Dear Mr. Parish Priest:
Hi. I'm Paolo Bataller and my place of birth is in Nabunturan, Compostela Valley. That probably explains why on December 31, 2008, I was one of your parishioners in your New Year's Eve mass.
First of all, allow me to erase some probable misconceptions you might have regarding this letter. I don't know you personally but I bet you are a good man and I do not intend to disparage your homily then (because the truth is, I have already forgotten what you said that night) or criticize your "job performance". No, I just want to point out one thing that went wrong with the mass and I hope that you side with me regarding my opinion.
As a background, my family and I have been celebrating our New Year's Eve masses in your newly-adopted parish for as long as I can remember. And for as long as I can remember, these masses had one obnoxious flaw: always, somewhere in the mass, the priest would recite a long, long, long litany of the names of New Year's Eve church sponsors, preferably at a point in the mass where the laity is standing (One exception occured, I think, a couple of years back, when the parish priest did away with this "tradition" and simply thanked the people in general for their generosity to the church). This litany would last for roughly 3/4 of an hour since the priest had to recite all the names of the 200+ sponsors.
As expected, you have not deviated from the tradition or from your predecessors. You also "acknowledged", for a solid half-hour, all the sponsors of the parish, at a point in the mass when all of us were standing.
Pity that there were a lot of women-parishioners who were wearing high heels or were carrying their babies. Pity that there were children in the group. Pity that all of us were forced to stand up as you recited ever so solemnly the names of those who contributed something to the church.
This is the flaw that I'm talking about and you should have known this. You made the mass look like a recognition program instead of The Sacred Eucharist. What made matters worse is that the names you were reciting were also flashed on the projection screen! Hell, you could just have instructed that the names be flashed so you could do away with the reciting part.
If I were you, I could have done away with the reciting part too. Instead of what you did, I would probably say to the laity these words which I will attribute in part to my mother (she mentioned the Bible passage to me then. Just translate the entire text to Bisaya):
Good evening. First of all, I would like to thank everyone for helping the parish, our parish. I have here a list of those who, in many ways, have contributed to the church.
I am supposed to announce to everyone this list but as Our Lord said, in Matthews 6:2-4:
"So when you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets, to be honored by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full. 3But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, 4so that your giving may be in secret. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you."
Hence, I will refrain from announcing our sponsors but will instead pray that the Lord God shower them with more blessings.
I think this would be a better way to do it. That way, you minimize the chance that some people exploit this portion of the mass for their self-aggrandizement and politicking.
But what really pissed me off (which led us to walk out of the mass even before you gave your final blessing) was when you gave out your Certificates of Appreciation to the politicians of the land! I don't know where that idea came from but you certainly made it look like an Awarding Ceremony or a political rally for that matter. At that moment, I could not stomach what was going on any further and I had to leave.
As I end this letter, I would like to reassure you that all is not lost. As priests, you have been tasked to guard the sanctity of the Eucharist. Although, I think you had good intentions to begin with on why you allowed these "flaws" in your mass, I still have to say that you, as the priest, should know where to draw the line.
That is all and God bless you.
Hi. I'm Paolo Bataller and my place of birth is in Nabunturan, Compostela Valley. That probably explains why on December 31, 2008, I was one of your parishioners in your New Year's Eve mass.
First of all, allow me to erase some probable misconceptions you might have regarding this letter. I don't know you personally but I bet you are a good man and I do not intend to disparage your homily then (because the truth is, I have already forgotten what you said that night) or criticize your "job performance". No, I just want to point out one thing that went wrong with the mass and I hope that you side with me regarding my opinion.
As a background, my family and I have been celebrating our New Year's Eve masses in your newly-adopted parish for as long as I can remember. And for as long as I can remember, these masses had one obnoxious flaw: always, somewhere in the mass, the priest would recite a long, long, long litany of the names of New Year's Eve church sponsors, preferably at a point in the mass where the laity is standing (One exception occured, I think, a couple of years back, when the parish priest did away with this "tradition" and simply thanked the people in general for their generosity to the church). This litany would last for roughly 3/4 of an hour since the priest had to recite all the names of the 200+ sponsors.
As expected, you have not deviated from the tradition or from your predecessors. You also "acknowledged", for a solid half-hour, all the sponsors of the parish, at a point in the mass when all of us were standing.
Pity that there were a lot of women-parishioners who were wearing high heels or were carrying their babies. Pity that there were children in the group. Pity that all of us were forced to stand up as you recited ever so solemnly the names of those who contributed something to the church.
This is the flaw that I'm talking about and you should have known this. You made the mass look like a recognition program instead of The Sacred Eucharist. What made matters worse is that the names you were reciting were also flashed on the projection screen! Hell, you could just have instructed that the names be flashed so you could do away with the reciting part.
If I were you, I could have done away with the reciting part too. Instead of what you did, I would probably say to the laity these words which I will attribute in part to my mother (she mentioned the Bible passage to me then. Just translate the entire text to Bisaya):
Good evening. First of all, I would like to thank everyone for helping the parish, our parish. I have here a list of those who, in many ways, have contributed to the church.
I am supposed to announce to everyone this list but as Our Lord said, in Matthews 6:2-4:
"So when you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets, to be honored by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full. 3But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, 4so that your giving may be in secret. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you."
Hence, I will refrain from announcing our sponsors but will instead pray that the Lord God shower them with more blessings.
I think this would be a better way to do it. That way, you minimize the chance that some people exploit this portion of the mass for their self-aggrandizement and politicking.
But what really pissed me off (which led us to walk out of the mass even before you gave your final blessing) was when you gave out your Certificates of Appreciation to the politicians of the land! I don't know where that idea came from but you certainly made it look like an Awarding Ceremony or a political rally for that matter. At that moment, I could not stomach what was going on any further and I had to leave.
As I end this letter, I would like to reassure you that all is not lost. As priests, you have been tasked to guard the sanctity of the Eucharist. Although, I think you had good intentions to begin with on why you allowed these "flaws" in your mass, I still have to say that you, as the priest, should know where to draw the line.
That is all and God bless you.
1 comment:
Exactly what I told you about just this morning... chos.
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