Last night, I had one of the most beautiful worship experiences I have had in a long time. We played at a Catholic youth festival in Louisiana, and afterwards we stayed for “adoration.”
I didn’t really understand everything that was happening last night, but that was part of the beauty of it. That heavy and intoxicating aroma of the incense. The bending flickering flames of the candles in the wind. The bold colors of robes and crosses and crucibles. The use of different languages. It was Heaven crashing into earth.
A lot of Protestants don’t think of the first 1500 years of Church history as part of their story. They seem to think that the disciples wrote the Bible and then the Catholic church just worshiped idols and killed people for 15 centuries until Martin Luther and Calvin came along and the Church got back to Christianity.
I’m sorry to tell you this, Mr. Evangelical, but without Rome, you have no Christianity. You have no Bible. You have no theology. You have no story.
The Church today is severely splintered and fragmented, and that should break our hearts. But healing needs to start somewhere. That’s why I wanted to tell you about my experience. Because perhaps for a few of you, you can think about your relationship with the “other”, no matter who that might be. But most of the time, the “other” is exactly who has the most to offer us. And any loving movement towards the other is a movement towards healing, unity, and peace–all things we desperately need.
// Gungor makes some of the best music around and even received a Grammy nod. Check out their albums Beautiful Things and A Creation Liturgy. (via plusjames)
7 Notes/ Hide
- jesusrox10-blog reblogged this from catholicyouthjmjwyd-blog
- wydcollective reblogged this from plusjames
- mjkorbe liked this
- mkuooo-blog liked this
- catholicyouthjmjwyd-blog reblogged this from plusjames
- longing-for-lovely said: Almost died. So amazing. Praise God!!
- longing-for-lovely liked this
- plusjames posted this