sweet sunday

During evening mass yesterday at St.Peter, it was GREAT! Havn't been experiencing so much joy in mass for quite sometime. Well, probably cause I havn't been able to pay close attention while the usual mass is going on. YES, i admit I don't. Anyway, Fr. Terriburke [if that's how his name is spelt. >.< pardon me.] was celebrating the mass. While he was giving his sermon, it striked me of all the things that he mentioned. It goes a bit like this,

There was a woman who went for confession few weeks ago.. She came in and well, confessed. One of the things that she said was, '..... I havn't been going to mass because I had to undergo a surgery.'
I understand that she had missed a mass in that week because of her illness but i think, it is rather unneccesary to confess about that. Why? Take for example, a guy come up to a priest and say,'I'm sorry I did not go for mass because I had to help bring one of my relatives to the hospital.' When you think about it, what that guy actually mean is that he is sorry that he was forced to miss mass because he was doing a good deed. Now, something here has gone wrong somewhere.
Since when is doing good, BAD? right?
Often, we all think that we need to be good in all the things that we do in order to be accepted by others. Thing is, what does it mean by being a good girl or a good boy?

And there was another thing that Fr.Terriburke mentioned as well. It's about the story of the Jewish man who was travelling and the good samaritan. As you know, Jewish and Samaritans do not exactly see eye to eye with each other. But in here, it shows that the Samaritan is willing to help no matter what the condition is. In fact, the Samaritan had a choice to just walk away.[Actual text in Luke 10:29-37]

Is it about pleasing others? or being true to yourself and to God? or being good not because you are force to?

And so, i'll leave it all to you to decide, my dear friends . . .

I guess, not being able to pay attention during mass is something that I fail to do most of the time. Therefore, going to mass every week doesn't make me good but a zombie church go-er.