Rules

Ugh, I know I am posting a lot but I'm so frustrated. Yesterday, two friends of mine posted an article (I am too lazy to find it) about a woman who was denied communion at her mother's funeral. It said that the priest said he couldn't give her communion because she lived with another woman. If a priest had knowledge of that, I suppose he couldn't give her communion, that's a fact. It seems KIND of weird that he would know that she was living with this woman, but whatever, if he did, the thing to do would be to not give her communion, although I guess he could have handled it better, i.e. talked to her before Mass. It then said that he walked out while she was giving the eulogy, and that he fell ill (or pretended to) so that he didn't go to the graveyard. The woman said she was a life long Catholic AND that she didn't think her sexual orientation would have anything to do with receiving Communion.

So. The communion thing is clear, I guess. My question is, why was she going to communion if she was aware of being NOT in a state of grace? I bet I know the answer, I bet she was not a church goer and was not a confession goer and had no intention of changing her life, which is all fine. It is hard to live your life according to the rule of the Catholic church, I agree! We are all sinners, the way I figure it. What I don't understand is WHY are you marching up for communion if you know all these things? If you were, to use a phrase I despise, "raised Catholic?". If you don't go to church anymore, if you don't believe in it, then don't TAKE COMMUNION! Sheesh! And I have no idea how someone could be raised in the church, be a life long Catholic, and not be clear on the homosexuality thing. Really? REALLY?

As far as the eulogy goes - no one except the priest is supposed to give the homily. This is also a fact. People want to have a more personal reflection of the person who died, at a funeral, which is COMPLETELY understandable, but if you want to do that, I think you should either talk after the Mass, or do something at the funeral home. Or better yet, at the wake after the funeral. I think a lot of people forget that a funeral Mass is a Mass and has rules, just like every other frickety fracken Mass that they have.

A friend of mine was saying that the priest was giving her trouble about playing a spiritual at her mother's funeral. It was Swing Low, Sweet Chariot, and a favorite of her mom's. They did play it, as a recessional, which makes perfect sense to me, both because of the lyrics of the song (coming for to carry me home) and because it was outside of the Mass. Personally, I think a priest presiding over a funeral mass for a mom who died very young should try to err on the side of the KINDLY but people are imperfect, I guess.

I think a lot of people don't know about the rules of the Mass, or about having to have sacred music for a Mass, because a lot of churches have gotten very lax about it and it's confusing. But just because people don't know about it, or because they are constantly showing movies where they are playing the wedding march at a Catholic church, doesn't mean it's not true. I feel like such a jerk, but I also feel I have to defend the church. Because I am insane.