Tuesday, November 13, 2012

"Dungarees"

There's a very different title huh? Sunday morning getting ready for Mass, Jake called me into his room and I noticed he was wearing black jeans and a green golf shirt. Not the best church clothes, but ok. Jake was going to be altar serving so he'd have a robe on anyway, and he was wearing his black dress shoes. The next kid I saw dressed was Jonathan, in the kitchen, a blue golf shirt and nice jeans. Ok too I guess. Jonathan runs the power point screen for 9:30 Mass, and since he was needing to go right from church to the theatre it made more sense than dirtying more laundry. Now it was almost time to leave and there comes the girl down the stairs...more jeans! Now I was getting a little annoyed. Is this the best thing our kids can find to wear to God's house?! Madi had to be there early to sing with the choir, so there was no time for anyone to change, but we had some words about it on the way to church. Or I had some words anyway. "Seriously, none of you could find something nicer to wear to church?" "Blah blah blah blah!" And then I had even more words inside my head, "Where did I go wrong?" "Shouldn't I have taught them better?" And sadly, "What will people think?" Fast forward 45 minutes, Mike and I are sitting alone as is typical because Jonathan is at the power point, Madi is in the choir, and Jake is on the altar. Father Robert is giving the homily and he's talking about the widow who gave her last few cents and how that meant so much more than the people who gave from their surplus, he's talking about not doing things to be show-y, he's talking about how he doesn't really like to wear the fancy vestments, but how their purpose is so during the consecration we are not looking at him as Fr Robert but as a representative of Christ, he's talking about how when he was growing up jeans were not necessarily everyday wear, but dungarees (as they were called then) were work pants used to do service. He's saying maybe dungarees or something less show-y are more appropriate for doing God's service. There are my three kids clad in their dungarees (can't you see I'm liking using that word), doing God's service. There is God in the person of Fr Robert telling me to chill out about what people will think and to stop sweating the small stuff. There is God smacking me upside the head on a Sunday morning. I'm sure there will be many more instances where I will stress over minor details. It's good to know God cares enough about my minor details to answer my prayers about them sometimes audibly and sometimes even before I ask.

1 comment:

ann marie said...

My dad calls them dungarees and Greg thinks that is so funny. I wore jeans to Mass a few weeks ago. It was colder out and I was sick of wearing my white skirt that I've worn the past 500 weeks to church. On the way to Mass I started to worry about my poor choice, so I know what you must have felt like. I love Father Robert :) he has a way with words. We went to a different Mass though, so I didn't get to hear him. I do know Joy's husband came into the church on Sunday( and her daughter and son in law are next up!) I must say, our Our Catholic Faith group is pretty impressive in that arena :)