Brady Woods - Church Visit #1

Church Name: St. Michael Catholic Church

Church Address:  310 S Wheaton Ave, Wheaton, IL 60187

Date Attended: Palm Sunday (20 March 2016)

Describe the worship service you attended. How was it similar to or different from your regular context?

The worship service of St. Michael’s was unsurprisingly similar in its liturgy to All Souls Anglican Church, which I normally attend. However, upon entering the building I was confronted with several significant differences. In my copy of the liturgical schedule for Holy Week, there were two significant differences initially. First, on Holy Thursday, the Eucharist would be left “at the Altar of Repose for private adoration,” language I do not think I have heard before in any church context. Second, on Holy Saturday there was the opportunity to “Bring your Easter baskets to church . . . to bring the Priest’s blessing into your home for Easter,” which was honestly rather disturbing to me. For the most part after these initial shocks, the service itself was nearly identical to the one I regularly attended, though I was not able to take part in the Eucharist.

What aspects of Roman Catholic theology did you notice expressed in the service?

There were a number of points at which the Roman Catholic theology became explicitly clear. First, the church prayed for the leader at each level of the hierarchy: the Pope, the Bishop, and the leaders of the local congregation. Second, in the lengthy Gospel reading for Palm Sunday, the part of Christ was explicitly forbidden to the laypeople and reserved to the priest. The congregation spoke the part of the crowds calling for Jesus’ crucifixion. This demonstrated an emphasis on Christ being represented by particular priests, although the Roman Catholic church also holds to the common priesthood. Finally, there was an emphasis placed on the unity of the body in the Papacy and the priesthood. This was most emphasized by the building itself. Instead of having different rooms where different age groups and social categories of people went through the service, every person in the congregation sat in the same room listening to the same priest.

What aspects of Scripture or theology did the worship service illuminate for you that you had not perceived as clearly in your regular context?

There were two interconnected aspects of theology and Scripture which the service clearly revealed: first, the importance of the unity of the body; and second, the lack of such unity. The bringing-together of each member—regardless of their age, education or marital status—of the very large community within this particular church, to share liturgical worship together, profoundly imaged the global unity of the body of Christ. However, the currently reigning disunity of the church was sadly apparent through the sight of a friend receiving Eucharist. My friend, like many other Roman Catholics, would emphasize the disunity’s efficient cause as being the rejection of the “principle . . . for the unity of faith and communion” (Lumen Gentium ch. 3 par. 18). Regardless of whether this is the case, the service was a simultaneously beautiful and painful reminder that any reformation should be consciously done in service of ultimately reforming the church, and not dividing it.