|
FROM
THE VIEWPOINT OF A CHURCH MOUSE
That was the morning that I attended Catholic mass. I had already been to a mass once before in my life, as a young girl in Poland with a friend's family. This time was different. I had discovered that there was a Polish Catholic church in Berlin. So, Sunday morning on the 3rd of September, I traipsed down to investigate. After an hour on the trains, I finally arrived in a region in southern Berlin called Kreuzberg, a place well-known for its immigrant communities, crime, and poverty. A few side-streets later, I was standing in front of a cathedral (see below left).
Have you ever been to a Catholic mass before? It is very, very structured. There is a set program that usually is repeated each Sunday: short hymns or doxologies, prayers by the priest, read-and-response between the priest and the people, readings of the Scripture by an altar boy, a very short sermon by the priest, more songs, communal prayers of confession for sin, and communion. Periodically everybody knelt down on the wooden kneelers at their feet and recited prayers together, which is the reason I sat in the back. I couldn't bring myself to do it, of course, and I did not want to be sitting bolt-upright in a stare-down with the priest while everybody else was dutifully kneeling (which is what happened last time!).
The people left their seats and filed to the front. The priest and an associate went down the lines of people dipping a little of the "blood" and "body" into their mouths. After the process was done, the priest returned to the altar and began one of the strangest things I have ever seen. He drank the rest of the wine, swished the cup out with water, and drank it again. Then he ate the remaining wafers (though I can't imagine that there were that many left over after 400 people) and began to clean out the goblet and the bowl with a cloth. The whole thing probably took only a minute, but its significance was tremendous. As I confirmed later, the priest did that in order to not leave one bit of "Christ" lying around. Although it sounds crude, it truly is a scheduled solemn procedure of every service. "How funny," I thought as a watched. "As if Christ could be left out like a dirty sock or an unwashed plate…" As the people were leaving at the end of the service, I stayed behind, thinking. I was glad that I had come. During the one-hour Polish service, I had learned a lot about what the Catholics believe and how they practice it. Even though it is hard for me to respect their theology, I can still respect their dedication to come from all parts of the city for the only Catholic service held in Polish in Berlin.
Home | About | Mission Fields | Opportunities | Support | Resources BIBLICAL
MINISTRIES WORLDWIDE Site
maintained by Biblical Ministries Worldwide |
The
church was packed. People were standing in the back and by the great
stone colonnades along the sides. There were people above in the
two balconies by the pipe organ. People were sitting shoulder to
shoulder on the old, brown straight-back pews. I was sitting back
by the confessional in the far reaches of the cathedral. My objective
that morning was to be a mouse - a mouse in church.
Large
crowds of people were filing in through the double doors that looked
like things Martin Luther on which could have nailed something!
Church was to begin in just a few minutes, so I fell in line and
went past the iron gates and into the church. I was amazed at the
magnitude of the place once I went inside. Half a football field
away, on the other end of the church, was a magnificent altar with
a painting of Christ above it on the walls. Colonnades lined the
church and ancient paintings of saints hung on the walls with inscriptions
in Latin. The grey stone floors were cold, but people still insisted
on first kneeling on one knee for a moment of worship to Mary and
Christ. After crossing themselves (ask a Catholic what that is,
if you don't know-they will show you), they got up and silently
filed into pews. I found a spot in the back. I wanted to remain
behind most people, because I knew what was to come. 
At
the very end came communion. The priest performs the ceremony every
Sunday. In this church, he led the people in a recited prayer of
confession of sin, and then took the cloths off of the communion
set. The gold goblet and bowl were filled with wine and wafers.
The priest read from the Bible, using the same verses that most
of your churches probably use when doing communion as well: the
words of Jesus at the Last Supper. As the priest read, he blessed
the wine and wafers, and then proclaimed them the actual body and
blood of Christ. To every Polish eye in that room, the wine and
the wafers went through a supernatural process called transubstantiation,
in which they were transformed into the actual blood and body of
Christ. 
As
I left the church a bit later, I walked out a bit wiser and a little
humbler. I am too quick to judge these people: in many ways they
rival Christians in their dedication to what they believe. They
challenged me to think about my own commitment to taking part in
the truth. These people travel by bus, train, tram, car, and foot
to come together as a Polish community to worship what they believe
to be true: they are taking an active role in their definition of
Truth. It convinced me to continue to take an untiringly active
role in what I believe to be Truth…or more accurately, in whom
I consider to be "the Way, the Truth, and the Life." Truth
was never meant to be passive…
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
