CAPG's Blog 

" The Workers: Those who have to work on Sundays are at the early Mass. God bless them! What would the Church do without such brave and generous worshipers? They work late and early, long and hard. Sunday and week day, often for low wages. Though they have large families to support, they always contribute to the collection-box and they are frequently at the Holy Table. It is there that they get the strength that enables them to make their hard lives so noble, so pure and so brave.

The Mothers: Behold the army of mothers who are in God's House before their loved ones are awake; or those busy ones who come later, when the children have been present with their bright faces, and pure hearts, and sweet voices in prayer and hymn at the Holy Sacrifice. How those noble mothers plan and plot to have the comfort of Sunday Mass and to teach their little ones by their example! How thankful they are for the little sermon that heartens them for the next week of their drab lives, even though they are worrying somewhat about the Sunday dinner they must prepare on their return home!
They love the Mass because it is so necessary for them in their hard lives. How our Lord loves such souls!

The Poor: There are those who slip into the church, as they say, at any Mass, because their clothes are not good enough for the solemn service at eleven. God loves these and no doubt pardons their weakness and understands it. Many of them have seen better days and now their spirit of resignation comes from the Sunday Mass. It stifles all complaints. One could wish that they had more courage, but is not their contentment with their lot quite brace and courageous! God help and bless them!

Young Men: Young men come who choose the shortest late Mass. I do not mean those who have worked far on into Saturday night and often even on Sunday morning, yet never fail to refresh their souls in God's House. No, I refer to the young men who wish to give God the least they can, who kneel on one knee guarding the holy water font with head bowed low with seeming devotion when the collection-box is passed around. What of these! Before the prayers are ended at the foot of the altar they are off, though in all probability they entered the vestibule about the time "the book was moved." What a sad state religion would be in if it were built on such as these! Not from such will salvation come to Israel. They will never build our schools or keep our churches open and in repair.

The Grumblers: Then there are the "sore heads," the permanent members of opposition. They never go to High Mass, for the music is either too loud or too soft; too long or too short. The Pastor follows the recommendations of Pope Pius the Tenth and has Gregorian chant, which our critics say was never intended for this country; or he doesn't seem to follow the Pope's wishes and they are not going "to encourage such disobedience." When the priest speaks of money they complain, as if the church could be supported by talk. Some have their own ideas of ritual and ceremonial, and as the priest prefers to take his rubrics from Rome, they go to an early Mass and thus escape the sermon which they sadly need.

The Lovers: Lastly there are those who love the Mass and the sermon and the ritual - men and women who give to God a service which is not stingy and niggardly, but a full and over flowing one. They look upon attendance at the Holy Sacrifice not as a hard, dry duty, but as an unspeakable privilege. They realize that all the wonders of the old Law dwindle into insignificance when compared with a single Mass in which the Sacrifice of Calvary is repeated on our altars! To these there is on earth no sweeter music than the sound of the Sanctus bell, no holier sight than a priest in vestments with hands uplifted, and they ever thank God for the joy of Holy Mass in their lives."

Source: Annals of Saint Joseph, Volumes 34-36 by the Norbertines Fathers 1922.