{"id":1544,"date":"2015-10-02T00:00:08","date_gmt":"2015-10-02T04:00:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/mission-and-identity\/?p=1544"},"modified":"2019-09-18T16:49:15","modified_gmt":"2019-09-18T20:49:15","slug":"oct-2-the-papal-mass-in-phillyseen-from-out-in-the-crowd","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/2015\/10\/02\/oct-2-the-papal-mass-in-phillyseen-from-out-in-the-crowd\/","title":{"rendered":"Oct 2 – The Papal mass in Philly,\tseen from out in the crowd"},"content":{"rendered":"

Friday, October 2 – ”\u00a0I want to be inspired by my faith, and I want to be excited and gleeful about it.”<\/strong><\/p>\n

A former history major student, now UDM graduate, and college faculty member \u2014 a mom with small children, a scholar with a reputation for her publications about Catholic feminists in the U.S. \u2014 told me early last week she and the family were treking to Philly for the Pope\u2019s mass on the Parkway that leads to the art museum and features the famous stairs from Rocky I. \u00a0 I asked her to describe the mass for me, and she did. \u00a0 I asked her if I could use her description as this Friday\u2019s post: \u00a0 \u201cYou write with a voice that speaks like many people about Francis in America.\u201d \u00a0 Mary replied: “Sure, why not? \u00a0Redact at will!\u201d<\/p>\n

Have a great weekend as summer eases into autumn with classic autumnnal gusty winds and rain. \u00a0Even so, October is my favorite month.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

john sj<\/p>\n

Today\u2019s Post: \u00a0 one scholar, teacher, street smart mom\u2019s thoughts about going to Philly for the mass.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

SO \u2013 I promised you some thoughts on the papal mass.\u00a0 I find myself with a few minutes before class, so I\u2019ll try to set some down.<\/p>\n

We went with Tim\u2019s cousin Lori and her family, who live in Willow Grove.\u00a0 The night before, Ella had a relapse of a stomach bug, leaving her green and us very very sleep deprived.\u00a0 Thankfully Ella\u2019s aunts also live in Philly, and are nurses, and graciously offered to take her for the day, having planned a pope-cation.\u00a0 So I was torn, having now abandoned my vomiting child to go see the pope on a jumbotron.<\/p>\n

We left around 10 am to attend the 4pm mass, with three boys in tow (ages 7, 6, and 5).\u00a0 The vibe was great all day.\u00a0 Everyone was friendly and smiling and considerate as we made our way by train to downtown, then walked and walked and walked to the parkway.\u00a0 There was a group of Mexican seminarians that was just a delight, basically screaming papal themed soccer chants as they walked down the street in their black cassocks.<\/p>\n

I found myself reflecting quite a bit on John Paul\u2019s trip to Philly in 1979.\u00a0 The women I wrote about viewed the papal visit as a means of access, a chance to say their piece, even if it was only holding a banner as he drove by.\u00a0 They wanted to have their voices heard.\u00a0 Here I am how many years later, with nothing really changed for women in the church, and I\u2019m acting like a superfan.\u00a0 It gave me pause.\u00a0 But honestly the last thing I wanted was disruption.\u00a0 I like Pope Francis a lot.\u00a0 I like how he\u2019s trying to redirect us, wake us up to messages that were there all along.\u00a0 Be present to the world.\u00a0 Bring Christ to the world.\u00a0 Go to the margins.\u00a0 This is what the mass felt like to me; I listened to the words in a new way.\u00a0 At the blessing I really felt like he was charging me with the power of the holy spirit to go out into the world.<\/p>\n

Some of this has to do with being outside in an enormous gathering of people, sitting on a blanket (draped with a sleeping child for a good chunk of the time), staring at a screen (we couldn\u2019t see the stage \u2013 we were right behind the grandstand).\u00a0 Although I don\u2019t want chant for my normal liturgical life, I found it very moving in this context, especially the chanted gospel which I thought was incredibly haunting.\u00a0 And the papal umbrellas moving down in a seemingly endless procession to bring communion to the people is just a beautiful, charming image that I think I will always remember.<\/p>\n

The day inspired high emotion on my part (the sleep deprivation might have something to do with this).\u00a0 Lori and I both found ourselves tearing up at odd moments, and catching each other at it.\u00a0 He represents the movement of the Holy Spirt for me, because I had given up hope of seeing anything inspiring coming out of the Vatican.\u00a0 I want to be inspired by my faith, and I want to be excited and gleeful about it.\u00a0 I love that people around me at work \u2013 colleagues and students \u2013 were excited too, whether they were Catholic or not.\u00a0 So I got weepy a bit.\u00a0 The kissing of the babies and sick children does this to me.\u00a0 (Although watching the bodyguards carrying the babies makes me giggle every time).<\/p>\n

Then he had to go and meet with Kim Davis.\u00a0 That threw me this morning, but I\u2019m filing it under the category of \u201cThings for which Pope Francis needs prayer.\u201d\u00a0 He asked us to pray for him, and so I do: for his health, and his peace, and his courage, and his conversion on a few select items.\u00a0 I also pray that he will do some reading in the field of gender history so we can convince him that gender theory is not from the devil.<\/p>\n

Ella has recovered, although it was touch and go for getting home yesterday.\u00a0 I managed to take communion (if anyone was going to be trampled it was then) and saved half to give to her when her tummy was more stable.\u00a0 I don\u2019t think the gesture meant much to her now, but I\u2019m hoping it will later.\u00a0 She got a hat with \u201cI love Pope Francis\u201d on it.\u00a0 I\u2019m keeping the pope doll for myself.\u00a0 (He now presides over my office.\u00a0 I might put him on my desk to inspire my students).<\/p>\n

Aack!\u00a0 Time for class!<\/p>\n

With love,
\nMary<\/p>\n

\"Philly1\"<\/a> \"Philly2\"<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Friday, October 2 – ”\u00a0I want to be inspired by my faith, and I want to be excited and gleeful about it.” A former history major student, now UDM graduate, and college faculty member \u2014 a mom with small children, … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":139,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[11641],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1544"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/139"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1544"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1544\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1547,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1544\/revisions\/1547"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1544"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1544"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1544"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}