Hokay.
So last night I’m going to the 5:30 p.m. vigil Mass for All Saints Day at my parish.
Afterward, I decide to go back into the Eucharistic adoration chapel to pay a visit to the Blessed Sacrament.
My parish (despite its flaws) has 24-hour Eucharistic exposition, except during Mass (when by law it isn’t allowed). After Mass, they expose the Blessed Sacrament again.
So I’m kneeling at the rail around the Tabernacle, waiting for the pastor to come and expose the Blessed Sacrament and this woman comes and kneels next to me, kitty-corner at a bend in the rail.
She’s probably 55+ years old and is wearing a dark sweater and pants and is entirely normal in her attire except for one item.
She has the most bizarre piece of headgear on that I’ve ever seen.
The base of it was a thin headband that anchored it on her head. Coming up from this were two white coathanger-looking wires, bowed inward toward each other concavely. Sitting atop the white coathangers was a SMALL CIRCLE OF WHITE FUZZ–looked to be made of down plucked off baby birds or something and bleached white.
The filaments of fuzz bounce and float about in response to air currents.
The overall effect was like she had a FUZZY miniature version of the Seattle Space Needle sitting on her head.
Now, it flashed through my mind for a second that this might be meant to represent an angel’s halo, but it wasn’t like typical costume angel halos (which classically only have a single wire, which isn’t colored white so as to make it obtrusively visible, and the halo itself isn’t FUZZY AND WHITE but solid and gold).
Frankly, the woman looked like a creation of Dr. Seuss–most likely an inhabitant of Whoville.
Now, I’m fairly relaxed about the attire people wear in church. I don’t get upset if they’re in shorts or bluejeans or sneakers or what have you. (Otherwise I’d be mad all the time. California is really relaxed culturally when it comes ot dress. People on the East Coast who have to wear suits all the time have no idea.)
I also recognize that God is concerned about our hearts and not our attire, but we are supposed to maintain a proper and reverent attitude in church and fuzzy floaty pieces of Whoville headware seem to me to be inconsistent with that–as well as highly distracting to the other people in the adoration chapel.
I mean, you can pray to God buck naked if you want–but do it in the shower and not in the adoration chapel.
Different kinds of clothing are culturally appropriate for different venues in public (Matt. 22:11-12), and this woman was not dressed appropriately for this venue according to the standards of the local culture. (Whoville adoration chapels may be different.)
So I thought, in the moments before the solemn exposition of Our Lord and God Jesus Christ for the adoration of the faithful, that I might do something ever so slight to help out in this regard.
To allow her to save face, I silently got her attention and pointed to her headdress and to the empty monstrance that was about to receive Our Lord, as if to signal to the woman that she may have forgotten that she had this FUZZY MONSTROSITY sitting on top of her head.
The woman stared at me blankly, with a look of false incomprehension as to what I was trying to tell her.
So I started to whisper to her, but I was hampered by the fact that I didn’t know what to call the thing she was wearing. I think I initially referred to it as "headgear."
Then this exchange occurred, all in gentle whispers:
CINDY LOU WHO’S GRANDMOTHER: I can’t hear you.
ME (leaning closer and pointing for clarity): Ma’am, you’re wearing a costume element and Jesus is about to be exposed.
SPACE NEEDLE WOMAN: He loves angels.
She then proceeded to look at me blankly again and, not wanting to make a bigger spectacle than her headwear was already creating, I turned back to looking at the monstrace–where the priest was just solemnly exposing the Infinite Lord Of The Universe Incarnate–said my prayers (including a sympathetic one for the woman next to me), and left.
Jimmy, does this mean only that exposition on the altar in the sanctuary is forbidden during Mass? Suppose you have exposition in a separate chapel elsewhere in the building — is that allowed during Mass?
It’s allowed if it’s in a different area of the church. Canon 941 §2 provides: “Exposition of the Most Blessed Sacrament is not to be held in the same area of the church or oratory during the celebration of Mass.”
My parish has the Blesse Sacrament chaple immediately behind the sanctuary, and the doors connecting the two are opened during Mass so that the (excessively numerous) Eucharistic ministers may (contrary to law) go to the Tabernacle to remove and repose the Blessed Sacrament during Mass.
Given their direct physical connection (the open doors between them, which are clearly visible to the congregation so that you can look into the chapel), this may plausibly be regarded as constituting the chaple and the sanctuary as part of the same “area of the church” for functional purposes during Mass, triggering the provisions of the above canon when Eucharistic ministers march into and out of the Eucharistic chapel twice during each Mass.
Jimmy,
You’ve lived in California how long? Yet, you’re shocked at this strange behavior? I attend classes once per month (doctors still have to go to school after graduating) in Santa Monica, and I have become accustomed to the weirdness of all the chakra/aura/yoga junk that goes on. The Mass at the local church is banal with 20,000 Eucharistic Ministers who stand in the sanctuary and other abuses. But I’m not shocked, I expect it from the LA Archdiocese. Ever since becoming scandalized by the overwhelming abuses I saw at a parish in Schaumburg,IL(Chicago) [dancing, intinction, etc..]and Noblesville, IN (Indianapolis) [children at the altar and The Precious Blood in a plastic cup etc..] I don’t get shocked by the lack of reverence in the laity or the liturgical abuses anymore. I’m outraged, but not shocked. Signs of the Times.
It was a bold move to try to talk to this woman, Jimmy, as she obviously had personally picked out and purchased this strange hat-thing and felt it was an appropriate outfit for adoration.
My gut feeling is–hallelujah that the woman is going to adoration and trying to wear something she probably feels is very special for our Lord. Her taste may be off, but at least she’s trying! Though I of course don’t know what this hat-thing looked like, I think you should have left it alone.
You think this is bad, at my parish back on Wedding Garment Sunday, the priest came out with a tacky tie and sportscoat, wearing it up through the end of the homily. At least he took it off for the consecration.
What the heck is Wedding Garment Sunday or do I want to know?
Unless I misunderstood Jimmy’s post, Devin, this wasn’t a fashion-challenged woman trying to please God with her headwear, but a woman who inappropriately didn’t bother to remove her Halloween costume before Adoration.
I think that warrants a mention.
California, Shmalifornia. It wouldn’t be a Catholic parish if it didn’t have at least one– and sometimes a whole squad– of people who might be more at home in Whoville. The old proverb is that God takes special care of babies and drunks. This lady added angels, but she could have added mildly-delusional-eccentrics, who are indeed drawn to the Church because they know, deep down, that here they can find at least one person (Jesus) who loves them unconditionally, Whoville-hat and all.
I’m glad you didn’t give her too much grief, Jimmy.
I know that approaching the Blessed Sacrament with the proper reverence is a serious subject — but your description of this woman and your attempts to communicate with her about her fuzzy headgear lest she may have forgotten what she had on her head — or indeed that she had a head — just cracked me up! Thanks.
*ROTFL* This post cracked me up.
mildly-delusional-eccentrics, who are indeed drawn to the Church because they know, deep down, that here they can find at least one person (Jesus) who loves them unconditionally, Whoville-hat and all.
I’m with John.
While we’re on the subject of headcovering, is it alright to wear a kippah to Mass?
While we’re on the subject of headcovering, is it alright to wear a kippah to Mass?
Why wouldn’t it be?
The pope can wear a zuchetto to Mass. The zuchetto and kippah are basically the same hat style.
Pope Benedict wearing zuchetto.
Pope Benedict wearing zuchetto.
Pope Benedict wearing zuchetto.
Pope John Paul II wearing zuchetto.
Just sounds to me like this lady was a bit mentally ill or something. I don’t live in California, but I wouldn’t expect to see a 55+ woman wearing such a funny contraption if she was sane – even on Halloween. Probably not so much an issue of reverence as such then.
“What the heck is Wedding Garment Sunday or do I want to know?”
The one a few weeks back with the Gospel reading about wearing the right clothes to a wedding or getting thrown out.
What is a ‘kippah’? The only thing I know that sounds like that word is a ‘kipper’ which is a smoked fish!!! I presume that you aren’t talking about one of those. On second thoughts, maybe you were! lol
A kippah is what most Jewish Americans today call the beanie-like headcovering that most non-Jewish Americans call a yarmulke.
I believe that “kippah” is modern Hebrew and “yarmulke” is Yiddish, but I don’t have any real etymology on that.
If she had more spunk, there might have been an argument as to whether the cowboy boot wearing Californian is the one wearing the costume! 😉
I wonder if she’s related to the woman at our old parish who would drink olive oil during Mass. (and leave the bottles in the pews.)
Space Needle 🙂
Thanks Kevin! I was thinking it was some new liturgical innovation similar to balloons and clowns at Mass.
the woman at our old parish who would drink olive oil during Mass
That’s an interesting one I’ve never heard!
So why is there a picture of the Space Needle? As someone from the Seattle area, I have never seen someone in costume in our Eucharistic Chapel. There was someone in there with a Frappicino once though.
Are you sure that was olive oil in the bottle?
I’m pretty sure…. I wasn’t the one to check but I know the person who did. If I were the one tidying up after this woman I sure would have taken a sniff!
So why is there a picture of the Space Needle?
It’s because the woman’s headdress looked like the Space Needle, and I wanted to remind folks what it looks like so they’d have an image of what was on her head (at least in outline).