Mystery Christians

Learning to love the mystery of the Mass

07/09/2017

Matthew 11:25-30 At that time Jesus exclaimed: "I give praise to you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, for although you have hidden these things from the wise and the learned you have revealed them to little ones. Yes, Father, such has been your gracious will. All things have been handed over to me by my Father. No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son wishes to reveal him." "Come to me, all you who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am meek and humble of heart; and you will find rest for yourselves. For my yoke is easy, and my burden light."

          I have been assigned as pastor to over 18 parishes and in every parish I have encountered certain people I call “mystery Christians.” I don’t mean they are “mysterious” in any pejorative sense – it’s not an insult – on the contrary, I intend that title as very high praise. What’s mysterious about them is their motivation in coming to Mass. It’s not what moves most people to get out of bed on Sunday and stumble into this sacred space. They don’t come to Mass to hear great preaching, a soul-stirring sermon. They would come to Mass even if I put everyone to sleep (and I have before). They don’t come because the music is by Mozart or the singing sounds like a Broadway musical. They’d come even if the music were in sign language. They also don’t come because the church looks like a Gothic cathedral or because the chalices are gilded with gold and the vestments are brocaded with gems. They’d come regardless of the grandeur of the buildings or the splendor of the linens; they’d come for the sacraments in a shed.

           Now this is a mystery to me because I’ve always believed that if I preached better or the choir sang better or we could build more beautiful churches, people would pack the place. And, to be sure, more people do come when these things happen, but this wouldn’t make the “mystery Christians” move a muscle. Those things don’t register on their religions Richter scale. That’s why these Christians are a mystery to me: they do not share the same motivations that move the majority of the people to come to Mass.

            So, why do they come to Mass? Well, that’s the real reason I call them “mystery Christians,” because they come to Mass to experience the mystery of God’s love in Jesus Christ. And that love is indeed a great mystery. It’s a mystery because while it can be enhanced by all these externals (like good preaching), it does not depend on them, it’s independent of them. At Mass, you still touch the mystery of divine love in spite of poor preaching, mediocre music, and crooked candles on the altar.

The New Testament uses the Greek word “mysterion” which is translated sometimes as “mystery” but also in Latin as “sacramentum,” or as we know it in English, as “sacrament.” In other words, hidden in the divine depths of every sacrament lies a mystery (mysterion) – which is nothing other than God’s love poured out for us in Christ Jesus – and that sacramental mystery is what these “mystery Christians” come to see every Sunday, in fact, they’d never miss a chance to come see this mystery; they’d never miss Mass.

           In the gospel today, Jesus shows his special solicitude for these “mystery Christians,” too. He praises his Father, saying: “You have hidden these things from the wise and learned [and] you have revealed them to the little ones.” Now, what does Jesus mean by “little ones”? Well, he does not mean “little children.” Rather, he goes on to explain: “No one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son wishes to reveal him.” In other words, Jesus means by “little ones” the same people that I mean by “mystery Christians.” That is, they are the ones who have learned the mystery of God’s love in Jesus Christ because Jesus has revealed this to them. And that’s what they find and feel at every Mass, and why they wouldn’t miss Mass even on vacation! When they go to Mass, they don’t worry about how long the song or how short the sermon, whether it’s the pope or a poor parish priest behind the altar, because none of that matters in the light of the sacramental mystery in the middle of the Mass.

            My friends, how do we become more like these “mystery Christians” who would never dare miss Mass? Well, it takes prayer and patience, it takes perseverance and practice. You learn by doing; holiness is a habit. That’s why many of the mystery Christians are usually older people. They don’t come to Mass just because they are retired and have too much time on their hands (although that helps, too). Rather, the “school of hard knocks,” that is, life, has knocked a lot of silliness out of their heads and hearts. They have been tested and tried and tempted and tortured – sometimes by horrible homilies and high-pitched hymns – and they’ve learned at last that’s not what matters most about the Mass. They’ve sort of peeled off the layers of the liturgy, like an onion, until they found the sacramental mystery at the core: the love of God in Jesus Christ. It just takes time for that kind of spiritual transformation to take place.

             One of the great Catholic intellectual lights of the last century was Msgr. Romano Guardini. In his book, called simply The Lord, he explains how John’s gospel is so much deeper than the gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke. Have you noticed how different and deeper John’s gospel is? He writes: “[John’s] Christ is painted from life – the historical life in which he, John, personally participated. Since then it has been enriched by long years of Christian experience, of prayer, proclamation, of struggle. Layer after layer of sacred reality has come to light.” Guardini concludes: “Thus, in the earth of long apostolic, prophetic and apocalyptical experience, they (these layers) unfold to the total reality of Christ in all its ‘breadth and length and height and depth’ (Ephesians 3:18)” (The Lord, 166). St. John died when he was around 100 years old, 50-60 years later then the other apostles, so he had time to perceive the richness and pick the ripe fruit of Christ’s love.  If it took St. John the Evangelist and Apostle a lifetime to become a “mystery Christian,” one of Christ’s a “little one,” don’t feel bad if it takes you a long time, too.

                By the way, in 1965, Pope Paul VI offered to make Msgr. Guardini a “Cardinal” of the church, but he turned it down. I guess once you’ve tasted the sacramental mystery of the Mass, everything else seems like small potatoes.

Praised be Jesus Christ!