Jeg leste nylig om noen som hadde vært på besøk i Irland og opplevd at en ukedagsmesse tok 11 minutter og en søndagsmesse 25 minutter! Når vi leser slikt er vi alle lykkelige over at slike ting (nesten) aldri skjer i Norge:
During our vacation stay in Ireland, Leila and I took a short walk to the local parish church on a Saturday morning to attend Mass. The experience was a revelation.
The priest said all the prayers at such a breakneck speed that I could not make out the individual words. The congregation matched his pace with the responses. I could barely keep up the recitation of Lord’s Prayer. The readings were a blur. There was no homily. Mass was over in 11 minutes.
We tried the same parish again for Sunday Mass, but we had not read the bulletin carefully. We thought we were arriving 5 minutes before the designated time; actually we were 25 minutes late. Sunday Mass had already ended!
Fortunately there was another parish nearby, where the Mass was celebrated at a comparatively sedate pace. But the frantic rush to finish the Eucharistic liturgy as quickly as possible was shocking.
Men blant kommentarene er det også en irsk katolikk som er flyttet til USA og også klager over messene der, der en ukedagsmesse tar 50 minutter og en søndagsmesse 1 time og 20 minutter – men IKKE pga høytidelig feiring, men fordi en drøss av menensker plent må gjøre unødvendige ting:
I have to report the opposite extreme since I married a US citizen and moved here from Ireland. Sunday Mass at 1 hour 20 minutes and weekday Mass at 50 minutes is excruciating. The sermons are memorable only for their length and the Church is a hive of ushers, readers, singers all busying up the service and detracting from the sense of solemnity. All this with (yes) 5 minutes for the Eucharistic prayer. I was used to 40 minutes of reverence on a Sunday, 20 on a weekday. Now it’s bustling tedium.
Jeg har bodd i Irland (da i Belfast) mesteparten av tiden siden jeg konverterte, og kan ikke si at en 11-minutters daglig messe/25 minutters søndagsmesse reflekterer min erfaring, selv ikke med den raskeste presten jeg kjenner til, selv om vedkommende prest er meget rask. Det reflekterer forresten ikke noen mangel på hengivenhet i denne prestens tilfelle, ettersom han hører blant de mer solide jeg kjenner til. Bortsett fra denne ene presten, har jeg imidlertid ikke lagt merke til at messene jeg har deltatt i i Irland er så mye raskere gjennomført om man ser bort ifra at prekenene i gjennomsnitt kanskje er noe lengre i Norge.