Mass twice on Sunday?? Are you serious?? GAH!!!!

I found out recently that some churches seem to recommend that its parishoners spend time with their family on Christmas day as opposed to going to church. Part of the reason for this would be because Christmas is on a Monday and everyone will have been at church on Sunday.
A similar delimma is popping up in the Catholic Church. If we go to Mass Sunday night, does that cover both Sunday and Monday? Do we have to go to Mass twice on Sunday? The answer: depends on how you do it.

For you nonCatholics, the Church follows the Jewish observance that a Holy Day begins on sundown the evening before. So we have Vigil Masses allowing us to fulfill the obligation the day before.

So yes, we have to go to one Mass for Sunday then a separate Mass for Christmas. Different readings and celebrations. Sunday is still a day and time of preparation (Advent) until sundown, when the Christmas Vigil Masses begin. Don't want to do more than one Mass on Sunday? Do the Sunday Vigil on Saturday or Christmas morning Mass on Monday. That Mass is a great way to start off Christmas with the family. Remember, don't let the presents become the center of your holiday. Make the Eucharistic celebration with your parish community the center of you holiday. After all, that is what it is all about. When Christ was born, many people converged to that one place to celebrate together. Why shouldn't we do the same? It's not just about remembering. It's about being there, being present in the present moment.

During Mass, we are not symbollically present, but actually present, transcending time and space.

Solidarity

The prinicple of Solidarity, held by the Church to be a virtue, doesn't just call us to walk with someone in their troubles. Rather, it calls us to become one of them, taking on their troubles as our own. We must make the poverty of Nicaragua our own. We must make the sorrows of a widow our own.

This coming weekend we will celebrate the day that God made our limitations and sufferings his own by taking on flesh. At the birth of our Lord, we celebrate God becoming one of us, in every way. He emptied himself taking even the form of a slave (Phil 2:6-11).

How can we take after Christ? How can we make the troubles, pains, and joys of our neighbor become our own?