by Mark Morelli
What is church for?”
It wasn’t a heavy, philosophical question I asked. It was more like a flash card drill
“Sit still, answered our three year old
I buckled her into the car seat. “Good,” I said. “What else is church for?”
“Ssshhh,” she answered, correctly
“Good,” I said, pulling out of the driveway. “Church is also for looking at
the candles. Church is also for singing along when everyone else is singing
And church is also for watching the priest tell us stories. Got it?”
She got it. She said she got it. She promised me she got it
Just like she had promised last week
And just like last week, moments after we took our seat in a pew near the
front, she squawked and fidgeted. She crawled under the pew. She talked
while everyone sang
“This is God’s house,” I whispered
“No, it’s MY house,” she said loudly
I wondered...why? Again, no heavy theological question. Just...why. Why are
we doing this to ourselves? And why are we doing this to her?
There’s an endless checklist of thorn-in-the-side chores required by life
Work. Commuting. Kids schedules. Long grocery lines. Dispiriting newspaper stories
Now then, what’s the best way to spend that remaining free, precious Sunday
morning. I know: Let’s take a rambunctious three year old and convince her to sit still on a hard wooden bench for an event that makes a Ruritans’ meeting seem like “Oh! Calcutta!”
(Why am I so hard on church services? Because a far too high percentage of
them are unstimulating, even when I’m alone and unencumbered by the fidgety kid. Rare is the priest (I’ve met a handful of them) and I make the effort
to know them and see them repeatedly who does NOT go five to fifteen
minutes too long on a homily, thereby diluting and perhaps even spoiling his
sermon’s lesson. In addition, I’ve observed enough years to conclude that most Catholics are just too awkward about singing and that makes hymn singing a session in weird, white-people self-consciousness.)
But how else do you get a little kid acclimated to church?
You’ve got to set aside what could be a full year of church worship time to
train her to sit still in it
Forsake enjoyment. Forget serenity. Forget the soul. But like teaching
Helen Keller to keep her hands to herself it has to be done
And while it is being done, I think this: Lively children are to stoic services what Dean Martin was to apple picking
I know, I know. Hang in there. I see the big picture. The eventual dividends
are this: The fidgety kid calms down and discovers serenity. She learns
about her faith. She becomes a part of something that is bigger than
herself, that is so many centuries old that it transcends fad and fashion
She acquires spiritual identity. She understands what God expects of her. We shall give community and faith. We shall expose to her the wonder of bread. We shall introduce her to sanctuary. We shall bestow upon her the gift of the concept of eternity
In the meantime, she won’t sit still. Also in the meantime, no one appreciates that communion wine more than me
So midway through mass, I took her outside and we walked down the sidewalk
We plucked a leaf off a tree. It was green, with streaks of autumnal red, orange and yellow on the edges. An explanation of why those colors indicated that the leaf was dying formed on my lips. And stayed there
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