Thursday, June 30, 2005



At long last....
After a few failed attempts to go to daily Mass at a local church Holly and I finally got it! The few times we tried, they had "communion liturgies" because we either came on the wrong day or the priest was unavailable. I'm not sure I was completely satisfied though. We opened and closed with Marty Haugen (if there's anything worse than Marty Haugen it's singing Marty Haugen accapella), no one kneeled at any point during the Mass except Holly, some other lady, and me, and during Communion was wierd too. Father consecrated 2 chalices and left them sitting on the altar. Father proceeded to distribute Communion and left them on the altar. I was a little curious why he would consecrate 2 chalices and not have Eucharistic ministers, but I went up to receive Communion. A little later I discovered that someone picked up the chalice and took it for themself (I didn't actually see this happen) then turned around and distributed to the next person, after that person recieved they distributed it to the next person, and so on and so forth. It was kind of like the handwashing system we use on Holy Thursday at our church. Doesn't this seem a little strange, not to mention possibly invalid? The whole distributing Sacraments to yourself (mind you, I didn't acutally see this happen, but I can think of no other way for the chain reaction to start) also, the fact that most of these people probably weren't Eucharistic ministers at all. Maybe we'll have to send them a well highlighted copy of the GIRM, anonymously of course.