Edwird
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Joined: 5/2/2016
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quote:
ORIGINAL: sunshinemiss
But here's my question... these lovely rituals, these connections with people, the inner awareness. These are good and I think natural. How do you incorporate them into your life?
Best,
sunshine
I understand the "missing the ritual" part, and I congratulate you for coming to an understanding that there night be other venues than religion to that purpose.
As a wee lad I came up in the church that did the rites of mass in the same Latin as those rites were established centuries before. The sermon and basic instructions as what to do next were 'in the vernacular,' i.e. in the home language (though 80% understanding of when to stand, kneel, be seated, back and forth, was just accumulated by watching others). It comes as no surprise to me now that after Vatican II changed the situation that the entire Catholic mass was now to be done in the vernacular (both the spoken and the sung), the church goers started a gradual decline in attendance.
At first I (in later years) attributed this decline solely to the issue that once people actually understood what was being said, there might have been something like a 'sinking feeling' for some, thereafter exiting the situation after a polite interval. But then it came to mind that the vast majority of other religions have had their rituals in the vernacular for at least 500 years (Lutherans, Protestants, etc. in the west), and not made much progress to distance themselves thereby either in the matter of social or business comportment, nor especially any much progression in the 'blind faith' department. In fact, a turn for the worse occurred in some regards.
In any event, I think it was the Latin that was the crux of ritual in this instance, and taking that away took away ritual. Or the essential element of ritual, in any case. Reduction of the ritual element led to reduction in attendance, and ultimately the reliance upon ritual itself. Not that taking that particular ritual away was, on its own, a terrible thing.
If for no other reason, I will always be grateful to Vatican II because of the inescapably high correlation between that and the corresponding decline in family size from 5-10 kids to 2-3 kids. Little difference between "raised Catholics" and "practicing Catholics' in that most important regard nowadays. The female body, especially, and then economically, both parents suffer a LOT less from being Catholics now than in the 1960s and all those centuries before. Not that the Church hated women more than other religions, but it's amazing how much -spiritual- damage and human heartbreak that 'faith-based' stone-blind ignorance can do. Hearing a mother crying inconsolably on her knees, hugging the bed after putting down her missal from HS, begging God for strength, (ANOTHER kid now coming, with all my failures with the first six, just today!) led some of us, with out any 'conscious understanding' to speak of (at that age), to wonder if there might be something amiss, here. All that human suffering I was taught about in catechism, religion study, history, etc. ... right here at home! God apparently was not up to the task of doing whatever the pope (or whatever preacher) said he was going to do, so at some point in life some some 8-9 yr. old has to wake up to facts as presented.
(Tons of literature exist {along with innumerable post docs thereby} concerning religion destroying people's hearts by spiritual means, for those who need literal explanation for everything by higher authorities on the matter.)
So yeah, I missed the Latin mass when it was taken away, and yanking the ritual rug out from under kids just starting to understand and appreciate it is somewhat disruptive. My sisters suffered a lot less than our mother largely due to that, all I can say about it.
(I can also say that going from Catholic school to public school (the American meaning, not the British "public school" which is in fact counterpart to private schools in the US) was far more disruptive to my world than not having Latin mass anymore, but that's another subject.)
In any case, even just reciting the Latin words seemed to be as though halfway between spoken word and sung word, to begin with, and the sung Latin seemed to put us all in 'the same spiritual place' much more so than hearing stuff on the radio about how much I love you and you love me, etc. Not to mention 1,000 times more meaningful than whatever English incomprehensible gibberish out of the priest's mouth in his sermon. Sung Latin was my first escape from the banal bathos of pop radio (or the priest), however attracted I was to the music behind it oftentimes.
Anywise, I found my subsequent satisfaction for ritual to be found at classical music concerts. I know that 'talking it over' can be helpful to some degree, but true ritual started out musically based (or at least by chanting, a form of "sung spoken word," if you will, which very likely was the first 'spoken word' to begin with), and I feel the ritual aspect of well thought out music when I listen to it, even if just in my own listening room.
But walking out of the theater into the lobby after a performance of a Ravel or Respighi opus performed by the London Philharmonic, NY Philharmonic, the St. Petersburg Orchestra, etc. and then hearing/feeling all the buzz and excitement from the performance itself and then about the shared experience of it ... A ritual experience, for some of us, anyway.
I might investigate or think about visiting some group(s) who are into more simple chanting (the more literally meaningless and foreign and in whatever way inconsequential the better; anything to give our spirits and inner thoughts some temporary respite from 'the garbage of words').
But the classical music thing does it for me now, as it has for some years.
< Message edited by Edwird -- 5/8/2016 8:00:18 PM >
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Sure they make that presumption because you are there and JC is the core and source of their purpose for being there as well. No one ever sees the whole picture at once, its too big. 
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