High Quality Presentations Demand Serious Preparation
I've made a few presentations in my work life. The really good ones demanded serious preparation. Once you understand this, you're hooked - and you get really impatient when you have to sit through sloppy, ill-prepared presentations.
In the same way, preparation for any important event in life usually enhances the experience. An obvious example during these summer months might be when many of us "vacate" the workplace and head off for destinations away from the old homestead. We used to take road trips when our kids were younger, and I can tell you that between my wife and me (mostly my wife), lots of preparation went into those trips.
The other day, I was looking through a "traditional" liturgical calendar - one followed before Vatican II. It's the calendar which most likely is followed by those who attend Mass in the Extraordinary Rite. One of the things that jumps out at you is how much "preparation" plays a role in that calendar. Important events during the liturgical year don't just come and go. We're called to anticipate and prepare, just as we might in creating a quality presentation at work, or preparing for a vacation.
For example, any important feast day is preceded by a vigil. A couple of weeks ago, we celebrated the feast of St James the Greater. He's the James who is honored by those who walk the Camino in Spain, where he is buried. In the traditional calendar, as opposed to the Novus Ordo calendar, the day before St James feast consists of a vigil which calls for preparation. On that vigil, the priest says Mass wearing purple, the penitential vestment we usually only see during Advent and Lent in the Novus Ordo. We're also asked to observe a degree of fast and abstinence. For the feast day, of course, we joyfully celebrate.
It got me thinking about the value of vigils as preparation and what we Catholics have missed by setting aside the "old" calendar with it's multiplicity vigils being but one characteristic difference with our "new" calendar. The old way was filled with prompts and reminders - like vigils - that called for penance, preparation, those things which recognized us as the sinners we are, but also as those who desire heaven and are willing to work towards the supreme goal of eternal happiness in the Presence of God. Nothing against this world, of course. but the fact is it’s inferior, a way station, a stepping stone in a greater journey.
By putting the world in its proper place and context we don’t denigrate it, but simply recognize it for what it is and in our daily struggle - laced and peppered with special prayers, fasting, vigils, feasts and the like - we more easily and directly and purposely sanctify this world by striving for holiness as we live our daily lives. The drama of daily living emerges in this recognition of the world as it really is and our relationship to it and to God, as we act in accordance with the distinctive reality of the material and spiritual which makes up our current existence. A richness permeates the mundane, forestalling any possibility of boredom or even ordinariness. The extraordinary nature of living each day in God’s presence wakes us from the torpor, cynicism, and even skepticism of the worldly man steeped in matter, bereft of spirit. We Catholics - fully alive and aware of God’s Holy Presence - work and pray with firm purpose, in a joyful spirit of gratitude that this day has been given to us to know, love and serve Him better than we did the day before.
Such was and still can be the extraordinary life of a faithful Catholic.
Our Lord Himself called us to watch, to be prepared. He's coming again someday. While we may not live to see that day, we will see Him one of these days. We will, in a sense, make a presentation to Him, standing in His Holy Presence as we are, the result of how we have lived our lives. Knowing that, the importance of preparing for that great presentation, for that greatest event of our lives, should be evident, shouldn't it?
In the same way, preparation for any important event in life usually enhances the experience. An obvious example during these summer months might be when many of us "vacate" the workplace and head off for destinations away from the old homestead. We used to take road trips when our kids were younger, and I can tell you that between my wife and me (mostly my wife), lots of preparation went into those trips.
The other day, I was looking through a "traditional" liturgical calendar - one followed before Vatican II. It's the calendar which most likely is followed by those who attend Mass in the Extraordinary Rite. One of the things that jumps out at you is how much "preparation" plays a role in that calendar. Important events during the liturgical year don't just come and go. We're called to anticipate and prepare, just as we might in creating a quality presentation at work, or preparing for a vacation.
For example, any important feast day is preceded by a vigil. A couple of weeks ago, we celebrated the feast of St James the Greater. He's the James who is honored by those who walk the Camino in Spain, where he is buried. In the traditional calendar, as opposed to the Novus Ordo calendar, the day before St James feast consists of a vigil which calls for preparation. On that vigil, the priest says Mass wearing purple, the penitential vestment we usually only see during Advent and Lent in the Novus Ordo. We're also asked to observe a degree of fast and abstinence. For the feast day, of course, we joyfully celebrate.
It got me thinking about the value of vigils as preparation and what we Catholics have missed by setting aside the "old" calendar with it's multiplicity vigils being but one characteristic difference with our "new" calendar. The old way was filled with prompts and reminders - like vigils - that called for penance, preparation, those things which recognized us as the sinners we are, but also as those who desire heaven and are willing to work towards the supreme goal of eternal happiness in the Presence of God. Nothing against this world, of course. but the fact is it’s inferior, a way station, a stepping stone in a greater journey.
By putting the world in its proper place and context we don’t denigrate it, but simply recognize it for what it is and in our daily struggle - laced and peppered with special prayers, fasting, vigils, feasts and the like - we more easily and directly and purposely sanctify this world by striving for holiness as we live our daily lives. The drama of daily living emerges in this recognition of the world as it really is and our relationship to it and to God, as we act in accordance with the distinctive reality of the material and spiritual which makes up our current existence. A richness permeates the mundane, forestalling any possibility of boredom or even ordinariness. The extraordinary nature of living each day in God’s presence wakes us from the torpor, cynicism, and even skepticism of the worldly man steeped in matter, bereft of spirit. We Catholics - fully alive and aware of God’s Holy Presence - work and pray with firm purpose, in a joyful spirit of gratitude that this day has been given to us to know, love and serve Him better than we did the day before.
Such was and still can be the extraordinary life of a faithful Catholic.
Our Lord Himself called us to watch, to be prepared. He's coming again someday. While we may not live to see that day, we will see Him one of these days. We will, in a sense, make a presentation to Him, standing in His Holy Presence as we are, the result of how we have lived our lives. Knowing that, the importance of preparing for that great presentation, for that greatest event of our lives, should be evident, shouldn't it?
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