Today at Mass I couldn't help but think of the straw in the cave where Jesus was born. Here is the immaculate Son of God, the One desired by all ages. There, animals. St. Joseph did his best, I am sure, to make sure the animal droppings were cleared out for Mary, but the scent of that stuff has a way of hanging on. The animals themselves have a certain scent, and it wasn't the scent of wood shavings from the carpenter's shop.
But as I contemplated that scene, two concepts welled up in me. First, Reality. The amazing Incarnation, the Son of God truly present in the world. Along with the smelly animals. Second, affection. When I truly behold what has happened, I do not, I cannot, think less of Jesus because of the animals, I have to think more of the smell because of Jesus. I know that I do not like the smell of cow dung. But it is here, with Christ, and so somehow, it also is taken up in my adoration of Him. That smell of cow dung might put me off from kneeling before Christ (what if I kneel in it?), but I have to go back to the heart of Reality. It is Christ.
I looked out over the congregation as I cantored today, and I remembered the times before I entered the Church when I cringed at the thought of being identified with those people, those Catholics. Today I looked with a sense of affection. I realize I still might be put off by the way Christ chooses to be present with us, but I am encouraged to see others kneeling in my straw and not worrying about getting their knees dirty. God grant me the courage to always do the same.
2 comments:
Well Marie, I don't know what you mean by, 'those people, those Catholics' but as a cradle Catholic, I've said and thought the same words myself many times and meant many different things by them ... depending on what age I was, the group I was looking at, the mood I was in, my spiritual state and probably a few dozen other factors I can't even remember.
Ever since finishing "Black Like Me" last week, I've learned to call that, "otherness", i.e., seeing people as different from and OTHER than ourselves. It's so easy to do and we all do it all the time--so much so we don't even realize it.
Maybe that's why Jesus chose to be born among the animals--to break down the "otherness"-thing. Isn't it great when, like you said, you can look at everyone with a sense of affection?
Before I became a Catholic, I had a very strong anti-Catholic bent to my thinking. I firmly believed that Catholics followed the anti-Christ and were stupid ignoramuses to not know their religion was unbiblical and idolatrous.
Then God called me to become a Catholic. I was convinced of the doctrinal truth of Catholicism, but I was very unsure of whether "those Catholics" really loved God or not. No, actually I was convinced that I loved God more than any single parish combined. The absolute best I could do was to see myself as coming among them out of obedience, and with a bit of pity.
Really I suppose I also saw the rest of the world as "the loved", who, all things considered, didn't deserve love, and myself as the unloved whom no one realized was so saintly.
So you see, I was a bit of a mess. Everyone was "other", and so was love.
My initial major conversion experience to the Church happened at a Christmas Eve Midnight Mass, and the Incarnation has been reverberating its power throughout my life since that day almost 18 years ago. Thanks be to God.
He is so good.
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