I agree with you, Ariel, about music. At church it was always very important for me, helped me pray. Quite often beautiful singing was accompanied by a strong contemplative state. I still like Taize songs very much.

Anyway, music is a great sacrament (not one of the Seven, but in general) of God. Some people are more open to music as a window for the transcendent, some less, but for the first kind a good music at church is a powerful help.

Yesterday I was listening to Mozart's "Magic Flute" in my car. Suddenly I thought: "Wow, the music this guy created, must have flow into him straight from heavens!" Even in secular works of Mozart there is this sense of the divine life and love. I don't know, but it seems to me that for Bach and for Mozart composing music was a "charism", a special grace of some kind.

quote:

Originally posted by Mt:
Even in secular works of Mozart there is this sense of the divine life and love. I don't know, but it seems to me that for Bach and for Mozart composing music was a "charism", a special grace of some kind.

Yes, I think so, too. I have a book about the spiritual lives of the great composers that is interesting. It seems to me that God, for the benefit of many, can inspire various forms of art, but especially music, even in flawed individuals. Michelangelo was another sincere Christian-- though he had his problems-- who was surely given a charism for the good of many.

Phil, thanks for those links. I read part of the articles and will read more. For those who have children, grandchildren, and young people we care about, I think we do need to care about how we connect with them where they are, not where we think they should be, and be willing to accept criticism of the church to that end, if need be. These days, I think it takes an effort just to obtain the room to let clear Christian views get a hearing amidst the noise of popular media.

quote:

Originally posted by chaosut:
Hello all.

The question I have is can Phil or anyone on the forum explain to me simply what contemplative prayer is, sitting in silence and breathing exercises are and how long i need to do it daily. My goal is to open the seven seals in my back and have my "eye" be single and body full of light. I have read alot of books but it is better to talk to Phil or anyone on forum who has actually felt the Spirit of God working on the body perfecting it than the dead letter.

Thanks

Hi chaosut. Sorry I missed seeing your post earlier.

We have an entire forum for contemplative practice issues, and another for Christian spirituality issues as well. If you don't find what you're looking for there, go ahead and start off a new discussion.

All,

GASP! …. WOW! (I went to those links because I hadn’t been aware of those distinctions).

Emerging church? …. GASP. Hey, can you help old geezer Pop-pop out here? (I know you, my sisters at SP, have servant’s hearts and I confess that I haven’t had even my first vision yet; and it probably wouldn‘t have been of the emerging church anyway).

So, like, what are you seeing? ….. a St. Dude’s? Something where the music ministry would be all electric guitars or would also include acoustic guitars as well? A good mix of vernacular songs amongst the hymns? I certainly like the Dixie Chicks’ version of Shower the People You Love With Love. Makes me feel all churchy. And I like Soul Train: …’Please don’t miss this train at the station … cause if you do, I feel sorry, sorry for you!’ Or will it be rap? Will I have to wear droopy drawers? I’d hate to trip pushing mom in her wheel chair.

Will there even be a music ministry, though? Or will everybody bring their own I-tunes in their I-pods? Can’t get more musically-vernacular than that, I’d guess. (Pre-moderns could listen to Greg’s Chants if they wanted to, even). I’m kind of at a loss though why non-churchgoers would be visiting our churches to hear great vernacular music and not just going to a concert .

Ooops! GASP. I just thought of something--Will there be churches? Buildings, I mean. Or will everyone be using twitter from home -- with the responses being texted by the congregation? Global responses… wow! Planetarian liturgy! These are all doable with distribution of Eucharist out of the way.

Or are you seeing something more along the lines of a St. Swami’s? I was going to order a zafu for mom’s wheelchair online this morning. Certainly it will be good to get out of that stinking pew, but then I wondered (I hadn’t hit SEND yet, PTL.) perhaps we won’t need zafus anyway. Perhaps we’ll just levitate to the top of a stile! Wow! Oops-- is that the correct response?-- or should it be OM?

Anyway. … GASP, (I’m getting all excited here, sorry.) Shaved heads? Mom wouldn’t like that -- given pre-moderns would even have a say. Definitely, definitely though, I AM GOING TO GET TWIN OXYGEN BOTTLES TO HELP WITH MY BREATHING. Gasp. I hear you loud and clear there. I’m repenting! Had I been breathing properly I would already have known the answers to all these questions.

Maybe a St. Euphoria’s? Digital drugs? ‘Good, good, good -- good vibrations!’ (Love’s graces really flow with a nice buzz. Even my ‘flesh’ knows that).

Gasp. Wow! The New Israelites are now in the desert complaining. The bandwagon of complaint is picking up momentum. God is sending upon it a spirit of velocity, so that those destined to be lost will crash.

All that is needed now is to move the Obamanation into the temple, and then text the A.C.: “Stage is set. Bring it on, Dude!”

Gasp. Oh, well, now for a glass of Chianti and a dish of baked kindalini -- maybe parmiggiano. (BTW, not a typo back there -- I just didn’t want to blaspheme).

Artifactually yours,
Pop-pop (cro-modern…. from the Dark Ages … when people wore bubers not tatoos).

p.s. And here I was thinking mystics of the 1500s could teach me something. Sheesh! Gasp BREATHE!

Pop-pop, I'd be pelting you with a snowball right about now if I could see you.

I don't see anyone suggesting that the Eucharist isn't crucial (pun intended) to church, or that worship music isn't most rich when it draws on all the long ages of the church.

What's with the sarcasm that doesn't really have anything to do with what anyone said?

I love a good sense of humor when it isn't mean-spirited...what you wrote comes across to me as kind of thoughtlessly entertaining yourself, but then, I'm saying that because sometimes I do that myself, and I don't always realize I'm being thoughtless until someone throws a snowball at me.

Well, I don't know if Pop Pope (I just love saying that name.. And that was a typo.. I meant Pop Pop..) Don't know if he is being sarcastic or not but LOL anyway...

Speaking of music... you'll love this Pop Pop.. The progressive, non-territorial church I used to go to back in the 70's sang songs like "Age of Aquarius", "I Don't Know How to Love Him" (from J.C. S.S.), "Where Have All the Flowers Gone"... All those good hippie songs.. Yes, it was a real Catholic church... way ahead of the times... dialogue, people sitting in the aisles.. congregation was allowed to go up in the sancuary.

My sisters and I went there for years... We loved it... didn't want to go home.. Can you believe that! Oh, for the good old days.

Really, the music means a WHOLE LOT to me... One time a few years ago at a local parsih.. the singing was so bad I actually had to leave early.

katy , your post brought a smile to my lips..

back in 1997 i had a very dear lay Carmelite who was( is my friend) very conservative woman who was also a character in her own right.. she still is... she went on and got her doctorate in Carmelite studies...

anyway.. she was all excited about my going to a certain more ***conservative*** monastery on the west coast.. a few hundred miles from where we lived.. and she would meet me there later in the week for a little retreat..

i got lost and ended up at another monastery.. a bit more liberal where they kinda danced around a Mother Mary statue and threw flowers on it.. she came to find me and found me there and almost had a heart attack! i just thought they were nice nuns.. i was clueless as it to being a bit eccentric because i had not been into to many monasteries before...

as i type this..... i still recall the look on her face when she walked in and saw me dancing around the Mother Mary statue draping scarves on it and throwing flowers with the nuns! LOL!!!

ahhhhhh.. ignorance was bliss.. i had no idea that that was not common practice in the monasteries...


i have always felt within my heart that Jesus picked kinda odd folk to hang around with.. i mean, look at the apostles.. now there was a crusty bunch when He first met up with them I do say i think our Lord has a delightful sense of humor...

oh and my take on the 'emerging church' is.. it has no denominational boundaries..as it resides within the hearts of ALL men who love God.

All,

Now that I can see again, from the snowball Ariel hit me with -- she’s a deadeye-- I apologize to any of you whom my sarcasm has injured. And Ariel was on the money in that I was enjoying being thoughtless. She handled that fraternal correction very diplomatically I might add.

So, I repent in dust and ashes. (As best I can anyway, since my little demon does get the best of me sometimes -- product of my childhood environment).

Let me clarify my thoughts so you will have a better understanding of why I ran off.

First of all, I have no problems with pop music in church for liturgies. I think it can work marvelously. I’m a geezer, but not that fuddy really. And I enjoy guitars and any other instruments not just organs.

I have enjoyed and participated in liturgies with unconventional music -- and dancing as well. It gives me no ajita whatsoever. I remember in particular going to a charismatic mass on the feast of Christ the King in Jersey City in the parish of Christ the King -- a predominantly black parish. The choir dressed in maroon grad gowns did the stroll up the aisle singing Hosannas and extending their hands upwards as they advanced in unison. It was great. But the best was the song after communion when the church was quiet and the congregation sitting. There was a guy at a grand piano -- a cross between Ray Charles and Nat King Cole. He had a voice of velvet and tinkled on the keys as he played slowly and crooned: It’s Impossible. It was simply dynamite -- as if Jesus was singing to the congregation that it was impossible -- IMPOSSIBLE for Him NOT to love us.

No. I have no issues with that and great liturgies -- I have other memories as well, but won’t waste your time. But I do vex when folk complain about the church and want to leave it because things aren’t gooey all the time --even most of the time. Or that some priest responding in humility to a call by Christ but with little gift for preaching, doesn’t catch one’s attention or stir one’s juices. The spiritual life has aridity often -- that includes liturgy as well as one’s private prayer life. Marriage has dry spells as well. Love is to be stronger than that. Every moment isn’t Taboric, or infatuating, nor honeymoon. Faith doesn’t run on emotions as sweet as they can often be. We have to be weaned of all that. You all should know that.

And I don’t really have issues with breathing etc, as I mentioned in a post. It just I think essential relevance sometimes gets clouded. Breathing has a place, it just doesn’t of itself promote growth in virtue.

I don’t think music is ever to be considered on a par with Eucharist. I can choke up as easily as any girl listening to some songs sometimes -- but it ain’t Eucharist in significance, and can’t come close.

As for the content in the links -- I disagree with the writer Todd Whatshisname. Christians shouldn’t be tolerant of false teaching in their churches. St. Paul and I puke at that.

So. Apologies to all and to all a good night. (Even Deadeye)

Pop-pop (the crustacean)

Hi there Pop-pop---

Thank you for your gracious--and thoughtful--response.

I don't know how to easily put some of my thoughts here into words...but, in brief, I'm with you on very much of what you're saying.

What, in particular, made me upset was where you wrote about the New Israelites in the desert complaining, and the bandwagon of complaint gathering momentum. You're often funny, and I don't want to dump another foot of snow on your sense of humor. But I really do want to hear about problems people have with church, and maybe discuss ideas for making improvements.

I'm out of time for now for articulating my concerns more clearly. But, I kind of have two concurrent, fuzzily formed masses of thought that I don't have time to unravel into verbal form right now:

Foremost is the reality that younger generations face things---high levels of divorce, school shootings and school violence--that you and I probably never could of dreamed of. There are, it seems to me, so fewer sanctuaries or safe places open to alot of kids. It's not just somebody else's news or a problem in some other neighborhood. And yes, I don't want to alienate older church-goers with worship music styles or teaching topics, so finding middle ground isn't easy. (posting this now because my computer internet service can to weird...)

The second pile of verbally fuzzy stuff in my mind concerns my experience of the Eucharist, sermons, and music as all very closely related. I'll have to tell a story, I think, to express what's in my mind, when I have a little more time. Meanwhile, please have patience to hear me out.

I'm glad our little foray into the consideration of different worldviews has livened up the exchanges a bit.

The problem with these three predominant worldviews is that they all can tend to make absolutist claims concerning how they do church. As a premoderner whether the high authority and strong institutional flavor of the Roman Catholic Church is what Jesus really intended, and you'll get a resounding yes. Postmodern Christians will scoff at the idea and point to the early Christians gathered in catacombs for prayer, teaching, and Eucharist as the model for Church -- one that they strive to emulate. Modernists tend to come down somewhere in between, on the whole, but are skeptical about the whole notion of non-democratic institutional leadership. There are well-articulated theologies that go along with all three approaches, and in many ways, Vatican II was a belated adjustment in Roman Catholicism to modernity. Now we need to work out our relationship to postmodernity.

In many ways, the whole question of "being fed" is fairly characteristic of postmodernity and even modernity, to some extent. It's pretty much a non-issue with promodern Christians, who generally place more value on obedience, fidelity, reverence, etc. Premodern Christian music exalts God, and that's why we go to Church. (Holy God We Praise Thy Name) Modern Christian music parallels that of the culture and sings of what God has done for me.(Amazing Grace, Just a Closer Walk, etc.) Postmodern music does a little of both, though it is often prone to emphasize God in community or for the community to even sing about itself. Examples of postmodern songs:
- We are his people, the flock of the Lord
- Gather Us In
- All Are Welcome
- Be Not Afraid (the community sings God's words in First Person)
- We Gather Together

Some communities actually have different services to accommodate these different worldviews and music -- e.g., the "traditional service" and the "praise group."
-

Hi Katy,

Bet you didn't expect you'd get a kind of internet group therapy started with this thread!

I'm game...

You make a number of points about your dissatisfaction with all churches, and you mentioned a problem with receiving the Eucharist from Catholic Churches in particular (maybe this is where things get too personal to share with us here...that's OK, I respect that).

Let me jump in that I've noticed in general that many people with family of origin abuse/trauma and or neglect/ deprivation will often experience strong negative, or at least ambivalent, reactions to church. While there are some blatant problems with some churches that anybody would say is harmful (Phil points this out), most of the conflicts are in the grey area where our "stuff" is projected and unhealed abuse and neglect of our childhood gets reenacted through church (the institution, the pastor, the people who go there, the theology, etc.) We can see a predictable list of grievances launched against our churches concerning things like neglect of our deep needs, denial of our emotions/conflicts, exploitation/abuse of our weaknesses, etc. What often fuels our enmity toward church is not a problem with the church per se but an internal wound or conflict which we externalize onto church (the Church at large, or some aspect of it is distorted as per our unconscious ‘issues.’)

So, for instance, people who were harmed by being thrust onto a performance treadmill in their childhoods often end up hating churches that impose seemingly arbitrary or excessive performance-based requirements. Just let me BE and not perform! is the cry of every child, isn't it? Or, (and this was my issue with church) people who have tyrannical, authoritarian parents will enjoy rebelling against churches which have an authoritative structure. (Note BTW: authoritarian is not the same as authoritative. Children are harmed by the former but need the latter)

The “I don’t get fed” complaint about church is more likely from someone with a deprived childhood than not, until and unless there is substantial healing.

Another example is people who have been so abused in childhood that they cannot really commit to any church group out of fear of being vulnerable. Some will enact the deep need for an idealized parent (to protect them from the real and destructive internalized parent) by hopping from one church to the next when they find problems.

To do a crude test of this theory, ask yourself this: Is there something about church that reminds me of some brokenness in my family (childhood)?

Issues of safety, being accepted for who you are, feeling understood, fitting in with others, etc. start in childhood and cut through to our present relationships with church.

This doesn’t mean there’s not an objective reality about bad churches/pastors/sermons, etc. Point is, what we bring to the experience of church will be colored by unhealed wounds and unresolved conflicts. As a rule in psychology, the more severe the neglect/abuse, the greater the distortions of reality. As we grow in healing and maturity, we gain the capacity to see churches for what they are. As we see and grieve our unmet needs, we're freed up to take greater responsibility for getting those needs met.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Shasha,

Shasha wrote:

quote:

Issues of safety, being accepted for who you are, feeling understood, fitting in with others, etc. start in childhood and cut through to our present relationships with church.

This was true for me. Because of it, I have generally stayed out of the church for most of my life. And I know it is the reason why I (personally) looked to alternative spirituality/religious practice. Being where I am now, it is also why I find my movement into the church very healing for me. And I must affirm that it is this here Shalom Place that has helped me to make the transition into the church gracefully.

As a child, I always wanted to be in the church, participating, belonging to a community. But, I did not feel worthy, did not feel I would be accepted, thought myself too shameful and full of sin (to be loved by God) due the unfortunate circumstances of my childhood. I projected this onto the church. How could I ever have received what the church has to offer when I was earlier seeing (only all) the pain of my early life in it???

Mother and father and other family issues get projected onto so many institutions/organizations and relationships. For those of us with these issues (and it happens in many families, not just those with extraordinary and overt abuse like my own, for so many families are imperfect), it can be hard to see at first, but very healing/freeing when we begin to work through it all.

Thing is if we don't heal them here (or, where we are), we only carry them with us where we go and end up remaining disillusioned, or, facing more abuse in the very circles we seek healing.

I had some things come up a couple of weeks ago when praying the Rosary that might have made me "poo-poo" the church, had I not received (and at this point) begun reading a book, "Praying the Rosary for Inner Healing." In it, Father Longenecker shares how the rosary can help us to heal these various dynamics the stem from realtional life in the world, be it family or otherwise.

Having said this, I suspect what I wrote in the other thread yesterday, has more to do with me than the others. Perhaps Mother Mary is actually just touching me in more of the places I hurt. I know this... No matter what comes up, I am staying with the church.

The Catholic church is brand new to me. I only started the RCIA process at the New Year, but I am determined to to learn and grow, to see through any confusions or prejudices.

Kristi

quote:

Originally posted by Mt:
I understand what you say about the celebration of the Eucharist in churches. Personally, I try to deal with that in three ways:

1) the whole of the Church reflects the human nature deified. Because our nature is broken, most of churches can be "boring" and sermons uninteresting or plain wrong, even hateful. Some churches, however, provide beautiful liturgy, although even there I find some things that I don't like. It's like our condition - we can be holy and beautiful, but most of the time we tend to be really boring and annoying ;-)

2) a Sunday mass is a strange thing, because it is an assembly of people so different according to their intelligence, personality, temperament, preferences etc. It's not possible to satisfy all. My "idea" sermon would be probably boring or to abstract for others, and what I find annoying might be perfect for my neighbour in the row. So I stopped wishing for the impossible, but I have some good churches around and I think it's better for me to go there than to the places where I don't feel comfortable. On the other hand - isn't it marvellous, that God organizes a feast where everyone can be fed, despite of their differences? Not only contemplatives need God's closeness and power.

3) I try to detach from my "feelings" during Eucharist. I had many powerful experiences in which God showed me that he's present in the host, in his words, in the liturgy etc. Usually, it is at church I receive most of contemplative graces and my kundalini movements are far more intense than at home or outdoors, even in beautiful places. So I had many "pointers" that I understand as if God said: "I'm present even in the most boring and annoying liturgy, so - go there!". But there are times when I don't feel anything unusual, just more calm and peace when being at church, and then I rely on my faith, that he is present there, despite what I feel or not feel.

...
I can see that you find churches boring or annyoing, and I wonder if you rely on your faith about the special manner of God's presence there? Or you just don't believe that sacraments are privileged with regard to God's power?

I really appreciate what you've said here, Mt. I resonate strongly with much of what you've shared. For me, going to Mass is a necessary humility sometimes. I'm confronted with my critical, restless mind, for starters and thereby reminded that I need GRACE. And there is something so beautiful about seeing all those people coming together to worship--all in different places spiritually, emotionally, yet all of us leveled before the Lord.

(Mt., You have a great gift of understanding and communicating that will minister to many people who need direction/discernment. Thanks for sharing with us.)