Midnight Christmas Mass

The Catholic church a few blocks from my house had a real midnight Christmas Mass which was cool.

A huge, 100-foot Christmas tree, a black Catholic church with a white (German?) priest, a piano player that rocked the house, and a soul singer that couldn't hold back at times "Hmmmm." Ha. He did that one time at the end of a song, the congregation laughed, and the priest turned around in a funny, joking reprimand. Regardless, the house rocked like no Mass I'd been to. People were dancing in the aisles during certain of the more passionate songs. The theme "Go Tell It On the Mountain," was one of them. It approached, but didn't reach, my experience with a friend's of mine, Zach, African Methodist Episcopal Church in Des Moines, Iowa. The congregants had tambourines and other instruments (!!), and I think we danced for about 75 to 80 percent of the service (awesome).

The priest himself is an odd character, a showman. When I walked in he was humming, figuratively, with energy, a babe in his arms, as he strolled down the main aisle greeting the congregation. I happened to bump into him in the darkened chapel as I looked for a seat and I said quickly, unconsciously, "Excuse me." And he responded, just as quickly, looking into my eyes, "You're excused." Hmmm. What is this? I know he was pumped up, but it was definitely odd. At the end, in a wonderful, touching moment, he took the same baby, lolling, though awake, and stood amid the congregation and lifted him up while talking about the "innocence of babes, we are all like little Ezekial here" etc. It was beautiful, but strange as well. When he finished, as he was walking back to return the babe to his mother, he said, to a kind-of relieved, though genuine and exuberant, laughter from the congregation, in showman style, "And, no, he's not mine." I had a feeling he was. Ha.

More later.