Good Church Etiquette

An instructive reminder

Remember to keep your Eucharistic fast by abstaining from food and beverages (water excluded) for an hour before Mass.

Always dress modestly and appropriately. Arrive early to allow for personal prayer and/or read the readings of the day.

Turn off all mobile devices while still in the vestibule. This is your time with God and His people.

Use the restroom before or after Mass. Men remove hats or caps before the Lord.

Deposit all water bottles in the waste receptacles.

Make the sign of the cross with Holy Water upon entering.

Genuflect with great reverence towards the Blessed Sacrament in the tabernacle before entering your pew. If unable to genuflect, a profound bow is respectful.

Refrain from chit-chat which distracts others who are connecting with God through prayer before Mass.

Join the singing. St. Anselm said that “singing is praying twice.”  Singing with others gives great praise to God, which is really why we are gathered here.

Listen to the readings. God is speaking directly to you.

Receive Communion with laser-like attention. We receive Communion, we do not take it. If choosing to receive the Body of Christ in the hand, place the hand you write with under the hand you will receive, in a way, creating a throne for the Lord. A simple bow of the head to the Eucharist is appropriate as a sign of reverence to Christ before receiving.

Don’t forget to make a prayer of thanksgiving after receiving Communion. “There is no prayer more agreeable to God, or more profitable to the soul than that which is made during the thanksgiving after Communion.” (St. Alfonsus Liguori)

Remember that the point of being at Mass is not to see what we can get out of it, but what you can do to praise and worship the Almighty.

And finally, leave church only after the procession has left the altar. Only one person left the Last Supper early”

Feast of St. Mary Magdalene July 22

Mary was called “Magdalen” because she was either from Magdala near Tiberias (on the west shore of Galilee) or possibly from a Talmudic expression meaning “curly women’s hair,” which means an adulteress.

In the New Testament Mary is mentioned among the women who accompanied Christ and ministered to Him (Luke 8:2-3), where it is also said that seven devils had been cast out of her (Mark 16:9). She is next named as standing at the foot of the cross (Mark 15:40; Matthew 27:56; John 19:25; Luke 23:49). She saw Christ laid in the tomb, and she was the first recorded witness of the Resurrection.

The Greek Fathers, as a whole, distinguish the “sinner” of Luke 7:36-50; Mary, the sister of Martha and Lazarus, and Mary Magdalen. On the other hand most of the Latin Fathers hold that these three they were one and the same. It is impossible to demonstrate the identity of the three through the Scriptural texts. Yet it is certainly Mary Magdalen who, according to all the Evangelists, stood at the foot of the cross and assisted at the entombment and was the first recorded witness of the Resurrection. And while St. John calls her “Mary Magdalen” in 19:25, 20:1, and 20:18, he calls her simply “Mary” in 20:11 and 20:16.

Many Scriptural scholars observe that the “sinner” in Luke comes early in the ministry of Jesus to seek for pardon; Mary is described immediately afterwards as Mary Magdalen “out of whom seven devils were gone forth”; shortly after, we find simply “Mary” “sitting at the Lord’s feet and hearing His words.”

To the Catholic mind it all seems fitting and natural. The sinner has repented, and she is no longer considered an “adultress.” At a later period Mary and Martha turn to “the Christ, the Son of the Living God,” and Jesus raises their brother Lazarus. Only a short time afterwards Mary and Martha make Jesus supper and Mary repeats the act she had performed when a penitent. At the Passion she stands nearby; she sees Him laid in the tomb; and she is the first Scriptural witness of His Resurrection (although it would have been only fitting for Jesus to have appeared first to His Mother) St. Mary Magdalen, patroness of penitent sinners, pray for us!

Feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel – July 16

Our Lady of Mount Carmel is the title given to the Blessed Virgin Mary in her role as patroness of the Carmelite Order. The first Carmelites were Christian hermits living on Mount Carmel in the Holy Land during the late 12th and early to mid-13th century. They built in the midst of their hermitages a chapel which they dedicated to the Blessed Virgin, whom they conceived of in chivalric terms as the “Lady of the place.” Our Lady of Mount Carmel was adopted in the 19th century as the patron saint of Chile, in South America.

Since the 15th century, popular devotion to Our Lady of Mount Carmel has centered on the Scapular of Our Lady of Mount Carmel, also known as the Brown Scapular, a sacramental associated with promises of Mary’s special aid for the salvation of the devoted wearer. Traditionally, Mary is said to have given the Scapular to an early Carmelite named Saint Simon Stock. The liturgical feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel is celebrated on 16 July.

The solemn liturgical feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel was probably first celebrated in England in the later part of the 14th century. Its object was thanksgiving to Mary, the patroness of the Carmelite Order, for the benefits she had accorded to it through its difficult early years. The institution of the feast may have come in the wake of the vindication of their title “Brothers of the Blessed Virgin Mary” at Cambridge, England in 1374. The date chosen was 17 July; on the European mainland this date conflicted with the feast of St. Alexis, requiring a shift to 16 July, which remains the Feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel throughout the Catholic Church. The Latin poem “Flos Carmeli” (meaning “Flower of Carmel”) first appears as the sequence for this Mass.

Signing with Courage

Signing with Courage – Charles Carroll of Carrollton

The legal separation of the American colonies from Great Britain occurred on July 2, 1776, when the Second Continental Congress voted to approve a resolution of independence that had been proposed in June by Richard Henry Lee of Virginia. After voting for independence, Congress turned its attention to the Declaration of Independence, a statement explaining this decision, which had been prepared by a committee with Thomas Jefferson as its principal author. Congress debated and revised the Declaration, finally approving it on July 4. A day earlier, John Adams had written to his wife Abigail:

The second day of July, 1776, will be the most memorable epoch in the history of America. I am apt to believe that it will be celebrated by succeeding generations as the great anniversary festival. It ought to be commemorated as the day of deliverance, by solemn acts of devotion to God Almighty. It ought to be solemnized with pomp and parade, with shows, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires, and illuminations, from one end of this continent to the other, from this time forward forever more.

Adams’ prediction was correct, but he was two days off! From the beginning, Americans celebrated independence on July 4, the date shown on the much-publicized Declaration of Independence, rather than on July 2, the date the resolution of independence was approved in a closed session of Congress. And the Declaration itself wasn’t signed until August 2, 1776.