“Wear” Did You Come From
John and his family were faithful Mass attendees each week for as long as John could remember. He went to Catholic school from kindergarten to twelfth grade, where he received a solid education in the faith. Served Mass since he was 10 years old. Made all of his sacraments of initiation. He was even leader of his parish youth group and would, from time to time, pray the Rosary on his own.
By the unwritten rules of the Catholic playbook, he did everything right.
So why was he so quick to walk away during his freshman year at a state university and never look back?
It’s easy to blame his departure on the secular culture and the natural tendency to drop parental conditions and restrictions imposed upon a young person once they taste a new sense of freedom for the first time. Most of us have experienced some level of this faith-rebellion at a certain point in our coming-of-age-journey.
But, here’s the thing: John didn’t leave Catholicism because he was questioning the catechism or bored with it all. Secular-atheism did not grab hold of his mind or heart, nor did a brand-new girlfriend or group of fraternity brothers that just couldn’t be bothered with such piety.
It wasn’t for any of these reasons that john renounced his Catholicism. Rather, The Journey Church of Greater Lancaster (where he was attending college) gave him an offer he couldn’t refuse: a garment of new-found purpose and joy. A robe of community and spiritual friendship.
He found a wedding feast where he finally felt at home.
And it broke my heart to see him leave the Catholic Church behind; we were best friends since freshman year of high school.
When I asked how he could abandon all that was given to him spiritually, his response cut to the quick: “The only thing I left was a lifeless, loveless Church where you all said you believed in Jesus Christ as your Savior, but I was hard-pressed to see it.”
I held back my initial anger-mixed-with-sadness, and asked for clarification. I needed to listen to learn, not react to prove that John was misguided. “What do you mean we are a lifeless Church? We have so much – sacraments, traditions, history,” I remember saying. I believed it then; I still do.
John responded: “I finally found a Church that actually embraces and studies Scripture … that doesn’t just show up for 50 minutes of ritual that no one seems to really understand or care about. I found a Church where we are really disciples with one another in love with the Lord.”
“We’re in love with the Lord,” I said defensively … and rather childishly.
Then, this is where John hit me at the core of my Catholic being – and he used today’s Gospel (Matt 22:1-14) as the focal point of his argument; for this reason I will never forget this particular parable of Jesus. He said quite bluntly: “You Catholics are like the guest at the feast without the garment.”
Pause. Breathe. Listen. Ask: “What do you mean?”
He continued: “I never found anyone at St. X Parish or [our Catholic high school] who fell in love with God. Really fell in love with the Word … whose life was genuinely and authentically changed by a relationship with Him. We went to Confession but never changed our ways. We had Fish-Fry Fridays in Lent but never learned the meaning of real sacrifice. Lots of rules – do this; don’t do that -- but no real love behind any of it.
“It’s like you Catholics got invited to the wedding but forgot to get dressed up for the King. You never bothered to put on the wedding garment.” (He was real good at quoting Scripture to me!)
All these years later, that particular comment of his still hurts in ways I can’t quite put into words. We didn’t put on the garment after the invite.
I know my friend’s comment came from a place of past Catholic hurts and current evangelical self-righteousness. He was stereotyping all that he left behind in the dust of his new-found Christian zeal. Yes, we have not been a perfect Church, the Lord knows. But we have been graced with so much – the saints who gave all for Him; unmatched education and service to the least among us; apostolic tradition going back to the time of Christ Himself; His Presence now in these very sacraments we celebrate.
It was then that it hit me: John wouldn’t have left – I don’t think so anyway – if he really understood the Sacred Gift and Beauty of the Mass: how God is made present here in Word and Eucharist every time we gather in Memory of Him. That we aren’t just receiving a symbol or play-acting an event from two millennia ago.
Every time we are here, we are present to the one eternal Mystery of the Last Supper, Calvary and the Resurrection. “On this mountain, God will provide for all people a feast … and the veil that veils us all will be destroyed.” When we are present at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, we are present to the Salvation offered once for all by Jesus Christ.
And that alone – that the One we looked to save us is really present among us – THAT should be the Feast of which we can’t wait to partake. This Feast should radically change us to make us like the One who feeds us with His very Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity. When we worthily receive our Lord, He becomes the garment we wear once we leave here to face the world – however the world shows itself to us, day by day.
Too often, though, we come without putting on the garment. Some of us leave Mass without ever having even tried it on.
And that’s really what my friend John was getting at, not from a place of hatred or anger or sour grapes. Looking back at our discussion that day, his words came from a place of genuine sorrow: “Why didn’t anyone in the Catholic Church show me the garment of real joy, community, and Christ-love?”
That’s the challenge that John leaves me with now – and one that I share as a priest as often as I can: Don’t be afraid to wear the garment. Mass … Eucharist … everything about the Catholic faith should change us for the better: make us more merciful; more forgiving; ready to sacrifice for others. Our faith should be the garment that leads us to form genuine community. And it should be the garb that says to others: I have found the One who has set me free from sin and selfishness, and I can’t wait to invite you to know His Love, too.
Jesus Christ is the garment we wear, so much so that when we are one day judged for how we lived and loved and served in the vineyard, God the Father will look at our very soul and say: “I can see my Son reflected in you.” That’s the goal. And now the challenge: Are we ready to put the garment on?