Abbey-Roads2

Fasting, preparation, reception, and thanksgiving.

The photo shows Carthusian monk-priests making their thanksgiving after Communion.  Theirs is an ancient tradition that emulates St. John leaning back upon Jesus’ chest at the last supper, although this position is anything but comfortable, as I found out when I was with the Carthusians.  Nevertheless, it illustrates the beauty of taking time to make a prayerful thanksgiving after  Communion.  St. Teresa of Avila recommended fifteen minutes of thanksgiving would be appropriate for her nuns, and encouraged it as a proper exercise by which to learn mental prayer.  Of course, for most busy people, such a lengthy thanksgiving is not practicable, although a few minutes of deep recollection might be.   (I’m not telling anyone how to pray here, just merely suggesting a wonderful practice.)

Times are changing however.

A commenter or two have suggested that certain dissident attitudes, or practices, or even the state of mortal sin, while being an impediment to the worthy reception of Communion, if observed, would mean there would be fewer people receiving Holy Communion.  I responded that would not be a bad thing at all.

Penance.

Growing up, frequent, even daily Communion was encouraged and practiced, but the rules were clear, one must be in the state of grace to receive.  Hence the lines for confession on Saturdays were very long, and even in small parishes, at least 2 priests were available to hear them.  People understood the necessary dispositions for receiving Communion.  On Sundays, less than half the congregation approached the Communion rail.  You see, the people attended Mass, but they were not obligated to receive Communion.

Fasting.

Preparation also included a lengthy Eucharistic fast.  Pius XII lessened the fast from midnight to whenever one was able to receive that day, to 3 hours before Mass.  Since Paul VI, we are required to fast only one hour before the reception of the sacrament.  Today Fr. Z has a post asking what people think of restoring the 3 hour fast.  (Don’t get upset, he is just “asking”.)  I personally think it is a good idea - but it isn’t my call - although privately, I’m free to fast as long as I want.  I’m also free to not approach the sacrament if I feel I am not properly disposed.  (I think it is chiefly self-love and undue regard for human respect that causes people to feel ashamed if they remain in their pew while everyone else approaches the sacrament.)

Kneeling.

News today is that the Holy Father will distribute Communion on the tongue and to those people who kneel.    I personally prefer that.  These matters have been under much discussion for years in this country - at one point a California bishop said it was a sin to kneel.  Crazy people, huh?  Thank God for Pope Benedict.  

Who knew homosexuals objected to the word “lifestyle”?

I found it out on a blog - here is the deal: 

“For a start, I know of no LGBT individual who talks about celebrating their “lifestyle.” The gift of their sexuality, maybe. Their orientation. Their relational capacity. But not their “lifestyle.”

As LGBT persons, we’re well aware that “lifestyle,” as Paula Ruddy points out, has become a “pejorative word used to denigrate gays, lesbians, bisexual and transgender persons. It’s a propaganda word, meant to segregate a group by its sexual practices and to exclude them from social acceptance.” - Wild Reed

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Then I read this BRILLIANT piece in an email I received:

. It is with some bemusement that I find a gay activist chastising a Church official for using the term “lifestyle” for a package of immoral attitudes, actions, and relationships which the Church opposes.

The term arose with psychologist Alfred Adler (1870-1937), who used “style of life” to include factors external to one’s “personality”: “The style of life of a tree is the individuality of a tree expressing itself and molding itself in an environment. We recognize a style when we see it against a background of an environment different from what we expect, for then we realize that every tree has a life pattern and is not merely a mechanical reaction to the environment” (source).

Interestingly, he opposed Freud’s mechanistic-deterministic theory and proposed to that personal motivation (free will) toward a goal was at the center of each life style, although apparently he understood most of these future-states to convenient fictions rather than certain realities.

Back to the etymology, the term “lifestyle” broadened in 1961 to mean “the typical way of life of an individual, group, or culture” (Merriam-Webster).  I suspect that it came into vogue especially in reference to the “hippie lifestyle”. And hippies certainly used the term freely (pardon the pun), precisely because it was opposed to a state of life (established institutions bad!) and vocation (I’m free to be me!).- Mr. GS  (H/T Ray)

Isn’t that interesting?  I actually know the man who wrote the email section of this post with the etymology of the word ’lifestyle’  - the man is so brilliant I could weep.  (Although why did he feel it necessary to denigrate ‘hippies’?  LOL!)

[Photo credit: "Breeder Talk" - Some Have Hats.]