The week before Christmas

I just featured pictures from the opening liturgy for the newly renovated Assumption cathedral here in Bangkok. The occasion saw both the rededicating of the cathedral and the opening of the Holy Door for the Jubilee Year of Mercy.  The experience of going into the new look cathedral for the first time was just overwhelming.  What has been created is what I would describe as "a grand cathedral of European proportions".  As I looked around, I was being reminded of German cathedrals with their own sense of style and grandeur.  Actually, German cathedrals would be simpler in style and presentation.  I thought this especially as I looked at the new altar which is that German style of being a solid table made of stone or marble.  Well, here the altar was made of marble to look like the solid table but it was no simple table.  Its size with the statues all round its base made it much more ornate and dare I say, much more expensive.

Here is the point for me.  They have created an amazing cathedral complete with air-con, a space that inspires awe and a sense of the sacred amidst great beauty but at what cost?  As I was being overwhelmed by the experience of standing within this new sacred space, I was having two internal reactions simultaneously.
One was Wow!
The other was wondering what Pope Francis, with his constant call to our being a poor Church for the poor, would make of this.
Fact is that there is nothing simple or poor about this cathedral.  I would stand with Pope Francis and ask where is the poor Christ here?

I will not get into being self-righteous on this but I do ask myself questions and reflect especially as I celebrate mass there every Sunday.  The cathedral is something to behold and I now have a place like no place I could ever imagine in which to celebrate liturgy.  However, I must be careful not to be corrupted by a Church that speaks of wealth and prestige.  This is my personal conclusion and challenge, a conclusion and challenge that I recognize many in the same crowd that night of the opening would never even recognize.  As Pope Francis would also say - "Who am I to judge?"

All this the week before Christmas.