The World of Grandpa Don

Who is Responsible?

On the week of December 5, 2003, I included the following comments on my "events" page:

"We had an Advent prayer service Wednesday evening and it was beautiful. Short hymns interspersed with prayer and scripture readings. It was a great way to break away from the turmoil of the season and get into the true spirit of the season, to calm down and have some quiet time with God, counting our blessings and leaving our troubles to Him. Thank you to Deanne, Sr. Gael and the gentleman who did the readings so well. Thank you to those in the background who prepared the worship aids and prepared the church. I and the other two parishioners who attended appreciate the efforts and the opportunity given to come a little closer to God." 

The World of Grandpa Don
www.plefka.net

And now I have some additional thoughts on the subject:

 The liturgy was not diminished for me by the lack of attendance but I was disappointed by the fact that so few people took advantage of the opportunity.  At first, I blamed the parish staff for not promoting this very special service. There was only a notice in the parish bulletin and I believe a brief announcement at Sunday Mass. The presider should have talked about it during his homily, telling of it's beauty and spiritual value. Maybe there should have been a big poster at the entrance to church.

But then I remembered that the Homily is a time of reflection on the readings for the day and Sunday Mass is it's own liturgy and special time of spirituality, not an occasion to promote other events. So, where does the responsibility for this poor attendance belong?

We are responsible! Each and every one of us as an individual are responsible for our relationship with God. Is our spiritual life important to us? Is our relationship with God a valuable part of our life? Do we want to take advantage of the spiritual enrichment opportunities offered by our religion? 

Then it is our duty to ourselves to read the bulletin to see what the parish has to offer and plan to take advantage of these opportunities. The announcement was made before Mass and it is our obligation to ourselves to be there in time to hear it and to be attentive to what is said. God gives us invitations and free will to accept or reject them. We, as individuals, have an obligation to ourselves to look for the invitations as well as accept them if we wish. No one else is to blame if we fail to do so.

Unfortunately, due to the lack of attendance to this liturgy and others like it (This isn't the first time), we may not have them in the future. I hope our parish staff does not give up on us. God doesn't.

p.s.

I sent a preview of this to our parish staff and received a reply from Sr. Gael in which she said that the staff would not give up and maybe next time six would attend.

 

Don Plefka
12/6/03

 

Thoughts About ...
Our Relationship with Ourselves

Who is Responsible?

The World of Grandpa Don
www.plefka.net 

Free JavaScripts provided
by The JavaScript Source