Silence is both a terrible and a beautiful thing. But how does one describe silence? Since I was born profoundly deaf in both ears, I know silence quite intimately. Even though I use a hearing device called a cochlear implant for my right ear, I am still able to encounter silence whenever I turn off my cochlear implant, and from my experience, I can tell you that the silence of the hearing world i...
I used to think that the Prayer of the Faithful was a bit like a bill passed in Congress. There would be certain key prayers, followed by additional prayers from special interest groups that might not have been part of the original plan, but after a vote from the parish committee on Sunday all of us are obliged to stand and repeat, “Lord, hear our prayer,” regardless of whether we were particularl...
When First Year Students enter the university each fall, they are provided the opportunity for a prompt and thorough indoctrination into the Notre Dame football culture. They learn the gestures, the cheers, and the songs that will punctuate their existence during their time on campus, and that will continue to help define their identities as alumni and alumnae long into the future. These tradition...
When I speak to young adults about why they have left the Church, they often say something about the homily. The preaching is boring. It's unrelatable. It's long. It's like listening to insider baseball. It's like a terrible essay with no organizational structure.
The cantor raises their arms, calling the congregation to stand and proclaim, Alleluia. Slowly, I shake myself out of my sleepy stupor and rise with my fellow Mass-goers. At this point, I am thankful for an excuse to stand. I haven’t had much to do for a while, and I’m in danger of falling asleep. Even though they call it the Liturgy of the Word, they don’t really give us many words to say, do the...
In his recently translated book, Mystery and Sacrament of Love: A Theology of Marriage and the Family for the New Evangelization, Marc Cardinal Ouellet writes:
Wedged between the First Reading and Second Reading at Sunday Mass (or between the First Reading and Gospel at daily Mass) is a small reading known as the Responsorial Psalm. If you attend Mass today, for example, you will hear:
This reflection recalls a prayer experience that occurred during an 8-day Ignitian silent retreat. On the fourth day, J.M. Hogue's spiritual director asked him to contemplate the Annunciation. For one of the hour long prayers, she invited him to go to the retreat center’s labyrinth, which follows the same pattern as the one inscribed on the floor of Chartes Cathedral in France. After explaining th...
After the angelic song of the Gloria concludes, in which heaven and earth kiss, silence descends upon the assembly. The priest says, "Let us pray," and then a series of words follow that (if you're me holding a toddler performing acrobatics), you rarely listen to.
