liturgy as prayer: 24th week tuesday 2012 II

Last two weeks ago, we reflected on liturgy as prayer, that when we come to celebrate the mass, when we come to have our child baptized or confirmed or when we go to confession or get married, we come primarily to pray.  We affirmed that liturgy is not a performance but prayer, that whatever we do in the liturgy, whether it is in the selection of the songs we will sing, or in the ritual actions that we perform, or in the pakulo that we do in weddings for example, may mga bubbles-bubbles, may sira-sira puerta, the question is, do these things enhance prayer, that after all these things are done, can we say, I have prayed?  Again let me remind you liturgy is prayer.

Our second point for this week in our consideration of the liturgy is this - liturgy is not just prayer but it is our prayer - not just my prayer, or his prayer, or your prayer, or her prayer or their prayer but, but our prayer.  The liturgy is the prayer of the church.

Sometimes I would ask people in my class this questions, yesterday was Monday, so how did you pray the rosary yesterday.  Kahapon nagsalakit arthritis ko, kadamo sang problema ko, nag-abot ang mga balayran ko - yesterday was really depressing, now can I pray the sorrowful mysteries instead of the joyful mysteries?  

Or I want to pray the via crucis, the way of the cross - what if I start from the 14^th station and end in the first station - can I do that?

Most often people would shout no, you cannot do that.  Pero kon isipon mo gid sing madalom, ano labot nyo - kon ako man lang ya ang nagapangadi, kon ako man lang isa, ano labot nyo kon mangadi ako halin sa 14^th station.  Ang lain lang dira kon damo kita, kag ma-insistir gid ako sang akon, otherwise imbes nga mangadi kita nag-irinaway na kita.  Pero sa tuod-tuod lang kon ako man lang isa ano labot nyo?  I can do that because these are devotions - these are personal prayers.  Sometimes you pray it as a group but they remain devotions, personal prayers.

But you cannot do that in the mass.  Indi ka puede kasiling, natak-an na ako sang misa nga amo man sa gihapon, subong nga adlaw masugod kita sa kalawat, then we will end with the first reading.  Puede?  Indi, you cannot do that.  Indi ka puede kasiling nga mapakasal kami sa baybay samtang nagasaka ang adlaw, ukon sa garden nga puno sang bulak kag ang amon bayo mga fairies kag butterflies.  Indi ka makapa-bunyag sa bisan diin lang.  You cannot do that - why, because this is liturgy, you are celebrating the liturgy and liturgy is our prayer, it is not just my prayer or your prayer but our prayer.  It is the prayer of the entire church.  Even the priest could not change it at will.  No one can change it arbitrarily nga pinagusto ka na lang.  There are certain parameters as to what we are allowed to do.

In the first reading today Paul tells us who we are - we are church, we are one body.  Though we are composed of many parts, composed of different individuals we are one body, we are one people.  And this is manifested more clearly especially when we gather for the liturgy, when we gather for the mass.  There are individual parts - the choir there, the ushers, the minister of communion, the readers, the mass servers, the sacristan, the priest who presides, and you.  Each of us may have different devotions, different ways of praying - may iban nga divine mercy, may iban nga santo nino, may iban nga rosary.  But when we come for the liturgy, when we come for the mass the many becomes one, the many parts become one body.

Gone were those days when homilies were considered by men as smoking break, gone were those days when rosaries were said and novenas were read while the mass is going on.  The Liturgy is our prayer, the prayer of the one body of Christ, so when we sing we sing together, when we respond we respond together.  In the liturgy we manifest ourselves as one body, one church.  In the liturgy we are made into one body, we become one.  This is because the liturgy is our prayer.