On Good Saturday (Easter eve), I attended a two hour and forty minute service with my family at St. Turibius – a Catholic Church on the Southwest side of Chicago where I grew up. Two hours and forty minutes is only an estimate. We actually left after two hours and thirty minutes. We knew it was going to be long, because the mass was to be delivered in three languages – English, Spanish, and Polish – but two hours and forty minutes?!
Frankly, I think even an hour long service is too long. When I was attending high school at St. Ignatius College Prep, we had a service in the chapel during lunch that lasted all of about 20 minutes. The Jesuit priests managed to work everything in – Bible reading, sermon, even communion – in 20 minutes, so we’d still have time to eat lunch.
Can you imagine the attendance you’d get if you advertised a 30-minute service when all of the other houses of worship in town are offering hour-long-plus services? And isn’t 30 minutes all you’d really need to get your point across?
From my experience, I estimate that 95% of the ministers and priests who sermonize on any given Sunday (or Saturday) have no business in public speaking. They fail to clearly state their thesis, and then they proceed to ramble on for 20-30 minutes telling inane stories and revealing all too obvious “insights.” They’re not engaging, entertaining, or enlightening.
Besides, Jesus was one of the (if not the) best teachers who ever lived, so why not let Jesus do the teaching? He could teach more in a five-minute parable than any of the best preachers since him can teach in their 20-30 minute ramblings. I’m sure that this holds true for other religions, as well. This isn’t a football game – we don’t need play-by-play commentary, just tell us the Bible stories – they’re pretty good, really.
I challenge religious leaders in this country to step up to the plate and down from the pulpit and let Jesus do his thing. Schedule 30-minute services and hold yourself to it. You can offer Sunday school for those who want to opt in for more coverage. Maybe this less is more approach will get more people in the U.S. to return to their churches and spend at least 30-minutes a week thinking about God. Hey, it’s worth a try!
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St. Monica in Indianapolis service was 3 hours and change. It starts at 9, finished at 12:10. Most people had to be there by 8:30 for a seat. It was done in English and Spanish — but not everything was said twice, they just alternated readings/responses and languages. Mostly it’s so long because there were 46 people baptized and/or confirmed into the Catholic church for the first time. It also utilizes some of the oldest traditions of the Catholic church: litany of the saints, and more readings — stories — of the history of our faith. Now on an average Sunday, I think an hour is good (it’s certainly as long as my kids can handle). But on the very special Saturday — the ‘high holy days’ so to speak of the Christian faith, I have no problem with a longer service.
Ahhh, now I’m beginning to realize why there are so many ex-Catholics.