Aurora Borealis

Mr. Tldz and I attended the dedication of our new parish church this morning.  The mass was just under 3 hours, and it was packed.  I counted at least 21 priests besides our own 3 concelebrating the mass, and several clergy of other denominations from the neighborhood were also there.  That was nice to see.  It would have been nice if they could have listed in the program the churches that were represented; but anway it was nice to know they were there.

We started in the old church (more formally and nicely referred to in the program as “the 1958 church”) for a short time.  I knew that part would be brief, but I was surprised there wasn’t at least a little more to it.  There was the opening processional with all the clergy coming in, a brief opening prayer of the mass, and then the Archbishop said, “And now let us process to the new church.” I thought there would be an official rite to de-consecrate the old church.  I think something does officially have to be done, but maybe they just don’t do that in the dedication mass for reasons of length or something.

Of course, moving from one church to another took a lot of time.  There was some sort of formal ceremony at the front doors, presenting the church to the Archbishop, handing over the building plans, and officially opening the doors.  We were pretty far back in the crowd, kind of out in the parking lot and they didn’t have a sound system set up for that, so we didn’t hear that part.

We eventually got into the new building, but of course, many of us were standing, because a lot of people had skipped the part in the old church and just secured their seats in the new building.  Communion vessels, linens, sacramental oils… all that stuff was processed in.  Things started at the back of the church, at the new baptismal font (large, placed like the one at the church where we were married).  The Archbishop blessed the water and then we had a rite of sprinkling by the Archbishop and our 3 priests.  We were standing right next to the font, so we got a pretty good bath!

Then we proceeded to have a normal (though bilingual) Liturgy of the Word.  The Archbishop gave a good homily.  He only gave a small part of it in Spanish, which I guess is because if he did the whole thing in both languages, it would have just gone too long.  He seems to be quite fluent in Spanish, though.

Following the profession of faith, we started the rite of dedication.  First was the deposition of the relics into the altar.  Apparently we have relics of Saint John Neumann, Saint Thomas Aquinas, and Saint Therese of Liseux.  I don’t know what they are, but I assume they are distant relics.  I don’t know if these relics were in the old church or if there were relics in the old church.  I liked this part because we got to sing the litany of the saints, which I really like.  Oddly, though, in the last part the names listed were some parishioners who had recently died.  Mr. Tldz is pretty certain that is canonically improper.  But even if an exception is made for an event like that specific to a local parish, my question is how is it decided which deceased parishioners are listed?

Then the Archbishop anointed the altar with oil.  A lot of oil.  He poured oil onto the altar.  Then he smeared it all around.  It looked like he was doing a hard scrubbing job.  Our priests got to anoint the walls with oil – or more accurately the sconces on the walls and place the candles.  Love the smell of that oil!

Next came the incensation of the altar and the church.  Love the smell of the incense, too!  But this was strange.  As this part of the mass got started, I leaned over to Mr. Tldz and said, “Oh no – I think we’re going to have liturgical dance.”  There were four willowy, barefoot teen girls in matching outfits coming up the aisle.  Well, they didn’t quite do liturgical dance.  They were the bearers of these big pottery bowls of the incense.  They walked them all over the church with very odd, ballet-like, pointed-toe steps.  They were wearing these green-blue leotard-like dresses with asymetrical skirts and matching leggings underneath.  It all seemed a little too new-agey for me.  Not incensing – that’s very Catholic.  But whatever happened to traditional censors and, oh, I don’t know, altar server robes?  I don’t know what that was about.  Except I guess to prove the definitely leftward slant of our parish.

Then came the lighting of the altar and the church – lighting all the candles around the altar and the ambo and the wall sconces – before we returned to the regular order of the mass with the Liturgy of the Eucharist.  The offertory basket that we saw seemed quite full of bills, with denominations besides $1s, so hopefully they did well.  And with as crowded as it was, distibution of Communion went pretty smoothly and quickly.  Having 21+ priests to distribute helped, no doubt.

Following Communion we had a solemn procession of the Blessed Sacrament (like Holy Thursday or a Eucharistic Benediction service) to the new reservation chapel.  The reservation chapel is behind the altar.  The organ pipes block it from view from the main part of the church.  The crucifix hangs in front of the organ pipes.  (The corpus is from the old church, though it’s mounted on a different cross.  This cross doesn’t have “INRI” inscribed on it, which seems odd.)  Apparently there is a sight line into the chapel if you’re seated at the side of the church.  The placement and expense of those organ pipes is a point of contention within the parish.  There are many of us who feel like we should more closely follow the Church’s preference for placing the tabernacle in a “prominent,” “visible” location.  But it is what it is, the design was approved by our bishop, and I guess I’ll get used to having those organ pipes as a backdrop.  I hope I’ll have a chance soon to walk around and look at the reservation chapel.

I do honestly have to say that this new church really does offer a more attractive worship space than our old church.  The old  church had its charms, but, well, it just wasn”t very attractive.  The new space has a rather modern feel, but enough classical elements that it feels “churchlike” to me, and I think it will stand the test of time pretty well.

There were lots of thank yous and other acknowledgements at the end of mass, including some good-natured ribbing between our pastor and the archbishop.  And our pastor announced that one of the stained glass windows (I think he said the Holy Spirit window) is being donated by members of the parish in the name of the woman who has chaired the building committee.  (We don’t appear to have any stained glass in the new church yet, but I guess that’s coming.)  That’s a good thing.  She’s done a lot of hard work for the past 7 years and had to deal with a lot of bad feeling in the parish about various aspects of this project, which ultimately boil down to “people don’t like change” and “people can hold grudges.”

The choir really did a good job – even the children’s choir.  Years ago, under our previous music director, the children’s choir used to sound awful.  Awful.  And they were inflicted on us at mass about once a month.  We’d all shudder.  The kids were very – enthusiastic – but they didn’t seem to be getting any instruction or direction on how to sing; and it seemed like a lot of them were really too young.  This current choir sounded fabulous, and they even had little choir uniforms.

A reception followed at the school gym, but we left right after mass.  We didn’t get out until the time that we’d told N. we’d be back to pick up Agent Murphy.  So we went straight over there.  Apparently he missed us.  It was, after all, his first time being away from Mommy and Daddy while also being in an unfamiliar place.  Aunty N. reported that the Agent hadn’t had much to say to her or A. or  I., and mostly N. had had to hold him.  She carried him away to start playing when Mr. Tldz and I were leaving.  Apparently once he realized we weren’t around anymore, he shrieked.  Fortunately, his trusted friend Lemon the Lion provided some comfort.  So I think it really was the right call to have Agent Murphy visit Aunty N. rather than go to the (I’m sure very crowded) church nursery.  A big thank you to Aunty N. for watching our boy so we could participate in the dedication!

We were glad to know our boy misses us when we’re not around.  And we’re glad he’s back to his normal, busy, talkative self now – babbling, rolling around on the floor with his dog, moving stuff around the house…

This entry was posted on Saturday, January 24th, 2009 at 7:08 pm and is filed under Catholicism. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.