First Communion 2016

First communion has come for our first born son! The long year of preparation has been exciting and challenging. The challenges have been extra classes and some extra homework to fit into our busy schedule. But this sacrament is the most important thing, so everything else has given way.

First communicant photos in the church's narthex

Close up of my son

Toddler looks for his photo--doesn't realize he has a six or seven year wait

In the last few weeks of preparation, we received an email from the religious education department asking if our son would be a lector at the Mass. He agreed readily and we practiced at home. In the final week before the happy event, we went to the church to read in the actual building. Since no photography was allowed during the Mass, I took a quick snap at the rehearsal. Naturally, on the day of the event, he was wearing much nicer clothes.

Reading at rehearsal

Close up

Okay, so someone else snapped an unauthorized photo!

Saturday morning the much nicer clothes came out for both my son and my daughter (who is just along for the liturgy).

The first communion suit

Dressed up for big brother's big day

The toddler was less cooperative dressing.

He lacks...focus

Happily the toddler used up his reserve of uncooperativeness at home and was quiet and low-maintenance for most of the Mass. My son did a great job reading the First Reading. He had a strong voice and good inflection. He was even better at communion, which was a happy and blessed moment.

When Mass finished, the first communicants processed out for a picture on the church steps. The picture was taken by the Director of Religious Education, who is posting/posted it on Facebook.

The children took the outside route to the church's social hall while the families and friends walked through the narthex and down some stairs to the hall.

Waiting in the social hall

Individual photos of the communicants were taken in the social hall and also posted on Facebook.

My son gets his snap

At the reception we picked up his certificate and a special gift, a cross. My son also got a hug from his religious education teacher. At one point during the homily, the pastor asked for the most holy girl and most holy boy to come up to help him with the homily. He wound up choosing two random children and asking them a bunch of questions. I mention it because the teacher said the first boy she thought of was my son!

With his teacher

Back at the house we had a big party with lots of friends. The weather cleared so the kids played outside while the adults chatted and ate inside. It was so much fun that I forgot to take pictures! We did get some pictures afterward while presents were opened.

Opening the first present with scribe dutifully taking notes in the back

Reading a card

It was a blessed day. Thanks to everyone who came to celebrate and special thanks to those who worked hard getting the events going and keeping them moving smoothly.

Theology of the Christmas Cracker

We went to the early Christmas Eve Mass since the children were in the nativity presented in the middle of Mass. Right after the Gospel, about 40 or 50 children went up front. The older children read the story of the Nativity while the younger children reenacted it. J and L were both donkeys. Apparently Mary and Joseph had a good year this year and could afford two donkeys. Or maybe they got a two-for-one offer at the donkey rental agency. The nativity was delightful and they both looked very cute.

As part of the homily, Father drew out a Christmas cracker. For those who don't know about this English tradition, read my post here. Father got a volunteer from the children to help him pull the cracker. He then took out the various bits inside and gave an explanation of how they related to the true meaning of Christmas.

The paper crown that we find in the cracker reminds us of the king who has entered our midst, the King of kings. He is the true royalty to which we owe our ultimate allegiance.

The joke is a reminder that God wants us to be joyous, not only at this most festive feast, but always. He wants what is best for us, what is good for us. Joy is certainly the ultimate goal of our lives--the joy of being in Heaven with God and the holy souls and angels. (By the way, the joke in his cracker was this: "Why does Santa use the chimney to get in our houses? Because it soots him!")

The present inside the Christmas cracker reminds us that this is the time of the ultimate gift. God gives His own Son to us as a redeemer. We are truly blessed and should be truly grateful.

Finally, the cardboard of the cracker reminds us of the stable and the manger, the first and humble home of Jesus in this world. No matter how poorly we are in our state of life, still God loves us and takes care of us.

It made for an interesting part of the sermon, certainly engaging for the children who were about to open Christmas crackers the next day. I wish you all the joy and grace of this Chirstmas season!

St. John the Baptist Church, Irakleon, Crete

On Sunday we went to one of the few Roman Catholic churches on Crete. St. John the Baptist is the Catholic parish of Irakleon, a port city on the northern coast of Crete.

St. John the Baptist, Irakleon

The church is small and was quite full. We arrived during the opening hymn (in Greek). Many others trickled in after us. It was tough to tell if they were other tourists who had a hard time finding parking as we did or people who just came late.

Nave after Mass was over

The liturgy was easier to follow since they had small books with four quadrants on each facing page, showing eight languages: Latin, Greek, French, English, German, Polish, Spanish, and one other language I couldn't identify. Many of the parts of the Mass were familiar, such as the Kyrie (which is Greek, after all) and various chants in Latin (Agnus Dei and such). They used familiar plain chant that was easy to sing along with. Interestingly, Kyrie eleison ("Lord, have mercy") was the reply during the petitions right after the Creed.

Communion was distributed by the priest by intinction, where the host is dipped in the consecrated wine before communicants receive. I don't know if that is the local custom or the priest's preference or it was a special occasion. At the end of Mass, many of the locals went to the front of the church to kiss the feet of Jesus on the crucifix, which was interesting, but again I don't know if that was just for Easter or is a local custom.

The congregation sang all the hymns with gusto. Strangely, the recessional hymn was a few verses of the Stabat Mater, a Latin hymn about the Way of the Cross. In the Orthodox church, Easter hadn't been celebrated yet (on our Roman calendar, it was the second Sunday after Easter), so maybe it was a show of solidarity with our separated brethren?

Church name in Greek!

It was a beautiful service and we were happy to attend Mass in another country.

Christmas Mass 2012

This year we went to the Christmas Vigil Mass. For the past few weeks, we've been staying around after Mass so J could practice for the Nativity. The Vigil was at 5 p.m. and we came to church at 4 for a rehearsal. Mostly the rehearsal was just getting costumes on. L decided she wanted to be part of the Nativity when she saw costumes.

Ready to shine

L and J ran around a bit. Then L had her fill and decided she didn't want to be in the play anyway.

A farewell hug

A farewell performance

Ready to play

Meanwhile, I was in church holding seats. Mommy and L came back at 4:40 to wait for the kids to come in. The performance was quite nice, though not as great as J's school nativity, but that will be a post later this week. The songs here were a bit too much like show tunes. I guess my taste is just old fashioned.

The sermon was definitely focused on the children and had a great message about the importance of giving and love. I wish it had a little more for the parents. At one point, father had a present and he asked some of the children to guess what was in it. J was a little dumbfounded at first, but then he guessed, "Frankincense?" Which got a good laugh.

Amazingly, Mass only ran a bit after 6 p.m., so bedtime was hardly delayed, even though we did have dinner and one present opened by each child, since they were so good all day.

J opens one...

L with her gift from J

Merry Christmas to all!

Christmas Mass(es) 2011, 1st Day of UK Christmas

For our first Christmas in England, we went to the 5 p.m. children's Mass at St. Roberts. We tried to get there by 4:30 but only left the house at 4:30, so the plan didn't work. I dropped off Angie and the children at 4:42 and went in search of a parking spot. The church's parking lot is pretty small and nothing was available; nor were any of the spots on the street. The supermarket across the way had a special sign up saying, "Parking for Waitrose Customers Only." I drove around the neighborhood for quite a while until I wound up parking by the library four blocks away. That wouldn't have been so bad except for the cold rain that was coming down.

By the time I arrived at church, people were already packed into the vestibule with one or two standing outside the doors. I waded in through the crowd and spotted my family standing by on the left side aisle. We stood through the Mass with some friends. The church was the fullest I'd ever seen it. Just like Bethlehem with no rooms at any of the inns.

Mass went fairly normally until the Gospel. At that point, some of the children came forward and read the nativity from St. Luke. A few appropriate hymns were sprinkled in. Then Father invited the children to sit up front for the homily. Jacob and Lucy went forward with Mommy. The homily was definitely aimed at the children. Father asked the children a bunch of questions about the first Christmas. Then he opened a present, though not before trying to get the children to guess what it was. They shook the box, tried to guess from the shape and the weight, etc. When he finally unwrapped it, it was not what they were expecting. Father said this was like the mystery of Christmas. Many of the Jews were expecting the messiah to come as a military leader to kick out the Romans if not take over the world. Instead, He came as an infant in the most humble of circumstances. And His gift of eternal life is more glorious than any temporal good that can be given. Father managed to pull a great message out of what started pretty routinely and seemed to take a wrong turn.

The rest of Mass went very well considering the circumstances. Jacob and Lucy were very patient if not very attentive. Our friends brought their son and Lucy did some book and toy swapping back and forth silently during Mass. Going to communion was not as hectic as I thought, even with the aisles packed with parishioners. We did light candles at the end of Mass. Jacob and Lucy prayed for Mommy and Daddy. All in all, it was a distracting Christmas Vigil but still good. The Mass is the Mass after all.

On Christmas morning, we went to St. Josephs (another church in town) for the 8 a.m. Mass to have a quieter and more prayerful time. After an early breakfast and unwrapping a few presents, we drove off. We arrived 10 minutes early and found plenty of parking.

The church had lots of people in it but everyone was sitting and there was still a few empty spots here and there. Lucy had a bit of wanderlust and forgot to whisper a few times, but otherwise was good. After communion, she wandered into the pew in front of us which was empty. Jacob followed her trying to convince her to come back to our pew because this was someone else's spot. He did a great job whispering but a poor job convincing. She came out the other end and back into our pew.

Lucy did do a great job shaking hands at the sign of peace. The people behind us were impressed. Jacob said most of the responses and was generally well behaved. Except for going to the toilet in the middle of Mass. They made it back for the Our Father. We lit candles after Mass. Both Jacob and Lucy prayed for Mommy.

Father's homily was quite good. He spoke about the superficiality of the secular version of Christmas we find in our culture. But even that still retains the core message of the Nativity--the exchange of gifts. We think of others before ourselves and remember the importance of family and of peaceful times. I wish everyone the peace of Christmas and hope that extends beyond today, far into the new year.