the lucernarium

[cornerofmadness]

in other words: Easter Vigil but before I get into that. I hope all my friends who celebrate Passover had a wonderful holiday. As for me, this is the second time I've tried the Easter vigil at this church (because the priest has to travel and it's only sunrise mass on Sunday). Never again.

I get there at 8 pm when it says it starts. I was late. I was so embarrassed then I was confused. NO CARS. Um, did I miss it? I know confession was at 5. I park in front of the church and walk in. THree other people are there. I have to say it probably actually started at quarter til nine. I was annoyed. I realize that they wanted to wait until nightfall to light the fire so tell us 830. By that time it was filling up.

I was raised Catholic and while I don't deal much with the church it's easier to go to Easter mass than lie to the parents. I DO like the ritual of the mass (but I think after tonight I'll do methodist). Let me say, I've been to many Catholic churchs all across America. This is the FIRST (and that includes heavily Italian and Hispanic churchs) that does ALL the Easter vigil. I think he wants to make it blend into the sunrise mass. Most places go about an extra half hour. The full mass for the vigil is in four parts. Part one - the fireside ritual Part 2 - NINE readings complete with responses and a prayer after each. Part 3 - a full baptism. Part 4 - a full 'normal' mass. Most churchs pick just one reading and move on. This priest does them ALL.

We troop outside and he lights the fire and does the ritual magic err blessing of the candle including carving in the alpha and omega symbols and a cross with the numbers of the years in the 4 quadrants before lighting it on the fire which now has thick pancakes of frankinsene/myrrh burning in it. We go back inside and we all light our candle from that one.

He sings (because that's what we suddenly do as of last year, sing EVERYTHING) the rest of the fire ritual cutting out nothing (it comes labeled with short cuts). Our candles are in a plastic holder with a candle pushed up through it. I got burnt four times over all my fingers and my palm, second degree burns (and maybe a littlee deeper on the left index) because it was going on SO LONG. Two old ladies in front of me melted their plastic holder. I wanted to just tell them BLOW IT OUT. They could have been seriously hurt.

I had preread all nine of the readings and sat through two of his before leaving. I was there nearly 2 hours as it was. It was going to be a 4-5 hour long mass. Sorry but I'm just not that person. I can't sit that long. And seriously I want to know what the selection process for the readings are. They made no sense to me. Seven were old testament and two new. It would make sense if they highlighted the prophecies of Jesus's life but no, it was the creation of the world, the story of Abraham and Isaac and several others that I could see no clear link to the event.

I don't like getting up and leaving but yeah, I'd still be there if I hadn't. I will find other arrangements next year.

I was lured in by lights. The Cambria Hotel (which i need to find the history of) had its tall towers ringed with yellow lights. The effect was neat. It's now an old age home (not sure if it's nursing or senior living) but it must have been pretty once and I wonder how important was Jackson to have such a high rise.

I did notice one thing. If I were to live inside of Jackson I would lose my stars. Cities are starstealers. I wouldn't like that.

Comments

[mamculuna.livejournal.com]

The best vigil I ever went to was at a cloister of silent nuns...actually, there were some readings, etc., from a priest, but still, the sense of silence was there.

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

that would have interested me more than 9 completely unrelated passages like an endless warm up to the homily

[evil-little-dog.livejournal.com]

Go look at the MooOOOOOOOooooooooOOOOooon tonight.

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

i saw that. it's the pink moon

[evil-little-dog.livejournal.com]

S'gorgeous.

[sp23.livejournal.com]

I'm not Catholic, but I sat through a high mass at my cousin's son's Christening during Easter. I didn't think it was ever going to end, but geesh, it sure wasn't that long. Good thing too, because her dad, my Italian uncle, would have probably walked out. He was bitching about the length of the mass as it was. LOL

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

Most High Masses are about an hour and a half. This new demand for a longer vigil is going to mean there's the priest, the poor choir and the Uber Catholics, all five of them. Mass at Mom's church was less than an hour and a half.