Why go to Mass?
Fr. Roch Kereszty, O. Cist.

We often hear complaints like this: I used to go to Mass regularly, but I did not get anything out of it, so I finally gave up. I think I live a good life: I pray when I like it, but if I go to a beautiful lake, meadow or forest or even if I look at the sky, I feel closer to God than in the midst of a bunch of hypocrites who go to Mass because they are used to it, who go through a boring ritual that is always the same, who endure a mediocre or bad sermon and listen to a long list of irrelevant announcements from the Parish Bulletin. Why should I waste my time with all this? I can read the Bible at home and get more out of it than listening to the parish priest. We can have a family meal and pray together as a family, which is a lot more intimate celebration than any Eucharist.

In a series of short talks I will try to respond to objections like these by explaining what the reality and the celebration of the Eucharist is all about. Today I would like to get to the root of such an attitude and offer to you a few ideas that you could share with your teenagers and friends.

What is implied in the saying, “I don’t go to Mass because I don’t get anything out of it”? It implies that these people go to Mass in the frame of mind in which they go shopping and want the best buy for their money. They have developed the attitude of a typical customer who refuses to buy what he does not like. He feels he must be in charge, he picks and chooses and follows his likes and dislikes, whims and moods.

This approach is quite normal in a shopping mall but may turn out to be a very dangerous attitude towards God. If God is God, then he is in charge and he is going to tell me what I ought to do. And I have only one right response: to obey him. The consumer’s approach to Mass ultimately implies that he is above God, that he wants to dictate to God what he should give him: this is the exact opposite of true worship.

Moreover, what do we want to get out of the Mass? Good, uplifting feelings, an aesthetic experience of beauty, a feeling of fellowship, joy, elation, an emotional high?

I am not saying that it is wrong to have a good and uplifting experience while at Mass. I am not saying that beautiful singing and a good homily are irrelevant. In addition, there might be legitimate grievances behind your complaints: poor sermons, irreverent and hasty celebration by a priest, people who are indifferent toward each other, and the list could go on and on.

But do you really think that Jesus on the cross had an uplifting aesthetic experience? Do you really think that he was surrounded by a loving, caring community and that he was comforted and encouraged by those standing around him? The celebration of the Eucharist includes the whole mystery of Christ: not only the last supper and return among us of the risen, glorified Christ, but also the cruel, bloody reality of Christ hanging on the cross, abandoned by all but a few, and apparently abandoned even by his heavenly Father. All these mysteries of Christ become present to us in the Mass. Sometimes this or that aspect of the mystery is perceived more keenly, sometimes the joy of the resurrection and sometimes the agony of the cross.

So the right attitude when going to the Mass would be something like this: I would tell Jesus, “You gave up for me your life to feed me with your Body and Blood. I come to Mass not to get a thrill, not even an emotionally satisfying experience, but I want to unite my body to your body, my sweat to your blood, so that through you and with you I may become an everlasting gift to the Father.”

Briefly, we should try to offer ourselves to God the Father through Christ and offer others, ultimately the whole world, to him. If we persevere in doing so, we will indeed "get something out of it." We will have more peace, and may even be able to share this peace with those around us. We will develop an increased ability to love, we will become “community builders” wherever we are, we will even be able to forgive those who sin against us, able to endure sufferings and resist temptations. We will have hope even in desperate situations, for we will know from the changes we have undergone that the crucified and risen Christ lives in us and his transforming presence daily increases in us.