rite ritual catholicism and doing lenten penance

so here's where the truth comes out
many of you know that I was received
into the catholic church
nearly 5 years ago now
at New Norcia Easter 2002
it was majestic and beautiful
the right thing for me in all ways
and then...

finding a catholic home has been harder
than i could have ever thought
i love the monks
the liturgy
the silence
the sacramental life
the beauty of the worship
a noble simplicity
but local parishes give me the whoops
good liturgy in Perth is hard to find...

so i drifted back to my wife's parish
whilst i couldn't stand the "worship"
the new minister is a good guy
accepted me for what i am
and needed my help for ideas about the church year
and structuring services
and taize
and all that is good and great and i felt needed and useful
but...

in that lies the rub.
not finding what I need
but just putting up with where they need me
not being true to my confirmation beliefs
especially eucharistically
but settling for something else than what i believe
not really struggling to move forward
but turning back
and in that seems to lie my struggle this lent...

as i read more about Anglo catholics
inevitably my study turns to those who leave and join Rome
as I did
for often similar reasons
beautiful catholic parishes who use the Anglican rite
poor brothers and sisters bringing silence and depth and healing with the poor
monasteries whose liturgy
would blow your mind with its depth
and the eastern rite churches
with glorious icons and divine chant
and then i see myself and wonder
what the hell am i doing
not being part of this family
and i feel confused and hurt and more than just a bit lost...

so i need to get back on track
and have your prayers dear friends

the struggle is to find my place in the church which i love
liturgically
spiritually
physically
personally
and be true to my insides by getting the outsides right

it seems like a real
Lenten task.

Comments

Chris Kan said…
practice comment
5:03 PM
H.M. said…
Ouch. I don't have words of advice; I'll only say I think I understand what you may be going through, and I will pray for you brother.

Antony
http://tothequiet.blogspot.com
11:00 AM
Chris Kan said…
It is quandry I have got myself into and with God's grace and a lot of prayer will get out soonish I hope!
Good to hear from your mate.
Hope you're doing ok.
C
11:41 AM
Anonymous said…
This comment has been removed by the author.
12:32 PM
Coralie said…
to really analyse how you feel and where you're at spitually and in your church family is something I try not to do too closely. On any given day my answer would probally change depending on my mood. Things could always be better because we're human and rarely satified.Every day I am in God's presence. He is my favourite shadow and no matter what frame of mind I am in He is shadowing me and listening to my hearts cry.
4:02 PM
Anonymous said…
Hey, I've had a day to tick over what you wrote, so here's a hopefully half-intelligent response to your great and touching Lenten post ...

First up, I relate strongly (not 100%, but a lot) to your quandary. Matching the inner realities to the outer in relation to church, and finding a nourishing spiritual home that gives at least as much as it takes, are challenging goals. You've articulated them brilliantly.

Whether or not this quandary is of our own making (as you suggest in your reply to Antony), well ... I can't tell. My hunch is that the quandary is probably a co-creation - to which I suspect grace is already an anonymous contributor. But certainly it is a real quandary, and a deeply felt struggle. I feel with you and for you. Like I said up front, I relate strongly to it myself.

For what it's worth, I find it helpful every now and again to do what I'd call "checking the frame". Sometimes the way I frame what I'm experiencing affects - even dominates - the experience (a kind of human equivalent to the Heisenberg Principle in physics, where the simple act of observing a really delicate object - like an electron - changes the behaviour of what you're observing).

So if, for instance, I hang a delicate blue-hued watercolor in a garrish scarlet frame, then the frame becomes the defining element in the visual experience - the picture at the centre of it all kind of fades out of view.

Tuning in to my feelings of spiritual isolation and hunger with honesty and compassion is a poignant encounter with a very delicate inner picture. This encounter may well elicit sadness and longing, but not necessarily anguish or panic or despair. It is not intrinsically tragic, even though it is definitely painful.

However, if I impose on this experience the assertion (for example) that "I'm lost", this hangs such a heavy frame around it that I can easily miss the central picture completely, and end up being distracted into the crude and false belief that my urgent mission is to get "found" again.

And what a wasted mission that can be.

So while I seriously appreciate the hunger you feel for sustaining liturgical nourishment and spiritual community, I think it would be a mistake to pathologise it, and an over-simplification to frame this experience as a "problem" to which grace will hopefully provide a future "solution".

It doesn't mean I think you should stop looking for brilliant liturgy and sustaining community. No way. That would be self-negligent.

But I think we are sometimes a lot closer to home in our lostness than we realise. Does this make lostness feel any easier? It's hard to generalise, but for me, yes, it does make it a little easier.

A final slightly mischievous thought ... I reckon it can be a productive spiritual experiment to ask "what is the problem to which my present quandary is grace's solution?" I think grace is quite a mystery, and re-framing our feelings of lostness in this inside-out way might be a way of refocussing on the subtle picture we've maybe missed, not just on the crude frame we've hung around it. It also might be a way to help us notice again that grace pervades and penetrates even these moments in which feel we are still waiting for grace to arrive.

Enough! I am almost completely out of my depth now.

All blessing and strength to you, mate. Thanks for hanging your washing out.
1:42 AM
Anonymous said…
Hey Chris, in case you're interested, I've posted something about my journey into Catholicism on one of my blogs: "The Five Dangerous Graces".

Onya, mate! MD
12:21 PM
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