A funny, poignant experience

I thought I was going to be late.  I was pulling up to the Cathedral at 6:29 for the 6:30 a.m. mass.  I was surprised to see 25-30 people sitting and standing on the front steps instead of in the church.  Two of the men I saw I know as sacristans (those who get the church ready for mass each morning).  There was also 3 of the local Dominican sisters who were there to attend mass.

There were different discussions about a possible key snafu and one of the sacristans said he was unable to do the key exchange last night; with whom wasn’t clear to me.  “But don’t worry, Father will open everything up when he gets here.”, one of them said with a wink, “Unless he oversleeps again!”

This experience was both very humorous and poignant.  The camaraderie of the crowd was, to me, what I sometimes imagine it was like when the Apostles and the early disciples were sitting around waiting for Jesus to return from one of His solitary prayer moments.  There was a lot of idle chatter about health, the weather, and so on; but it was tinged with a anxiousness to have Jesus present with us in the Eucharist.

A couple of people were a little testy, wondering why there weren’t contingency plans in place.  But Catholics are nothing, if not joyful in the face of adversity!

One of the men present had his knee all bandaged up, and was lamenting to another:  “The doctor thought he fixed it, but it looks like he has to go back in.”  To which the other guy said, laughing, “You know, if you had the faith of a mustard seed that would be healed by now!” (Luke 17:6, Matthew 17:20)  The whole crowd laughed out loud at the good-natured ribbing between the two men.

Just then, a younger man walked up, looked at the crowd, and knocked on the door.  A voice out of the crowd said, “Jesus said ‘knock and the door will be opened’ (Matthew 7:7, Luke 11:9), but that’s not true today!”  Another  voice sang “Knock knock knockin’ on Heaven’s door” (Guns N Roses), then one of the Sisters chimed in with “I hear you knockin’ but you can’t come in! No no no no!”  (Dave Edmunds)

Then, a couple of people got tired of waiting or were running late for work, and started leaving.  One of the sacristans said, to no one in particular, “...they all left him and fled.” (Mark 14:50) Someone else in the crowd said, “Do you think we should leave, too?”  The only response I could think of was , “To whom shall we go?” (John 6: 67,68)

At that, we heard the door opening from the inside, then Father appeared in the doorway apologetically, and those of us who were left let out a cheer.

I looked at the time, and it was 6:40.  Only 10 minutes late.  A wave of sadness came over me for those who didn’t have enough patience to wait a mere 10 minutes to experience the miracle of the Eucharist.  And then another wave of guilt hit me, because I had judged those who left without knowing their reasons for doing so.

I really have to work on that!