Today, being at Mass was refreshing; hearing the Priest talk was wholesome and rewarding. One of the main things this particular Priest said that resonated with me this evening, was that […we live our lives’ through and within Christ in the Church, while outside in the community, we live out our own lives…] .
Being a Catholic means a great deal to me, but this statement is almost the central feature of my faith at the moment; I love to live my life, but at difficult times in my life (outside the Church), I can always rekindle my love for God in a special way by going to Mass in the church.
I am not a 100% practicing-Catholic. Like many others my attendance has lapsed as the years have gone by. But this evening as I attended Mass with my parents, the same things that have occurred to me in the past, were rekindled in me as I entered the Church, sat down, and listened to the Priest talk and act out the Mass, as God’s/Christs’ disciple.
It’s important for me to state this effect Mass has on myself. The Priest was saying his last evening Mass in our Parish this evening. He’s a nice man, I feel i’ve got to know him over the years. Hardly have I spoken directly to him, but I feel nevertheless I know him well to a degree. Sometimes, and especially at inspirational sermons like these, I think ‘I could have been a Priest’. I would have been suited to it. But, I am not a priest, and have lead too dirty a life to become one now.
This sense that there is a duality of spirit in us, that we can live a life in community spirit within the Church, and a life outside of the Church is breathtakingly powerful. I am deeply interested for my own sake and the sake of others in my ‘community’ in our shared/confusing sense of being individual’s and also part of a community of spirit within the Church. I feel indebted to those who practice their religion, in whatever form they do it, as their example proves powerful enough for me to follow suit at key times in my life.
Today for example, this example of faith came directly from my parents; they are my community.
While having said this, I personally find myself to be deeply individualistic – isolation for me is one extreme of this individuality, while love and empathy for others is the other extreme, a polar opposite scale you might say.