Take This Sabbath Day

Working at a camp is always an experience in learning about people.  I am lucky enough to work in a Catholic camp, because I often find myself encountering my faith when I'm out in nature.  Because of the nature of our camp, we have many Catholic groups visit, and sometimes they offer mass while they are here.  We as staff often try to slip in the back and get some Jesus time in before we have to go back to cleaning or group programming or some other part of our job.  I'm always surprised by how much the style of the mass really reflects the culture of the group that participates in it.  It can be hard to tell if the group has created this culture that the priest then feeds into, or if the culture of the group is created by the mass culture set up by the priest.  It's probably a little bit of both.  I love mass.  It's one of my favorite times of the week, so getting to have my favorite part of my week in my favorite place is such a great blessing.

This weekend, one of our groups was a college campus ministry group who worked the entire weekend doing service, literally digging holes and helping us continue to prepare for our incoming beehive that I talked about a few weeks ago, as well as prepping for the tree house that we're building.  They were a really great group, and when I found out that I would be able to join them for mass, I was really excited.  There were only 11 people, including the friar who was their fearless leader, so us three staff helped bulk up the group a little bit.

Right out of the gate, as we were literally turning to our opening song page, we got a Harry Potter reference.  It was hymn number 394.

One Snape impression down, and mass hasn't even started yet.  My kind of people.

Our friar opened mass with something that set me back in my seat a little bit: "We have to remember that what God has in store for us can be different from what we think should come."  It's something that I've heard a lot over the last few years, but every time it's the most jolting of reminders.  I often feel the need to control every part of my life, work for perfection.  And pretty much every single time, things turn out differently than I originally expected, or I had to take a completely different path to get to the same outcome.  It's fun.

The readings were also great today.  I'm a big fan of the second reading, which was Ephesians 5:8-14.  The whole section is worth your perusal, but one of the highlights: "Live as children of the light, for light produces every kind of goodness and righteousness and truth."  It's pretty beautiful.  The Gospel reading was also wonderful, with some sneaky sarcasm in there which I particularly enjoyed.  I would paraphrase it, but I think John says it best, so you can just read John 9:1-41 and come back here whenever you're ready.

The homily.  Holy cow, the homily was perfection.  We started with a Mean Girls reference, a reference that actually tied into the greater message of the homily and Gospel and wasn't just a hopeless attempt to appeal to the millenial generation.  So great.  And from there the friar spun this wonderful oratorical web around this idea of inclusiveness, bringing in not only the Lenten season, but the service that these college students had undertaken over the weekend.  It was truly one of the best homilies that I've heard recently.  Inclusivity is so close to my heart, and I could not help myself from smiling during certain points.  I particularly loved how the homily ended: "May we know that the service that we have done here will be fruitful for generations to come.  May the tree house the we helped to build be a place for all children to enjoy, no matter who they are, and hopefully the children will be inspired by the bees and allow everyone to gather."  I mean, come on, how much more perfect can you get?

I also really enjoyed the Eucharist.  With such a small group, we were able to gather around the altar and participate together.  Also, and this is probably the most subjective part of the whole mass, everyone hugged during the Sign of Peace.  I am a huge lover of hugs, and to literally be welcomed with open arms into this group that has known me for little more than 24 hours just warmed my soul.  The Eucharist was beautiful (as always), and we prepared for the final hymn.  One of the students is actually a cantor at his home parish, and he chose the closing hymn.  Keep in mind that this weekend, it rained A LOT.  It rained all evening, all night, and all during mass.  The hymn that was chosen to close out this great mass?  Rain Down.  The reverent sarcasm was almost too much for my sarcastic soul to handle.  

Yes, I really did just write a whole post about a great mass.  This is a great job that I have.