Putting Catholic Men on Ritalin
SIT DOWN & SHUT UP
The lady cantor, in her polite intercom voice, intoned the dread phrase as she announced the final “song” of the Mass: “Please turn to song number 117 in your Breaking Bread hymnal. We will be using the alternate lyrics.”
Ah, yes: “Joy to the World.” Instead of “Let men their songs employ,” we have “Let us our songs employ.” The cantor had done the same with “Let There Be Peace on Earth”: from “Brothers all are we” to “We are a family.” I had to keep from laughing out loud as the voice of Barney singing those alternate lyrics resonated in my head.
This episode, and it was hardly the first, got me thinking: What exactly does the American Catholic mindset offer to its laymen?
To be blunt, it offers this: the opportunity to sit down and shut up.
Think about it. Unless your parish is unusual, the ratio skews female on Sundays and other holy days of obligation. Why is that?
You May Also Enjoy
We fixed what wasn't broken with a correction that wasn't necessary, and in the process created a real problem that seems impossible to repair.
Hymnal and missal editors aren’t infallible or unswervingly orthodox, and just because a song is in a hymnal or missal doesn’t mean it is free from error.
Leadership in a revival of Catholic devotions might be an appropriate role for those who are not priests but who are ordained: deacons.