I missed mass last week because I had a bad cramp that lasted for two days. Maybe it is a blessing because I notice that I actually feel I miss mass! Hmm….I never know that one can miss church.
This weekend will be a busy one because I have duty on both Saturday and Sunday. I will have to go for Saturday sunset mass, Sunday 7 am mass and later at 11.30 am, for choir practice. I hope I don’t get an overdose of holiness with so many trips to church.
Last week, there was the graduation event where my second son should have received his confirmation certificate. As I was sick and I don’t think it is right to send him there alone, minus the family, he didn’t go.
This weekend, there is some parish assembly event and it seems like a big one with the Bishop coming. I do not know what it is and frankly, these sort of things make me feel like an outsider. I notice it is for BEC and stuffs. I definitely will not step foot there eventhough I am curious to know what it is. For sure, people are going to ask, Which BEC are you from? Oh…you don’t belong to our church? So nice of you to serve eventhough you don’t belong to the parish. The ‘don’t belong’ just grates on me.
The other day, I expressed how disappointed I was with how things run. Here is one very sad looking church with bad roads, bad garden, bad everything and they seem to have no money to do the upgrading works. Meanwhile, just a few kilometres away, they are raising millions for a spanking new one.
I know there are boundaries and segregation for administration purposes. But when I think how tiny my island is, the huge disparity makes me real sad. It shows our human weaknesses. How we tend to draw lines, boundaries, territories and segregation based on our financial backgrounds.
If I ever have a chance to say it, I think I will say it to the highest authority in church that we failed in our Christian charity. The rich sticks to the rich. That’s why there are big, comfortable church and small, rundown church. Even in a tiny island like Penang, we cannot see beyond our own comfortable domain and tend to weed people out.
Hmm….maybe the Lord is prompting me to go to my tiny rundown parish to serve? I will. One day. When they stop telling me, “The parish priest will not come to your house to give funeral rites if you don’t start serving in this church.” So, meantime, I shall merrily be the outsider looking in, with my discerning eyes. Or like I shared with a priest, “I wish to tell those who said I cannot have my funeral in church, I will blardy buy a big bungalow next to the cathedral so the priest have no way to turn my coffin away.”
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