On Sundays when it’s just he and I at Mass, my youngest son, he never stops speaking.
We arrive just as mass begins, and I let him pick our seats. He leads to the left—side where we usually sit because, in morning light, the pews are cast in colors from stained glass stories and symbols of the windows.
Late, our normal place is taken. I nod, encourage him still to choose. He leads us forward all the way to second pew.
He’s excited to be there, in the front and not the back and says we should sit up there more often—he’s probably right.
He is smiling. You can see a pleasure in his eyes, and maybe it isn’t the Mass, but it’s something to do with being there—just us—as he whispers, or slightly louder, every thought that comes to mind. I let him speak, do my best to listen—to both him and the readings, homily, and ceremony of the Mass.
The second reading of the Mass speaks to the sternness of a father:
“Brothers and sisters, You have forgotten the exhortation addressed to you as children: ‘My son, do not disdain the discipline of the Lord or lose heart when reproved by him; for whom the Lord loves, he disciplines; he scourges every son he acknowledges.’ Endure your trials as ‘discipline’; God treats you as sons. For what ‘son’ is there whom his father does not discipline? At the time, all discipline seems a cause not for joy but for pain, yet later it brings the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who are trained by it.”[i]
Maybe I should tell my son to be quiet—to listen more and to pay attention, but I think of other Gospel stories and believe which lesson and Wisdom, right for a time—like faith—rests on discernment and guide of the Holy Spirit.
I think of the story of the Pharisees questioning Jesus and his disciples on why they do not fast—honor the customs and norms of religion’s habited practice—and Jesus answers:
“Can the children of the marriage fast, as long as the bridegroom is with them? As long as they have the bridegroom with them, they cannot fast. But the days will come when the bridegroom shall be taken away from them; and then they shall fast in those days.”[ii]
My son will not be young forever, nor so open to me with his words and heart; and so today I embrace in receive all, to me, of these he desires to share.
I do not exhort or discipline, but listen—doing my best to follow. I let him speak and spill in smile and whisper all that raises, ebullient, from his heart.
I know what my son loves most, right then, is to be in the presence and attention of his Father; to know his Father loves that he is there and desires to listen, be part, and share in all his joys, all on his mind, and in his heart.
In reflection, my reason for loving Mass is same as my son’s—to be in the presence of my Father, to know his love, to share my heart through what I think as prayer but to Him—amidst infinite and concurrence of prayers, conversations, and cosmic events—must sound, to Him, much like the disjointed ramblings of my son’s words to me. As I try to make sense, I believe God too does best to make sense and understand but the greater point—even should there be misunderstanding of words, reason, and meaning—is that every share, and effort to listen, are all done from Love. And even should my words and intentions be confused, I really don’t mind. What I love most, desire most, is to have this time with my Father.
Yet a little while, my son will be this age—will want to share and give and speak, when only us and God, all that is in his heart. I know the quiet and the distance and the silent days will come—because what human soul, in maturing, doesn’t learn to hide and conceal within the sanctuary of their selves?
When such comes, we will be quiet and pious, proper as the Sanhedrin asked of Jesus in honor of asceticisms the joyless pretend as virtue.
But today, in his age, my son still lives his Joy and shares his heart with me: every…single…word, and giggle.
“Yet a little while, the light is among you. Walk whilst you have the light, that the darkness overtake you not. And he that walketh in darkness, knoweth not whither he goeth. Whilst you have the light, believe in the light, that you may be the children of light.”[iii]
There will be years and times for more disciplined love, but today is not that day.
Yet a little while, the light is beside me; and by his Spirit, I feel mine too.
Children of Light—silly and goofy and not-quite-quiet—we sit in the second row loving the time, just He and I, with Father that we love.
[i] Hebrews 12: 5-7, 11
[ii] Mark 2: 19-20
[iii] John 12: 35-36