 |
| Youngster I saw at Petworth House |
After the Communion of the Faithful I grabbed my bag of milk, coffee and biscuits and went out to the parish hall. My self-declared leave of six weeks is over, and I'm back to being Head Tea Lady, M.Div. I was joined shortly thereafter by my Deputy Head Tea Lady (who would be shockingly young for the role had the average age of our community not dropped to 22), our Pre-Teen Assistant and two other Ladies. All this voluntary labour meant that after I had made a half-gallon of coffee (a fine art, as the Deputy discovered in my absence), I could chat with friends I hadn't seen in yonks.
From my vantage point (and from jumping up to check on the coffee supply), I could observe my little faith community and the clusters that they formed. At two tables there were young parents and their infants. At another table were, roughly speaking, the few parishioners approaching my age or older. There was our table, featuring parents of both teens and tots, and there was the vast expanse of Young People, mostly unmarried, stretching from the far right of the tea table to the far left.
They were all quite beautiful.
As I mentioned, I saw very few Young People as I walked around the South Downs and Exmoor National Park with my mother's seniors' walking group and the other HF guests. (Presumably they were studying, working, or abroad.) By the end of the trip, I missed Young People very much indeed, and I was slightly disturbed by the idea that the price of a comfortable retirement might be eschewing the company of the Young. (That said, I very much enjoyed my conversations with the other non-Boomer, age 93.)
I was only 30 or so when I noticed that the presence of Young People energize an otherwise long-in-tooth group. I taught night courses at a community college for three years, and the 19-year-old who appeared in one of them made a palpable difference to the energy in the room. I believe there are programs to introduce schoolchildren to nursing home patients--singing badly to them and whatnot; it seems to me it would make more sense to send in the teens and the college students for tea and chat and, if practical, cards, board games, and swing-dancing.
That said, almost all the Young People I know these days are Traditional Catholics; it's a little harder imagining Just Stop Oil urchins going anywhere near the institutionalized elderly, except to assure them that Black Lives Matter, inform them that Love is Love, and ask them to Be Kind.*
Anyway, after I was informed by Boomers that Catholicism in Quebec was dead as a doornail (and "good riddance" was their subtext), I wrote to Benedict Ambrose that I couldn't wait to be back in the Land of the Young (or Tír na nÓg in Gaelic). By this I meant the company of traditionalism's Glorious Future, and on Sunday, there they were--booted and suited or wearing pretty dresses. It was all very refreshing. And some of them walked with B.A., his new wheels and me to the bus stop, which filled me with extra energy and cheer.
This reminds me again of the science fiction story I read about Young People dating or married to attractive, elderly billionaires. They were all on a luxury holiday to an exclusive and isolated island spa with cutting edge medical treatments. Somehow as the days went on, the elderly billionaires began to look younger and the poor Young People began to deteriorate. You can guess what was happening there.
And besides being horrifically unnatural and selfish, it was totally unnecessary. If you want to feel young, simply be where your kind of Young People are, and if you are in any kind of management or mentorship role, find them useful things to do. If asked, give advice that will stop them from falling into the pits you or your friends have crawled out of. Definitely ask them for their advice, and don't pretend you know all about their lives because you were young once. (You seriously don't, and I suspect that goes double if you were young in 1968. And this, in turn, reminds me of an online Boomer who wrote to me over 20 years ago that although he was twice my age, he was much, much younger.)
Naturally, there are other things you can do for youthful energy: avoid sugar, get enough sleep, intermittent fasting (after taking medical/spiritual advice, etc.), exercise and dancing.
I got this last tip from a mother-of-teenagers who (unlike me) was at my June waltzing party.
"I love dancing," she said in a conspiratorial way as she was on her way out of the parish hall. "Dancing keeps me young."
Well, indeed.
*Naturally, I could be completely wrong on this point. See above.
My mom recently went to the Latin mass that my parish has each Sunday. (They do multiple Novus Ordo masses on the weekends too.) She did it as a way of paying respect that day for a relative of her boyfriend. I was and still am too sick to attend. I haven't gone to a Tridentine mass in years. The time they have it scheduled is rather early at 8am.
ReplyDeleteMom complained about the mass afterwards. She doesn't understand the appeal. Nobody followed along with the program. There wasn't participation like in the Novus Ordo. She asked, "Where's the joy?"
I was annoyed by the comment and didn't know what to say. We've argued about liturgical abuse in the past. She doesn't understand why it's bad. I switched parishes years ago because I couldn't stand the liberal priest assigned.
Hello, Tiny Therese! I'm surprised that your parish still has a TLM and not at all surprised that it's at 8 AM. Actually, 8 AM is a great time for at TLM. In some places it's relegated to 4 PM every third Wednesday or whatever. I'm also not surprised that your mother disliked it because it is so different from the NO. Some people fall in love with the TLM at once, but it took me at least 3 tries to get used to it. If someone told me there wasn't "participation" at the TLM, I would ask them to consider the rapt concentration of the faithful. The faithful are actively engaged in praying in Latin and English near-simultaneously while immersed in the music or the silence. There are also the physical gestures of kneeling, rising, bowing, making the Sign of the Cross. And there is the discipline of not chatting to neighbours inside the church before or after the Mass. The joy is usually inside (sometimes someone is moved to tears, of course), and the joy gets expressed outwardly after Mass. There's a lot of joy in our carpark, in the parish hall, and whenever we get together for a dance or party. Well, anyway, all that's what I would say to a naysayer myself! (Mrs McLean)
Delete