Cincinnatian Rich Leonardi tells of a "typical" Sunday at St Rose Church. It is located on Eastern Ave, along the Ohio River just east of downtown. The neighborhood has seen better days, but St Rose is seeing them lately. The parish does not have a website, but you can see for yourself one of the Queen City's best kept secrets, through the panoramic photography of Ron Rack.
I didn't mention this in my earlier piece entitled "Andrew," but whenever I go home anymore, I don't usually attend the parish where I grew up. It's not that I don't want to, but it's nothing like the place I knew "back in the day." Oh, I know things change, and twenty-six years is long enough. For years after I left, they kept a place in the tenor section of the choir for me. Wasn't that nice? Still, I can do without holding hands (across the aisles, for pity's sake) during the Lord's Prayer -- as apparently the Church could do without it as well, but try telling these yokels. I could also live without the current pastor's grandstanding. They can have their love fest turned inward. As one too conscious of his own sins, and his humble place in the universe, I like my worship turned upwards, thank you very much.
Today is the First Sunday of Advent, a day that begins the liturgical year in the Western church. We are warned of the last days, and to watch for the Lord's coming. But if recent developments eminating from the Chair of Peter are any indication, there is another warning as well. In the next five to ten years, the way in which the average Catholic worships is going to change dramatically. Despite the efforts of bishops and bureaucrats to delay the inevitable, it is only a matter of time.
In the comings and goings of our daily lives, we are tempted to put off that which cannot be for long.
Prepare ye the way.
1 comment:
As a Jew of my acquaintance says (he is being ironic, as he's a virtual atheist,) "For your mouth to God's ear!"
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