https://nzcatholic.org.nz/2019/04/22/qa-with-national-liturgy-office-acting-director/ The New Zealand National Catholic Newspaper Tue, 07 May 2019 06:32:10 +0000 hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.1.1 https://nzcatholic.org.nz/2019/04/22/qa-with-national-liturgy-office-acting-director/#comment-25302 Tue, 07 May 2019 06:32:10 +0000 https://nzcatholic.org.nz/?p=19504#comment-25302 Catholics like most others enjoy their Television.
This induces them to discard what does not provide an emotional stimulus within a short period, not unlike a good novel, and if gratification is not there if payback in invested emotion is not there, they will simply use the remote.
This has groomed them to be audience driven, screenwriters actually writing stories from the audience backwards, instead of the old style of engaging.
Mass arrives with hymns, but Catholics generally do not prepare for mass, and entering the mystery is far from their minds, very often, and these attitudes and values are translated into the general tenor of the gathering, and youth are quick to pick up on this.
Rare is the church where the Monstrance is placed before and after mass and the congregation invited to adore, to reverence, and to enter the mystery.
It could all change with private adoration, fasting, deep prayer, the family rosary.
Liturgy can make for a nice concert, but faith is not a good feeling.
Restoration of Eucharist to what it used to means providing opportunities for the mystical body. Hence the “Rosa Mystica” movement, and this is worth reflecting on to see what actually has been happening.
Without the JOY of the Lord, there is no God. (St Augustine: “The most infallible sign of the presence of God is JOY”)

]]>