We had the opportunity to visit our friend Gina Czerwinski a few weeks back in the Diocese of Springfield, Mass. for a pair of youth rallies. The local Catholic TV show dropped by – here is their segment on the events. Thanks to all involved for a great couple days!
Category: liturgy
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Holy Week and Catholic Social Teaching
Pope Francis Washing Feet at a Previous Holy Thursday Celebration
Our “Jesus Justice Joy” reflection this week is a little tardy, owning to two full days of Oddwalking on Monday and Tuesday—
As we approach Holy Thursday evening and the beginning of triduum, I’m struck by how, at Thursday night’s mass of the Lord’s Supper, the Gospel is not what it seems like it should be. One would think that we’d hear one of the evangelists tell about that Passover meal. Rather, we hear in the epistle Paul describe how the tradition of that meal was handed down to him. Instead in the Gospel, we hear a narrative unique to John – the humble washing of the feet.
John’s Gospel doesn’t even include a narrative about the last supper meal the way the synoptics do. Some see the significance of this – that the description of the meal is replaced with this story of the foot washing – as one which instructs the early Christian community to live lives of solidarity and service – both important tenants of contemporary Catholic Social Teaching.
In fact, the whole evening, if one listens from a certain vantage point, is linked to issues of justice: liberation, solidarity, service—
I have often wondered why foot washing didn’t “make the cut,” so to speak, as the Church finally focused in upon seven “Big S” sacraments. It seems like it would meet the usual requirements and definitions of one. Pause for a moment and imagine if, when preparing for first communion, young people also learned about and prepared for foot washing along side of that.
How much more linked then would we as a Church find our reception of Eucharist to the command we are given just a few minutes later: Go in peace, glorifying the Lord by your life. Eucharist, as much as it is thanksgiving is also service, solidarity, and our freedom. May we recognize it as such the next time we gather around the table.
Orin
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And Jesus Wept.
This article was originally posted last Monday over at Any Given Sunday Project. It’s a reflection on the Catholic Mass readings from this past weekend. The article is being re-posted here as part of our ongoing Jesus, Justice Joy series. And Jesus Wept It’s perhaps best known as an answer to a trivia question:…
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Jesus and the Border War
I did not grow up loving college basketball. We were more of a baseball family. So, when I moved to Missouri, I had to do some quick catch-up on the long and heated rivalry between the beloved Missouri Tigers and the hated Kansas Jayhawks. It’s called the “Border War”. The roots of this war can…
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NCCYM 2016 Videos
This past weekend, Oddwalk was invited to take on several roles that exemplify the things we find important in our ministries, at the National Conference on Catholic Youth Ministry in San Jose, California. We are grateful for these opportunities, whether it’s leading prayer, encouraging audience participation, making people laugh, or commenting on our retreat ministry. Here are a few videos of those moments.
First, here we are, with Shannon’s wife Erin, singing a prelude before the Saturday morning mass, a piece by Orin titled “To Know Darkness,” published by GIA Publications and on our “Walk Away Different” CD.
Next, here we are talking a bit about our retreat ministry at a “Great Ideas” session later that day.
But a highlight for us of these NCCYM weekends is the “Youth Ministry Extravaganza” a chance for folks like us, who “do what we do,” to thank the youth ministers (and others) in attendance and hopefully feed their souls through, among other things, humor. We relish the chance to create original “set pieces” for this night (previously “May God Bless and Keep You,” “Songs We Should Never Record” and others); this year, thanks to an idea from our friend Erin Brennan, we created a segment where we pretend to be covering the Games of the XXIII Liturginerd Olympiad.
For a couple extra “goodies” related to the Liturginerd Olympics, click here! Thanks San Jose and the NFCYM for a great conference, see you next year at NCYC!
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Oddwalk at NCCYM 2016
12/1 3:15pm – Netsourcing session, music & liturgy N09
12/1 7:00pm – National Youth Ministry Award introduction
12/2 8:00pm – Youth Ministry Extravaganza
12/3 8:00am – Music Ministry for Daily Mass
12/3 2:15pm – Part of Great Ideas workshop
And of course in the exhibit hall when it’s open. Check your program books for more details. Hope to say hi to many friends old and new!
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Oddwalk on CatholicTV from NCYC 2015
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Oddwalk and Our New CD Feature Article
From the March 4, 2016 edition
On March 4, we and our new CD Mercy at Work were featured in a news article in the Catholic Missourian, the newspaper of the Diocese of Jefferson City, MO. The story talked at length about the music on the new CD, and how it shows a side of us that some people aren’t aware of, at least as much as they might be aware of our silly and fun side. Thanks to editor Jay Nies for the write-up. A few ways to check it out:
To visit the webpage of the article (at least for now), click here!
To see a pdf of the article as it appeared in the papers, click the photo or click here