In our book, Living the Mass: How One Hour a Week Can Change Your Life, Fr. Dom Grassi and I include a feature in every chapter called The Other Six Days of the Week in which we strive to show the connection between what we do at Mass and how we live the Mass the other six days of the week.
Now, there is a website titled www.other6.com that encourages people to “find God” not only on Sundays at Mass, but on the other six days of the week as well. Take a look at it…I think you’ll enjoy it.
Interestingly enough, a few weeks ago, Sen. Rick Santorum (a Catholic) said this of Islam and Christianity:
“Islam, unlike Christianity, is an all-encompassing ideology. It is not just something you do on Sunday…. We (as Americans) don’t get that.”
The part he really doesn’t get is that Christianity is all-encompassing…not just something we do on Sunday!!! St. Ignatius of Loyola summed up the all-encompassing nature of Christianity in his prayer, the Suscipe:
Take, Lord, and receive all my liberty,
my memory, my understanding
and my entire will,
All I have and call my own.You have given all to me.
To you, Lord, I return it.Everything is yours; do with it what you will.
Give me only your love and your grace.
That is enough for me.
Interesting assessment by Senator Santorum. I would have to say that my circle of family and friends (Catholic and other Christian traditions)tend to their relationship with God everyday. I am blessed to have these people in my life. I’m sure I’m not the only American that is so forunate.
Concerning the other six days of the week, I tell my students how the word “Mass” was derived, from the Latin “Ite, missa est” “Go, you are sent”
I tell my students that they are being sent from Mass to proclaim the Good News they’ve just heard and the Eucharist they’ve just shared. Ideally, this is what we should be doing the other six days.
Paul, I think it’s great that you tell your students about the origins of the word “mass.” I think that makes a very powerful point about how the Mass relates to the other 6 days.