St. Joseph - Paris

Sorry this post is last.  I was exhausted from going hiking after Mass.  I climbed to the highest peak in Arkansas.  Then on Monday night I had softball.  I love getting walked!

On Sunday, May 11, I headed out to Paris, AR for the 9 am Mass at St. Joseph Church.  It is an old style church and was pretty.

Music was accompanied by an organ in the choir loft.
Opening:  Alleluia! Alleluia!
Offertory: Hail Mary: Gentle Woman
Communion:  Pan de Vida (instrumental), Let Us Break Bread Together (at a funeral pace)
Closing:  Jesus is Risen

The Gloria was not sung.  The congregation started saying it, got lost, and just kind of stopped.  Father made us redo it.

Why do churches put the cry room in the choir loft???

Homily:
The Deacon gave the homily.  Because it was Mother's Day, he asked for the Mom with the oldest child (odd) and the newest mom.  Something changes when girls have babies (yeah...their hips).  God knows what mothers need and gives them the tools to be good mothers (so bad moms didn't pick up the tools?)  You only appreciate your mother once you have kids of your own.  A mother is a mother for ever.  Mothering is out of pure love (no comment).  The history of mothers:  Eve, then Mary, then Mother church (and you missed some generations...).  The history of Mothers' Day goes back to when the early church had a day when you were to go back to the church you were baptized in, that was your mother church and the day was Mother's Day. (Uhm...he does realize that most people in the early church didn't tend to move all that far from the place they were born....it's not like they had planes or cars or anything... and on this bright note the Church I was baptized in is closed/suppressed.  Guess I don't have a mom church.  Excellent.)  Mothers' Day is not a liturgical holiday (but we are going to treat it like one)  To tie it into the Gospel, mothers are shepherds (oh this is a stretch).  Shepherds slept outside the gate to keep out the wolves.  The wolves would smell the human and go away.  In the morning, the shepherd would open the gate and the sheep would follow the call.  The image of Jesus carrying a sheep comes from when, in the old days, lambs were rambunctious and would run off.  The shepherd would break the lamb's leg and therefore would need to carry the lamb everywhere.  The lamb would then stay close to the shepherd when the lamb was healed in 2-3 weeks.  (*blink*  I don't even know where to begin on this fail.  Seriously. Other than to go stop reading wikipedia and talk to the ranchers/4H people in your parish....)  Now this doesn't mean you should break your rambunctious child's leg (I'm glad you added that qualifier there...)  We all need a hit upside the head to follow (Because when love doesn't work, violence is the answer..).  Mother wants to lead us to Church, to Jesus (that only works if your mom is a practicing Catholic and not a CAPE, C&E, or somebody died Catholic).  They do this completely out of love.  We hold mothers in high esteem (yet we trash stay at home moms).

The Deacon then gave a special blessing to all the mothers.  There were about 5 adult women who did not get to stand for the blessing.  One woman looked very very unhappy.  Then all the mothers got to come up and get a rose.  Here's a tip:  over buy your roses.  There is nothing worse than running out before all the moms get one and then having to go raid flowers in the sacristy....

One of the petitions were for Mothers who gave some quality to Earth ( I have no idea)

Father used Eucharistic Prayer II.  There were bells at the Consecration.  The Our Father was sung.

Pictures:

I guess the Holy Spirit got tired of flying...

Or it's a chicken...

 

Where's Pope?

You can tell this a Pre Vatican II window..

 

 

Link:
St. Joseph - Paris