We as a society have become very informal. Boundaries that delineate what behaviors are appropriate for certain places have either become very fluid or nonexistent. Whether it’s talking during movies, receiving cell phone calls, or carrying the ubiquitous water bottle, there seems a rather prevalent “I-should-be-able-to-behave-however-is-convenient-for-me-at-the-moment” attitude. This is disastrous for ritual, and we have seen the effects of it in our liturgical celebrations.

If it seems our liturgical celebrations are lacking a sense of the holy and transcendent, the problem is not with the rite itself; it is with the way we are enacting the rite. Of course, there is no excuse for a poorly enacted ritual on the part of the liturgical ministers, and any one or a combination of a careless presider, a poor leader of song, banal or unsingable music, ill-trained altar servers, or a reader’s incomprehensible proclamation of the Word of God will have deleterious effects on the sense of reverence and transcendence that should be part of liturgical celebrations. But even when all those aspects of the ritual are done well, there is still something more required, and that is the proper ritual behavior of the assembly, of each and every person present who makes up the Body of Christ gathered together to enter into mystery.

It is vitally important that every person present be aware of his or her proper ritual behavior. When we enter into liturgy, we are supposed to create, through our attitude and bearing, through our mind, body and spirit, through our body language and verbal language, a space of the holy and a space for the holy. Creating this “space,” this “climate,” this “attitude,” this “atmosphere” — whatever one wants to call it — is part of the full, conscious and active participation of everyone there, and it is demanded of everyone there. The priest and the liturgical ministers cannot do it alone.

Celebrations of sacramental rites that will truly have an effect in transforming us to live the life of Christ more completely demand that we hand ourselves over to them; transformation in God’s grace cannot fruitfully occur in our life if we are not open and receptive.

Perhaps an inability to “get something out of Mass” results from a lack of proper behavior that would allow us to fully enter into it in the first place. When we bring Starbucks coffee cups and vitamin water bottles into church, we make going into Mass the same as going anywhere else. By behaving the same way in church as we do elsewhere in terms of our bodily posture, our conversational volume, and even in the way we dress, are we expressing a subtle message about our fear of letting that time and that space truly be something different where we will encounter the holy? Do we deliberately try to tone down or tame the transcendent because we are afraid of it: because we are afraid we might really be transformed, afraid that a real demand might be made on us in terms of changing our life to live in greater conformity with Christ? Are we afraid at Mass to let go of all the little pieces of “life as usual” because deep down we are afraid to let go of whatever bigger things Jesus is asking us to let go of in order to give ourselves more totally to Him?

Getting something “out of Mass” doesn’t just happen. We have to do our part to make it happen. Only then can we truly see, once we have done all we can do, that in fact liturgy is not about what we do, but what God has done and is always doing for us, at Mass and every moment of every day. But we have to be fully present to that.

Try it the next time you go to Mass. Get there early enough to settle in. Consciously put on a mind-set of being in a different place. Behave ritually. Let go of your usual trappings and enter another world. Turn off the cell phone and “crackberry” even before you are invited to — or make a really radical act of trust and don’t even bring it with you! Don’t get up to go to the bathroom during Mass! (There are times when it seems like the beginning
of the first reading is a signal for children — and some adults — to get up and go. Is it really that difficult to teach children to go before they leave home, or before Mass begins? What happened to saying, “No, this isn’t the time for that? You have to wait.”)

Our ritual behavior at Mass — or lack of it — may just be a spiritual barometer telling us how much we are willing — or not willing — to really hand ourselves over to God.