SPEAKING ABOUT THE EXTRAORDINARY FORM LOW MASS, LET'S SPEAK ABOUT NOISE VERSES CONTEMPLATION

I found this article this morning on contemplation which I print below. Of course, Catholicism which invented it for Christianity isn't represented in the survey of "ministers".

What is sad is that for the laity, except for those who go to adoration, contemplation is a lost art in the Ordinary Form of the Mass where there has to be some noise of some kind happening at every moment, more or less.

Not so in the Extraordinary Form of the Mass, which unlike the Ordinary Form, is more like adoration (worship?). The Low Mass in particular provides the priest and the laity for times of contemplative silence.

In fact shortly after I was ordained in 1980, many of my first parishioners who were older then and well-formed in the pre-Vatican II  Mass which they missed immensely and resented being rediculed or demeaned for loving it, told me that the pre-Vatican II Mass was more quiet. I did not know what they were talking about. But now that I celebrate it, I do.

I think the quiet offertory rites, the quiet canon, especially, lends itself to the priest's contemplation but even more importantly to the congregations development of contemplative prayer.

Today in the Ordinary Form of the Mass, silence has to be imposed on the Mass, silence after "Let us Pray," silence after the readings, silence after the homily, silence after Holy Communion. But this imposed silence makes the congregation uncomfortable and they think it will never end because it is the priest who controls the amount of silence and how long, not the Mass itself. And they prefer noise just as most people have their television on while at home even though they aren't watching its.

So what do you think about this article below and what we have lost in Catholicism so much so, there is no mention of contemplation that Catholics invented for Christianity in this article:

(Protestant) Pastors returning to silence and contemplation to hear, reach God

BY LAYNE SALIBA
The Times (Gainesville, Ga.)

The Rev. Stuart Higginbotham remembers spending time on the banks of Lake Chicot in southeast Arkansas in order to find a little quiet, a little silence, as he was growing up. Sometimes, he simply went into the woods near his home.

“I’ve always been drawn to this question of how transformative silence can be,” said Higginbotham, rector at Grace Episcopal Church in Gainesville, Georgia. “It’s always been something in my life that I needed.”

That’s why contemplative prayer is something he practices on a daily basis. This type of prayer, Higginbotham said, is focused more on silence and listening for God’s voice, instead of asking God for things – how most of modern culture imagines prayer.

He said contemplative prayer is “grounded in the Biblical tradition of silence, stillness and solitude” and “nurtures a deeper awareness of God’s presence in our lives so that the way we live in the world is transformed through compassion.”

Prayer and contemplation can sometimes best be achieved by physically and mentally cloistering ourselves, according to another local pastor.

“We really do need to take that pattern from Jesus himself and go away, go into our rooms and quiet ourselves and find ways to experience the richness of what silence can actually offer us.”

The Rev. Carolyn Clifton, associate pastor at Gainesville First United Methodist Church, recently helped to lead her church through four weeks of centering prayer during Advent. Centering prayer is a discipline that often leads to contemplative prayer, she said.

“The benefit of it is to find within yourself a center-place in God so that that becomes the place that you live out of,” Clifton said. “In my mind, it’s how you achieve the praying without ceasing, because it becomes a way of living.”

Higginbotham said the original idea of contemplative prayer came from Jesus, who demonstrated it when he went into the desert to fast and pray after being baptized. He said it was also evident when Jesus went to the Garden of Gethsemane to be alone and pray before his crucifixion.

Higginbotham mentioned part of the verse Matthew 6:6: “But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen.”

“It’s a pattern in Jesus’ own life and one that he encourages his disciples to have, to take moments to actually go and contemplate,” Higginbotham said.

Oftentimes, when Higginbotham enters his time of contemplative prayer, he said he is reminded of poverty. His time of being silent helps him understand the things he truly needs and the things he only wants. He said it also helps him make decisions. In order to not make “rash decisions,” Higginbotham said it’s important to be quiet – something “the church as a whole” could benefit from.

“Taking time each day to sit in silence and pay attention to what rises up – what fears, what concerns, what hopes, what dreams – it reorients the entire way I see my life,” Higginbotham said.

Although it’s a practice that has been demonstrated in the Bible, Higginbotham said it was lost somewhere along the way. Throughout seminary, he said he started studying many traditions of Christian culture, and he wanted to know more. He ended up doing his doctoral thesis on the subject of contemplative prayer and is working to help his parish and others know more about it. Grace Episcopal is hosting a Mindful Silence Retreat 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. Jan. 12.

“The truth is, where it was lost was when the practice of Christian faith became conflated with political structures of culture,” Higginbotham said.

Through centering prayer, Clifton said the focus can be placed on God, which in turn, will help how individuals see the world.

“If you’re centered in God, then it changes how you interact with the person in front of you, or the news you hear on TV or social media or whatever,” Clifton said.

The prevalence of those things on TV or social media may be part of the reason centering prayer is becoming more widespread and contemplative prayer is returning to churches in the U.S.

“Everything is so competitive,” Higginbotham said.

“It just feels cutthroat. And the toxic political environment, economic uncertainty, real concrete issues in people’s' lives, what does it mean to actually take time out and sit and pay attention to your thoughts? At the end of the day, that’s what we’re called to do is to recognize God’s presence in our lives and recognize God’s presence in everyone else’s lives.”

Higginbotham said contemplative prayer can be done in any denomination. He said “it is like a river that flows underneath denominations.” People from many different backgrounds can identify with it.

“The practice actually shows that we can pray alongside each other.”