A Concord Pastor Comments: Getting back to Ordinary Time

Some of us are old enough to remember a portion of the liturgical year whose Sundays were titled as the Sundays after Pentecost. Those same days are now titled Sundays in Ordinary Time.

It would be easy to presume that this season on the liturgical calendar is called "ordinary" because it seems that nothing extra-ordinary is celebrated on these Sundays. But that's not the case. The use of "ordinary" here comes from "ordinal" or "expressing order or succession."

Think of Ordinary Time as the season of "counted Sundays."

But is Ordinary Time ordinary in the ordinary sense of the word "ordinary?" No, it's not. There is never anything ordinary about the gathering of the Christian faithful on the Lord's Day for the purpose of hearing God's voice in the scriptures and offering God praise and thanksgiving through the prayer of all prayers, the Eucharist. It may not be a particular feast or solemnity but it is the Lord's Day, the day the Lord has made, and we are called to be glad and rejoice in it!

Of course, the major seasons of year (Advent - Christmas and Lent - Triduum - Easter) bring with them extra-ordinary anticipation, preparations, scriptures, rites, customs, colors, scents, vesture, song, prayer and sacraments. From the perspective of those who work all year long in helping a parish to celebrate the mysteries of our redemption through the liturgical calendar, the "high seasons" are much more work than the "season of counted Sundays."

So, not a few parish ministers are breathing a sigh of relief as Pentecost 2010 becomes history and most of the Sundays in Ordinary Time stretch before us. We find ourselves between "7:00" and "11:00" on the pie chart above. (The first six weeks of Ordinary Time in this Year of Grace 2010 were celebrated following the feast of the Baptism of the Lord and before Lent. The last (34th) Sunday of Ordinary Time will be the Solemnity of Christ the King, this year on November 21, just before Advent, which will begin a new liturgical year on November 28.)

But the portion of Ordinary Time ahead of us has a festal beginning. Every year the Sunday after Pentecost is the Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity (popularly known as Trinity Sunday) and the second Sunday after Pentecost is the Solemnity of the Body and Blood of Christ (popularly known as Corpus Christi).

These two Sundays are among days on the church calendar sometimes called "idea feasts" or "feasts of devotion." That is to say: these feasts commemorate not a person or an event in the life of Christ or the saints but rather commemorate either a theological doctrine or a special devotion. Homilists often find such feasts to be difficult preaching assignments!