Cultural Angst

It's safe to say my family is in a place of transition within the Catholic church. Due to our dissatisfaction with elements of the liturgy in the common Mass (Novos Ordo) when we moved from Alaska we expected to land at a Tridentine (TLM) Mass somewhere in “the Lower 48”. It didn't work out that way as our experiences at two parishes in different states left us disenchanted with the parish cultures (not the Mass itself). Of course our options in this regard became extremely limited due to Pope Francis' crackdown on the older form, so what remained were the relatively few and scattered parishes devoted exclusively to its expression, and we decided they were not for us. We eventually found ourselves in the area where my wife's family first immigrated to from the Old World in the late 1800's or early 1900's. When we visited her ancestral hometown - which is within a half hour drive of where we currently live - we usually stop by the graveyard next to the church to see what relatives of hers we can find (in fact there is literally nothing else to do). It appears all of the early gravestones in this cemetery are written in German and it's my understanding that this tiny, rural, agricultural town was indeed founded by German immigrants with some of them – like my wife's family – coming via Hungary courtesy of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. As expected, the church that was built reflected their heritage. I don't know anything about the first priests and the language spoken at the liturgy during the early years of the church, but one would think the experience would be reminiscent of their homeland.

A farmers life was, and still is, a hard life. But at least (commercial) farmers today have crop insurance. Not so in bygone years. In the 1940's and after the Great Depression, my wife's great grandfather moved his family from their rural farm community in their rural state to the bustling city life of Sacramento, California, after apparently one to many brutal winters and failed crops. The eldest daughter of the family, at 17 and after just graduating high school, led the way. A year or so later, dad, mom, and the rest of the siblings joined her. Some extended family remained, and it is that web of family connections that my wife has been hunting down through the family tree.

We didn't come here due to my wife's nostalgia for her roots in this country, but it interestingly coincided with our interest in the liturgy of the Eastern (Byzantine) Catholic Church, the direction which we pivoted to in order to satiate our hunger for a liturgy and community where we felt we could raise our boys (hopefully) free from some of the issues (as we saw it) plaguing the Western church. Exactly how we got interested in the Eastern church is another story, but the church we chose to attend is about a 40 minute drive from where we live in the opposite direction where my wife's family once settled. After attending the small Byzantine church for at least 2 ½ years the cultural difference from our heritage and upbringing came to a head after this past Christmas liturgy. We attended a few more liturgies after that, but from the beginning I never felt part of the community despite the outreach of a few of the parishioners. Many were amiable but most didn't really talk to us and were seemingly perplexed why we were there since most of them are related in one way or another and chatted among themselves while my family often ate alone in the church hall after liturgy while we waited for our eldest child to get out of catechism class. The exception was when others joined us who themselves (usually) had no family connections and were not ethnically affiliated, such as the seminarian.

Is one's culture really important in the life of the church? It seems so to us and my family is currently pivoting again. Many within the Catholic Church recognize that the expression of the Mass could be done more beautifully and in better keeping with tradition and what appears to be the true intentions of Vatican II (of course much abuse has been done in the spirit of VII) but bishops require things to be so-and-so due to their own understanding or via direction from Rome. Whether we like it or not, this is our culture. Our western European heritage is of Latin origin and not of Greek. I am tired of the search for a parish home that checks off all the boxes we would like. It's apparently not going to happen, or at least anytime soon, but I've become increasingly impatient not so much with the Church as with myself. My lack of participation has been a problem. I can blame it on raising babies over the past half decade and moving as much as we have, but the fact is I have always been on the periphery long before getting married and having children. I don't like registering with parishes because I like hedging my bets. We were registered anyway at the Byzantine church, and maybe not using the offering envelopes with our name on them and using cash was one of the reasons the priest ignored us (except in announcements on our birthdays) thinking we contributed nothing. Who knows? I think it is fairly certain we would stay in an Eastern Catholic Church that was not so ethnically centered, like the one we visited that really sent us on this journey, but I tend to think all things happen for a reason, and our journey over the last few years has really made us look into our own Catholic heritage from Western Europe. We are going to miss the chant from the Eastern Catholic Church, and the icons, and much of the liturgy, but our origins are from the West, and we want to delve once more into the rich traditions that we and our ancestors were brought up in, despite the fact that many of them have been eclipsed by modern thinking, ignored, or forgotten.

Transitioning back is not going to be without its annoyances, but as already stated I'm more concerned at this time with my role within the church than that of the hierarchy who should be doing this or that. I don't know what the bishops are up against, but I do have some understanding of what the priests are up against, and since “misery loves company” we are aware that many clergy seem to be just as frustrated or perhaps much more so than we are with what the bishops are telling them what they are allowed to do or not allowed to do at their parishes, despite tradition or primacy of place. These priests truly need support. No matter what they do they often get dumped on. The liberals are always pushing for never-ending 'equality' that for some reason they can never obtain and the conservatives are demanding priests ignore their bishops and 'do what's right' despite the personal cost.

What has been on my mind lately is this: what beauty am I bringing to church? The Church isn't just composed of clerics. We, the laity, have a significant role to play. I am always looking outside myself for a renewal, whereas renewal always begins from within. So what beauty am I bringing to the church? A similar question is what talents and skills am I bringing to the church, but beauty resonates more with me at this time. The most obvious place to start for myself and my family is how we present ourselves to the Lord during Mass. Are we a family that others recognize as wearing our best “wedding garments” to the feast? Can the priest or religious sister's use my family's help in bringing more beauty to the Mass or to the community in some small measure? This last question makes me think of the previously mentioned (former) seminarian in the Byzantine Church who over a number of years used his own money (and was sometimes paid) to beautify the sacristy by such things as building reading stands or commissioning and buying icons from overseas. He hasn't been able to move forward in his studies as a seminarian because, it turns out, ethnicity and culture actually do matter, and despite how much one may identify with a particular culture and adopt that culture, it may not adopt you. And he is not the only one we know to hit this wall.

Yes, culture and tradition do matter and an increasingly number of Catholics and Christians seem to recognize this. Western nations are also starting to acknowledge this – albeit the time is quite late – as we witness Western civilization become increasingly uncivilized due in part to the suicidal embrace of foreigners who reject our Christian heritage and culture and are openly hostile to it. I am an American, but embracing American culture (as such it is) doesn't seem to be enough. There needs to be a deeper grounding in the faith – and culture – or our fathers. I don't want my children to become cultural orphans. If what was meant by multiculturalism was for fellow Catholics to express their unity in faith by wearing their traditional apparel at Mass or serving ethnic cuisine afterward, then I am all for it, but that is not what it means or how it has played out.

To summarize, although there is much to be commended in the Byzantine church and I certainly understand why others like us end up there, my family has decided to look back toward our traditional homelands and draw from their traditions. I don't think this 'backward' thinking is nostalgia for the past, per se, but a means of holding the thread connecting the ancestors with the descendants...at least the few who are left to hold that thread.