved with the ancient and moving supplication, Kyrie, eleison, or “Lord have mercy.” “[The Kyrie] is a chant by which the faithful acclaim the Lord and implore his mercy.”[9]

“The Kyrie may be sung in the vernacular or in Greek. Each acclamation is made twice, but the old ninefold version may be retained if this is integral to the musical setting.”[10] The Greek is a more ancient Church Language than the Latin, but the Latin is both ancient and universal, so Latin is the first language of our Liturgy.

The expression “Kyrie, eleison” is even found in the ancient authoritative Greek translation of the Old Testament, the Septuagint, in a handful of places,[11] and people say it to Jesus in the Gospels in at least six instances.[12] It is therefore both an expression of deep human emotion, as well as a prayer founded in the scriptures.

It’s use goes way back to the ancient Church, and is found in the earliest post-New Testament documents.[13] And the expression Christe, eleison (Christ, have mercy), was used in Rome habitually by the time of Gregory the Great (Pope St. Gregory I) in the sixth century,[14] from whose name we derive the expression Gregorian Chant.

            17. If I could leave you with one thought for the day and the week at the end of these considerations, it would be a thought which St. John Fisher wrote in 1508 regarding why to trust God’s mercy. St. John Fisher, 27 years before he was beheaded by King Henry VIII (1508, 1535), shortly after he was made bishop of Rochester at 35 years of age, in a series of discourses on the seven penitential psalms, reminds us of the dispositions of humility and penance with which we should begin Mass: “We can now be assured that almighty God will be merciful to all true penitents: first, because of his promise; secondly, because he is almighty and can perform it at all times; thirdly because he is so gentle and eve ready to forgive.”[15] Let us take the Saint’s words to heart, Amen.