I Am Not Hamlet

     I was not at my home church for mass this morning (not that I feel like I have a home church since becoming Popish), but nevertheless my mood was buoyant.  After all, how could it not be.  Here we were standing as brothers and sisters commemorating one of the top five greatest events in the history of reality: the Incarnation.  Yet looking out and listening to the participation of my Roman brothers and sisters, one would think that something less than mundane had happened.  Something BORING, even.  We gathered to remember the God of the universe condescending to take on human dress and all we can do is half-heartedly sing and mumble ancient creeds that people died for?  I remained buoyant despite the lack of mutual awe.      Annie Dillard said waggishly that when people go to church they ought to be wearing crash helmets.  Do they really know who or what they are summoning?  Something more terrible, me...

     If you had asked me, oh, even ten years ago if I could adore a rug or a piece of wood, I'd probably given you one of my looks through squinty eyes conveying suspicion.  So, tonight, when I kissed a tapestry, bearing the likeness of a deposed Jesus, I wondered--Wow!  Have I come a long way from where I was.      I'm on the verge of preparing for entrance in the ancient church, and while there are some things I'll miss from  Protestant worship, there are some things I'd never dreamt of.  Incense, like prayers; icons and the iconostasis, a reminder of worship in Heaven, of the great cloud of witnesses, of the human form, of stories, of something to look at and focus, of something to handle with hands, to kiss, to reverence; of water splashing at Theophany/Epiphany, of the burial procession of Holy Friday and Saturday Matins; the bowing, the signing, the whole body and senses involved.  Not yet, but now.  Not the wh...