This year Christmas Day is on Monday; for the clergy this means two major feast days in a row, with the Fourth Sunday of Advent falling today, Christmas Eve. Midnight Mass will be the fifth mass of the day for me, to be followed by three further masses on the morning of the 25th. Clerical heaven is the time when Christmas falls on a Sunday. But this year it is going to be a hard slog.
Midnight Mass, the one ceremony of the Catholic year that is familiar to many, is losing its appeal, and sticklers for tradition are fighting a constant battle to keep it at midnight. Some people want to have it at 9 p.m., because midnight is ‘too late’ for old people. Well, it may be, but what on earth is the point of having a Midnight Mass which does not begin at midnight? One might as well not have it at all.
At Christmastime the priest really does need to put his best foot forward
The story of Midnight Mass is singular, as it was the only mass that was ever allowed to be celebrated in the hours of darkness.
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