Skipping Mass

I trudged up the steps to the Church, secretly hoping the priest would not be at the confessional. When I poked my head inside the door, the light was on over the ajar door to the Reconciliation Room. I stood patiently beside the humble, downcast praying man at the fount. Eventually he entered the confessional and emerged several minutes later with a smile on his face. I sighed heavily before entering and taking my place upon the kneeler.

"Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned. It has been four days since my last confession."

"Greetings, my child. May the God and Father of all mercies help you make a good confession."

"Um, well, I missed Mass on Sunday."

I heard the priest put down his book on the other side of the curtain. He paused. "Wait... You missed the Feast of Corpus Christi? You were so looking forward to participating in that feast!"

My face burned red. "I know, I just... I was up late the night before with family, and I wasn't feeling well when I woke up, so I slept a little more, and it just turned into longer than I expected..." I felt ashamed. Even though I knew I had a *technical* reason to miss Mass, I felt shame admitting it to the priest who had walked me through my faith and ultimately baptized me into the Church.

"Well, here's the deal," the priest said, clearing his throat, "You're a theology student, so I'm going to let you in on a little history. Missing Mass on Sunday isn't a sin like adultery or murder - not in the sense that God expressly forbade it in the Bible. But He did command the Israelites to gather together in worship and remember His Holy Days. Keep the Sabbath Day holy - how could it be any holier than to be in worship? While on earth, Jesus did exhort us to seek out fellowship with each other and to worship communally. To not follow that teaching would be to disobey, which is a sin. Therefore, we have a historical precedence for making weekly Mass mandatory, but there's more to it than that.

"When we worship together at Mass, we are forming our relationship with God, quite literally, alongside other believers. For us, Christ is truly present in the Eucharist. It is His Body and Blood. While each of us needs to be in that presence, we also need something greater, and that greatness comes from Mass. Christ Himself said that, where two or more are gathered, He is there among them. By gathering together for worship, we experience the presence of God in a way that no personal prayer time or Bible reading could ever express. So many people experience God's grace through another human being. We were meant to live and learn faith together, as a community. Mass builds that community.

"In Ecclesiastes, we read that a cord of three strands is not easily broken. When a man travels on a journey with a friend, if he falls, his friend can help him up. But if he has no friend on that journey, he is alone, and more vulnerable than before. By gathering together each week, parishioners have the ability to form those relationships as they walk on their own journey of faith, much as you did during your time in RCIA and even in the choir. How many godmothers did you 'adopt' before your time there was finished?"

I thought back to my multiple godmothers. At least half a dozen Catholic women in my parish saw fit to reach out to me with food and fellowship over the course of my time in RCIA. Each of them fulfilled the role of sponsor at least once in some rite or another. These ladies walked with me, prayed over me and even for me, before I knew their names or faces.

"So, this is what I'll tell you. God knows when you're sick and when things get out of your control and you just can't make it. He knows what's in your heart, though. I don't. I can give you a few aves as penance, tell you your sins are absolved and you can go on, all that good stuff. But here's what I'm going to say instead: I want you to go read Matthew chapter 4, and I want you to think about what causes you to skip Mass. When you figure out the pattern, I want you to think about why it needs to change and how you can overcome the temptation to skip Mass."

I made my Act of Contrition and then went to pray before Mass. Four from the front and to the left was my godmother's pew. We normally stared at Christ's feet as we prayed before Mass together. This time, I couldn't even look up from the ground.

I thought back to all the times in my life when I had struggled with faith. After the talk from the priest, I saw a singular pattern emerge. When I had tried to go it alone, without the Eucharist or accountability or even faithful friends, I had stumbled. All my greatest sins, the deepest darkest secrets I would never divulge to a living human being, I had committed at times when I had neither a reliable church body nor a close friend to challenge those parts of myself. Those deep dark secrets were like scars on my face, making me feel ugly and ashamed.

Over the last year, however, I saw a drastic change. I had cut a toxic relationship out of my life for good. While I felt a pull, I no longer felt an unyielding desire for destructive habits. I had grown closer to girls in my small group as well as the Godly women I met in choir and RCIA. The RCIA group itself felt like a family as well. Walking the same path together, we all sought truth, love, and God, and we all came out closer to God and to each other as a result. Bonds were formed over the trials of faith that could never have been forged otherwise. I knew that those bonds had helped us life each other up, wiping similar scars off of each other's faces and revealing the beauty that lay beneath the shame and guilt.

Where two or more of us had been, a beautiful, unconditional love had flourished. That love nourished a few repentant sinners into a right relationship with God and eventually birthed us into the Church. Now we grew there together, side by side, still lifting each other up just as we had before.

I looked up slowly to the face of Christ from my kneeler. For once, I no longer saw the agonizing gaze of a dying Man on the cross. Instead, I saw the worn, caring expression of a Lover desperate for His Heart's desire. Tears slowly streamed down my cheeks. I knew there would be times I could not attend the Mass. I understood that, but now I knew the true cost of skipping out on Mass.

Mass is so much more than a service to attend or a ritual. Christ died to be with me. While not an embrace or caress, the Eucharist is the physical expression of His love. It is His sacrifice. Mass is the time when I can physically and literally be in the presence of such love, when my faith can take root and grow. The gestures, the sitting, standing, kneeling, listening, singing, praying - all of it just clicks, "Yeah. He's here. I know it. I feel He's here." When I skip Mass, I skip that nourishing sensation of His presence. I miss the ability to grow together with other believers, also growing in their own faith. When I do this, I hurt my relationship with God as well as my relationships with other believers - in any of which could be of use to the kingdom by God's grace. It is a rejection of both God and the Church. By His grace, however, we can be forgiven and come back into that presence, as though we had never been apart.