The Church Universal
One of my favorite things to do when I go to Croatia is attend Mass there. The beauty of Mass is that it is (at least in roman rite) more or less the same wherever you go in the World, so I never feel completely like a stranger no matter where my travels may lead me. And yet, there are many differences, most of which could be easily lost on the outsiders. It has often been said that Catholic Church is much larger from the inside than from the outside, and this can be noticed by the way people approach Mass. In many ways Masses in Croatia seem more disorganized than the equivalent ones in the US – there are no ushers and greeters, no church bulletins, communion is handed out on the first-come-first-served basis, people line up for confessions while Mass is going on, and most Masses (unlike the rest of Europe) are standing-room only. However, all of this to me suggests a very vibrant and alive faith, faith that is treated seriously and with urgency that is in many ways lacking in other aspects of our lives. People there experience faith much more viscerally, and that cannot leave anyone indifferent. Throngs of believers that were lining up at the doors of the Franciscan Church in Mostar to get a glimpse of the Midnight Mass were not there out of some social obligation. They came because they truly believed, attending a church whose bare concrete walls still speak of the renovation that followed the total destruction in the war.
During one of our day trips, my brother and I visited Dubrovnik. It was supposed to be just a short visit, a few hours at the most. However, my brother got in touch with a friend who wanted to find an accommodation for us so we can spend the night. In the end she found us a room in a convent that was just down the street from the Old Town. This was practically a miracle, since Dubrovnik is one of the most expensive cities in the World (yes, the World) when it comes to the price of real estate, and stay in a hotel in that area would have cost us an arm and a leg. The nuns in convent were extremely hospitable, and immediately took to my niece. In the morning when we were supposed to leave they served us in the guest room with all sorts of most delicious Croatian pastries, and travarica, a form of Croatian grape brandy. God bless Croatian nuns!
I also went with my brother and Vida to visit Međugorje. Usually, this is a very bustling city, filled with tourists and visitors from all around the World. This time, however, the whole town was practically empty. It was the Christmas day, and all shops were closed and everyone presumably wanted to spend this holiday surrounded with their family. Even so, we came across visitors from all over the place – Austria, Romania, Italy, Canada, etc. It brings to mind a truly universal reach of the Church, and in a very poignant way. Međugorje is located not too far from some of the places where just fifteen years ago ethnic hatred was the theme of the war that was tearing the whole region apart. It is good to have such a direct and visible reminder of the unity of human race, and how trite and silly those local conflicts can be in the big picture.
Today I attended Mass at the Immaculate Conception Cathedral in Memphis. As I looked around me I saw church members from every race imaginable: and African family to the right in front of me, an Asian family straight ahead, a young man of south Asian descent to the left, several white families, and several families of mixed racial background. All of them had assembled quietly on this Sunday afternoon to worship one God and share the fellowship with each other. They came because they all in their own way felt the sense of belonging to this universal Church. They were not there because some committee somewhere decided to increase the "diversity" of the congregation. They were there because in this Church you are truly not judged by the color of your skin, but by the content of their faith. And on the eve of celebrating Martin Luther King in the US, it is encouraging to see that his dream is reality in the Universal Church.