No More Boring Sermons: Italian Bishop's Plea

[cappie]

A leading Italian Bishop has criticised Sunday homilies as boring, uninspired and unpalatable. Bishop Mariano Crociata urged priests to pay more attention to their homilies, acknowledging that the minds of churchgoers need to be nourished.

Bishop Crociata, secretary-general of the Italian Bishops' Conference (CEI), urged trainee priests to take their preaching seriously if they want to connect with their flock.

"Too often, sermons are just boring mush, unappetising fare and certainly not too nourishing" for parishioners' minds," Crociata said.

The monsignor's warning was taken seriously by the Vatican daily Osservatore Romano, which printed large parts of his address.

[url="http://www.ansa.it/web/notizie/rubriche/english/2009/12/30/visualizza_new.html_1650025771.html"]http://www.ansa.it/web/notizie/rubriche/english/2009/12/30/visualizza_new.html_1650025771.html[/url]

[Thy Geekdom Come]

I hope the plea included the line, "and for goodness sake, everyone knows the story of your childhood already, please stop ignoring the readings to try to 'relate' to people through nostalgic retellings of events most of them weren't alive for and don't care about...we want Jesus, not your self-aggrandizement."

Not that I have any particular priest in mind.

[OraProMe]

[quote name='Raphael' date='05 January 2010 - 07:37 PM' timestamp='1262738230' post='2030466']
I hope the plea included the line, "and for goodness sake, everyone knows the story of your childhood already, please stop ignoring the readings to try to 'relate' to people through nostalgic retellings of events most of them weren't alive for and don't care about...we want Jesus, not your self-aggrandizement."

Not that I have any particular priest in mind.
[/quote]

I think all of us have a particular priest in mind when reading this thread.

[MissyP89]

I should give this to my confessor to pass on to someone [i]else[/i] we know.

[BG45]

[quote name='MissyP89' date='05 January 2010 - 10:16 PM' timestamp='1262744184' post='2030519']
I should give this to my confessor to pass on to someone [i]else[/i] we know.
[/quote]

Edited January 6, 2010 by BG45

[KeenanParkerII]

I dunno, my local priest is a pretty crazy dude! But seriously, I like his sermons.

[Piccoli Fiori JMJ]

I could sum up most of my pastor's homilies with one statement:

"It's all about relationship."

Our other priests give quite good homilies, it's just harder to understand with their Polish accents...

[Resurrexi]

I really like the idea of a priest reading a homily from one of the Fathers as the homily at Mass.

[KeenanParkerII]

[quote]Our other priests give quite good homilies, it's just harder to understand with their Polish accents... [/quote]

^ Trufax. Our priest said "our faith handed down from the apostles" and, nojoke, we all thought he said "handed down from the horses". Still, very good homilies.

Edited January 6, 2010 by KeenanParkerII

[Thy Geekdom Come]

[quote name='Resurrexi' date='05 January 2010 - 10:00 PM' timestamp='1262746828' post='2030539']
I really like the idea of a priest reading a homily from one of the Fathers as the homily at Mass.
[/quote]
I can see the commentaries 2000 years from now:

"This homily, falsely attributed to St. John Chrystostom since the beginning of post-invasion history, is actually reputed by scholars to have been given first by Fr. Bob of the parish of St. John Paul the Great."

I threw in the parish name just for you.

[Slappo]

[quote name='Resurrexi' date='05 January 2010 - 07:00 PM' timestamp='1262746828' post='2030539']
I really like the idea of a priest reading a homily from one of the Fathers as the homily at Mass.
[/quote]

I'd rather have him site heavily from a homily of one of the Fathers, or paraphrase the homily.

Reading those texts can be difficult enough for the learned even when using a highlighter (I know... blasphemous ), but to hear them read out loud would make following some of those homilies near impossible, especially for the common lay person.

The meat is good, but many would not understand the language... and since it is a homily not a prayer... understanding the language is a little more important.

EDIT: I have heard a homily read in latin at a latin novus ordo mass. Everyone just kind of stared googly eyed wondering what was going on.

Edited January 7, 2010 by Slappo

[Thy Geekdom Come]

[quote name='Slappo' date='07 January 2010 - 02:16 PM' timestamp='1262891814' post='2031847']
EDIT: I have heard a homily read in latin at a latin novus ordo mass. Everyone just kind of stared googly eyed wondering what was going on.
[/quote]
It wasn't the infamous homily by the one FUS friar who will go unnamed when he was trying to express why he thought Latin Mass shouldn't be said, was it? Sigh.

[King's Rook's Pawn]

I just can't take those foreign priests with thick accents you can't understand. I have one from Africa; he might as well be Charlie Brown's teacher for all I can follow him. Luckily, the other two are quite understandable and engaging.

[Ash Wednesday]

My husband and I sometimes attend a nearby church but also attend elsewhere to get a break from his sermons. He is a very angry priest from the hippie generation, and seems very much influenced by liberation theology. Very big on social justice, but he has called JP2 a fascist, and BXVI "autocratic." With his sermons, it's the same thing every week: criticizing us all for our complacency, pondering about how angry Jesus must be ("if you had him over for tea, I imagine him turning the table or slapping the cup of tea in anger for how we behave!"), emphasis on what bad Christians we are, asking us what we do with our lives and how much we waste it, asking us what have done with ourselves besides going to church on Sunday. He raises very valid points, mind you -- but when you hear it week after week after week, it no longer feels like going to mass, it feels like we go there only to get scolded. He is very pleasant otherwise. He's got the image of Jesus angry in the temple down perfectly. But people need to have a little sense of hope and encouragement once in a while. A little variety can be the spice of life if you know what I mean.

Edited January 7, 2010 by Ash Wednesday

[dominicansoul]

i fell asleep at last Sunday's Mass during the homily done by a married deacon...I just lose interest when married deacons use the homily to talk about their wives and children...

...can't help it...