Catholic Sensibility

Christmas marathon: I dropped out at the twenty-mile mark One reflection on Christmas is that I no longer have a child's stamina to go the distance. With Christmas falling on a Sunday next year, I have two years to build up to 2006, in which Christmas falls on a Monday, and we're treated to another marathon of liturgy. After 9AM Mass yesterday, it was clear my flu-addled head had had enough, so I went home, leaving the noon Mass and the 5PM visit by our bishops in the capable hands of our associate pastor, Fr Shawn. The best three singers in our ensemble were already home sick or away visiting, and it took me about half a first verse of "Hark The Herald Angels Sing" to find out what key I was supposed to play in. After Mass, a new parishioner asked me if I had the sound system on. No, I hadn't. I finally noticed after Communion that while the levels on the sub-mixer were all set just right, the on button was still off. That cued me in that it was probably time to go home and rest. Still, Christmas was fun, with a dash of aggravation. Children's choir did well despite my having to accompany and head-nod them. Our director had an illness in the family out-of-town, and my ace-in-the-hole substitute pianist (the end of a long list of calls I made the week before) turned out not to be available as she thought on Christmas Eve. Having an extra half-hour was helpful for the third Christmas Eve Mass (the first two are held simultaneously). We got through most of the prelude. The choir insisted we make room for my wife and I singing "In The Bleak Midwinter," which was dropped last year. Unfortunately, one choir member who left practice early, didn't read the outline and sang on verse 3. Oops. 8PM Christmas Eve was happily full. Midnight, which for the last three years has featured a pick-up group of singers and musicians whose motto could be described as, "Let's do the very best music with the minimum of rehearsal." The minimum of rehearsal bit always scares me, but the presentation at Mass has always been thrilling. One newcomer said he'd be happy to do that about once a month. So a seed has been planted. I have never liked Adam's "O Holy Night," but this group's performance of it has changed my mind. Mary's teen daughter Katie has matured into a dynamite singer--must be the confidence. Christmas Day was more lightly attended than in previous years. Our big choir does two Masses, the 8PM Eve and the 10AM morning with a concert 30 minutes before each liturgy. I felt badly we had about five people in the pews when they began on Christmas morning. Noon Mass was pretty full, though. My one complaint this year was our electronic carillon, or rather its programmer. First, a disclaimer: I abjure the practice of fake bells, and would prefer a real bell tower, if possible. We had the speakers and the various tower hardware overhauled the week before Christmas, and I had re-programmed the device for a variety of Christmas sets at various times before and in-between Masses this weekend. On my way up from the school at 2:45 on Friday, I noted the first program was underway as planned. Then I ran into our retired pastor after 3:30 Mass. He told me that "someone" had erased all of his Christmas programming, so he had to do the bells manually himself. Hmm. He left the thing on manual mode, which cancelled out the bell program before 6PM Mass. Since I had servers to brief and 8PM Mass to set up for, when I didn't scan the computer till mid-evening. Then I found that all of my programming had been erased. To top it off, our current priests were told if they needed a primer on how to run our bells, lights, and HVAC systems, just to call him. The new pastor and I had a good chuckle over it, but not everyone was happy. On one hand, I know the guys appreciated having a retired priest to come in and spell them for two of our thirteen Masses this weekend. On the other, I sure hope that when I retire I can just let go.