By Bob Sullivan
Nearly 20 years ago, in a Gallup poll of Catholics in Chicago, 48% of men answered that “Mass is boring” and 55% said they “don’t get anything out of the Mass.”
I think this is what you get when your identity is defined by attending Mass on Sunday. “I am Catholic. I go to Mass on Sunday,” or the alternative heard from lapsed Catholics, “Church just isn’t for me.”
What do you do in addition to Mass? What do you do to prepare for Mass?
Worship of God is necessary. It is actually an obligation of all Christians. And the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is the very best way to fulfill that obligation. But does going to Mass on Sunday make me a disciple? It is one thing to do the minimum, but if you read through Scripture and Christian history, God clearly does not want the minimum from any of us. This is why it is very difficult to worship God throughout your life if all you do is what you are required to do. Meditate on Luke 17:7-10 to see what God says about it.
Going to Holy Mass every holy day of obligation out of sense of duty is not a bad thing, by any stretch of the imagination. That said, Holy Mass is not supposed to be habitual or mechanical. Certainly nothing about Jesus, especially His passion, death, and resurrection was mechanical or thoughtless. On top of this, as mortals, we simply burn out when a routine has become mechanical and thoughtless. This is a common reason why men stop attending Mass. It becomes boring, or they just don’t feel like they are being “fed.”
One solution is to make Holy Mass more interesting and engaging. Popular podcaster Father Leo Patalinghug recently did a very good job of discussing (with video footage) why this is a horrible approach. Aside from appropriate music, good homilies, and reverence, all of which are properly part of Holy Mass, the only thing a parish needs to do about the liturgy, is to follow the actual liturgy. The rest is up to us.
The change has to be in the person, not the liturgy (unless the liturgy is like those seen in Father Patalinghug’s video). We cannot be passive and wait for a compelling homily, or to wait for one of our fellow parishioners to inspire us or to start an interesting program or Bible study. While these things can be very helpful, they are not necessary. What is necessary is for us to take the lead in our own heart, mind, and soul. This means that there is a lot of work to do outside of that one hour on Sunday.
This is the purpose behind the commitment cards we handed out at the Men’s Leadership Summit earlier this year. If you look at the list of 10 commitments, you will see that each one is pretty simple:
1. I will attend Mass every Holy Day. (Worship)
2. I will go to confession at least every eight weeks. (Humility)
3. I will attend at least one retreat. (Spiritual Exercise and Training)
4. I will serve my parish in some way. (Service and Humility)
5. I will pray for 15 minutes every day. (Relationship)
6. I will abstain from meat on Fridays or do some other form of penance each week. (Purgation and Penance)
7. I will lead my family in prayer each day. (Headship)
8. I will read the Bible for at least 5 minutes each day. (Spiritual Exercise)
9. I will listen to a podcast, a Catholic radio station, or a Catholic speaker at least once per week. (Intellect and/or Spiritual Exercise)
10. If I stumble on any item above, I’ll start over again. (Perseverance)
However, if you look at national statistics on the practice of the faith (which are as disappointing as those cited earlier), you will see that most Catholic men do not actually practice any of the 10 commitments on the list. Spending five minutes a day with Scripture (#8) is as basic as reading the readings for Mass each day. Polling also found that 54% of Catholic men do not pray daily. If I don’t pray for as little as 15 minutes each day (#5), how can I expect to go to Mass on Sunday with any expectation that I will feel inspired or “fed” at each Mass?
Your spiritual life cannot be a checklist. However, for many men, almost everything we have done successfully has involved a checklist.
Whether the goal is a project at work, packing for a vacation, planning for a weekend hunting excursion, or a trip to the grocery store, we rely heavily on checklists. The commitments above are simple steps which would help most men introduce practices which would enrich our experience at Holy Mass on Sunday. Therefore, the checklist is a starting point for a meaningful experience of the faith which touches each day of the week and all aspects of your life. In short, if you do these things, you will experience Mass much differently, and we will all be freed from the weak and false excuse: “Church just isn’t for me.”
Church is for you. And you receive grace during Holy Mass whether you realize it or not. Father Mike Schmitz – another well-known podcaster – has a great message on that, which we’ll look at in an upcoming column.
