Opening Procession:
 Every Mass begins with an opening procession.  Another word for “procession” might be parade.  A parade or a procession is given to draw attention to a momentous event whether that is a Christmas parade, a homecoming parade or a St. Patrick’s Day parade.  The length of a parade varies depending upon the amount of people you have and the popularity of the event.  So while the Mass is always a momentous event the opening procession varies from place to place.  A normal procession at Mass is led by a server carrying a crucifix on a pole (processional cross).  The processional cross serves in the same capacity as a banner.  Imagine a large banner in front of the marching bands during a parade.  It is a reminder to us that the Mass is about Jesus Christ and what He did for us; namely die on the cross for us.  Two servers carrying candles follow the server carrying the processional cross normally.  These two processional candles serve the same function as the lights on a police car or fire truck.  They help to draw attention to things.  When we are blessed to have music accompany the procession our spirits our lifted higher and we are united by the sounds of our voice.  Other people in the procession are normally members of the community who have a special role to play in this particular Mass.  This is not to say that these members are holier but rather what they do is of special importance i.e. reading the Word of God to us.

Greeting:
 The greeting at Mass normally follows the Sign of The Cross and normally the priest is quoting St. Paul.  “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all” (2 Cor 13:13).  Or: “Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ” (Rom 1:7).  Or a shortened version “Lord be with you,” Everybody responds “and also with you.”  We are asking each other to remember that Jesus is present in a special way when we gather in His name.   Don’t we all act better when we are reminded that someone we love is nearby?

Gloria:
 The Gloria is a hymn of praise based on the words found in the Gospel of Luke.  The angels sang “Glory to God…” to announce Jesus’ birth to shepherds.

Liturgy of the Word:
 Just as a family gets a better sense of what it means to be members of a particular family by the telling of family stories; so too do we as a the Family of God get a better sense of what it means to be God’s family by telling our family stories: the stories that are found in the Bible. 

Responsorial Psalm:
 The responsorial psalm is taken from the Old Testament Book of Psalms.  What is really special about the psalms is that these would have been the exact same prayers that Jesus prayed and sang. 

Gospel:
 The Gospel begins with the saying once again of “Lord be with you,” because we are once again in being reminded of God’s presence in our midst in a special way: in this case in the story of Jesus’ life.  The priest or deacon then declares, “A reading from the holy Gospel according to N.” with N. being the name of the evangelist who wrote that part of the Gospel.  Everyone responds, “Glory to you, Lord.”  It is customary at this time but is not required for people to make the sing of the cross on their forehead, lips, and heart while saying a silent prayer “Lord be on my mind, my lips, and my heart so that I may worthily proclaim Your holy Gospel,” or something similar.  This is to remind us that we proclaim the Gospel by not only reading it but also by living it with our lives.  The Gospel passage is then read out loud for all to hear.  In the Catholic Church, Sunday readings go through a three-year cycle – so you will not hear the same group of reading for three years.  Weekday readings are broken down into a two-year cycle.  Either way, the readings from Scripture touch our very lives every time we hear them.

Profession of Faith:
 The Church stands together and professes the Nicene Creed.  This creed that was developed in the year 325 helps us state what it is that we believe in.  The other creed that is sometimes said is the Apostle’s Creed which dates back even closer to the time of Christ.  It is a tremendous sign of unity for all of us to stand together and profess the same faith.

Presentation of the Gifts:
 The Presentation of Gifts begins with the collection.  This is the opportunity for people to offer back to God some of the gifts that He has given them.  In some of the more primitive cultures of the world, often produce and livestock are brought forward as a sign of offering first fruits back to the Lord.  In our modern society we use money which practically makes it easier because we don’t have animals all over the place and the smell is not as bad but symbolically it makes it harder for us to connect it with the idea of giving from ourselves.  The offering is used to help run the Church and to help the poor in the area.  The gifts that are brought forward with our offering are bread and wine.  They are to symbolize our offering of ourselves as a whole back to the Lord.  Just as bread is made up of many grains of wheat that have been shredded and baked together and wine is created from many grapes crushed together will form the Body and Blood of Christ in the Eucharist, we to from the Body and Blood of Christ by offering up our many hardships and joys from the past week.  Once again there is a procession, which should draw our attention to the gifts and then to the altar. 

Washing of the Hands:
 The washing of the hands began as a very practical matter because the gifts (livestock and produce) were often not very clean to begin with.  Now it serves as a reminder to the priest and to the people that it is Jesus who makes the priest worthy to celebrate the Eucharist.  No matter what sins the priest has committed, we believe that Jesus will work through that priest in the Eucharist for the sake of His people.

Preface:
 This prayer begins with the dialogue between priests and congregation: “Lord be with you” – “And also with you”, “Lift up your hearts” – “We lift them up to the Lord”, and “It is right to give him thanks and praise.”  The next part of the prayer states why we should give thanks to God and it can vary from Mass to Mass. 

Eucharistic Prayer:
 The part that follows the Holy Holy is known as the Eucharistic Prayer.  Through this prayer the bread and wine will become the Body and Blood of Christ.  Through receiving the Body and Blood of Christ we will become more like Christ Himself.  There are four main Eucharistic Prayer that can be used at Mass.  Sometimes the priest will use a Eucharistic Prayer that is not one of the four and that is fine as long as it has been approved by the Church for example one of the Eucharist Prayer for Children.

Consecration or Institution Narrative
 The priest using the prayers provided him by the Church then recalls what happened when Christ instituted the Eucharist.  The priest echoes the words of Jesus at the Last Supper.  The priest becomes an instrument of Christ and utters the same words “This is my body…” and “This is my blood…”  I believe it is important to note that the priest genuflects or bows after raising the consecrated host (the Body of Christ) and the chalice filled with the Blood of Christ to remind himself that he is only an instrument of Jesus Christ.

Anamnesis
 The word Anamnesis is from the Greek and means “calling to mind” and that is what we do now.  We call to mind all that Jesus has done for us and give Him thanks.  We recall in a special way how he became our offering and offered himself to God. 

Doxology:
 The word doxology is from the Greek word meaning “glory”.  “Through him (Jesus), with him, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, all glory and honor, is yours almighty Father, for ever and ever.”  Everyone responds Amen, which means Yes I believe.  The doxology brings to an end the Eucharistic Prayer.

Sign of Peace
 Before receiving communion we are asked to live out the Our Father by forgiving those who have trespassed against us.  We show our willingness to forgive who ever it may be by offering a sign of peace to those around us.  In a very real way the people around us become living symbols of those people who have wronged us.  It may be impractical to stop everything at that moment and go and call someone who lives three states away to forgive them and get back in time to receive communion.  The sign of peace then becomes an oath that we will go forth from the service and forgive that person.

Communion
 People come forward toward the altar in a procession to receive Jesus Christ’s body and blood soul and divinity.  Jesus’ presence in the Eucharist is a gift is symbolized by the fact that members of the congregation must receive the Eucharist from a priest, deacon, or another designated minister.  When the minister says “Body of Christ” or “Blood of Christ” the person responds with “Amen”.  Once again Amen means, “I believe.”  The Catholic Church’s teaching called concomitance states that a person receives the full body and blood/ soul and divinity of Jesus Christ when they receive either the smallest piece of consecrated host or the smallest drop of consecrated wine.  This is because Jesus’ resurrected body is not confined to space and time like ours.

Final Blessing and Dismissal
 The priest imparts a special blessing as we leave Mass in order to help us go forth to love and serve the Lord.   The word Mass actually comes from the Latin word “Missio” because the Mass gives us a mission and that is to take the love of God we have received at the Mass to the world.

Over the years, I have met quite a few people who have been given the task of planning a Mass for a Church organization and school and quite a few of them have confessed to me that they were given the task of planning a Mass with little or no experience. It is my hope that this guide will be a help to those who find themselves with the holy task of planning a Mass.

Step 2: Identify the type of Mass that you are planning.

Step 2c: If it is a ferial day or an optional memorial, you may choose the readings and prayers for the Mass that you are planning.

Step 3: Choose your ministers.

Step 4: Choose Your Readings

When choosing readings for a Mass you must first realize that you are only allow to deviate from the readings the Church has chosen for the day if it you are planning a Mass on an optional memorial (in which you are not celebrating the memorial) or a ferial day. The readings that the Church has for the day can be found at www.usccb.org/nab/index.shtml. Sunday Readings are on a three year cycle called A, B, & C and weekday readings are on a two year cycle year I and year II.

Step 5: Choose Your Music

Most of your music should be prepared by the people in charge of leading the music.

Mass Parts:

• Gloria: This acclamation can be spoken, sung, or omitted. It is expected to omit the Gloria during Advent and Lent and all Masses that are not a solemnity or feast.
• Responsorial Psalm
• Gospel Acclamation: Except during Lent the Gospel Acclamation needs to have an Alleluia in it. If it is not sung, then it is omitted. You should never recite the Gospel Acclamation.
• Sanctus (Holy-Holy-Holy): Can be spoken or sung
• Our Father: Can be spoken or sung
• Lamb of God: Can be spoken or sung

If then Death was the supreme moment for which Christ lived, it was therefore the one thing He wished to have remembered.  He did not ask that men should write down His Words into a Scripture;  He did not ask that His kindness to the poor should be recorded in history; but He did ask that men remember his Death.  And in order that its memory might not be any haphazard narrative on the part of men, He himself instituted the precise way it should be recalled.- Archbishop Fulton Sheen from his book: Calvary and the Mass.

I have always had a special bond with my grandmother – my mother’s mother.  She was the only grandparent that I ever got to know because my other grandparents had all died before my birth or shortly thereafter.   My grandmother has always impressed me as a very strong person.  I know that when she was younger, she was forced to go to work as a child during the Great Depression and that at a very young age she had to place her father into a mental institution.  She became the guardian of her four siblings. 
  
 I know that my grandmother was a very loving person.  She took her obligation as the only grandparent seriously and made every attempt to spoil us.  It was always a real treat when we could spend the night at her house.   My favorite memory regarding her harkens back to the days that when I was in grade school.  On days where we only had to go to school for a half a day, I would walk over to grandma’s house to spend the afternoon.  She would give me money to run to the ice-cream store and I would go and bring back to ice-cream cones.  We would then race to see who could eat it the fastest.
  
 Grandma moved in with our family when I was a sophomore in high school.  My parents added a room on for her and despite the fact that her presence made it nine people living under one roof nobody mined.  In fact often you could find all of us back in grandma’s room lying on her bed watching television with her.
  
Towards the end of her life, it became hard for me to watch her grow old.  She was now hunched over because of osteoporosis and walked with a cane, and she began to suffer from memory problems and anxiety attacks. She refused to go out in public because she didn’t want people staring at her and because she was also becoming intimidated by new spaces.  This was made all the worse because of her memory problems almost every place was a new place for her. 
 
 All she wants to do was stay at home watching television with my mother near her side. From time to time, she would get up and turn the lights off and lower the shades with no reason at all - leaving everyone in the room in the dark except from the light of the television. 
  
 As a result of the aging process this once independent woman became almost a prisoner in her own home.  In addition to that she has developed more of a temper.  Now my grandmother has always had a small temper but toward the end almost anything can trigger it. 
  
 In all of this though I have grown in amazement at the way my mother cares for her.  In a day an age when old people are being placed in nursing homes and forgotten about and society at large is debating whether or not to start euthanizing people like my grandmother, my mom doesn’t even raise her voice at her.  My mom takes the abuse that my grandmother offers her and she continues to give my grandmother the best care that she can. 
  
 I once had the opportunity to ask my mother where it was that she found the strength to take care of my grandmother, and her answer amazed me.  She simply told me that she would never be able to repay my grandmother for all that she did for her, and she gave me a particular example.
  
 She told me that when she was pregnant with my sisters, who are twins, that she was told that she would have to be on complete bed rest if she was to give birth to two healthy babies.  My mother told me that she was frantic, how was she going to care for the four children she already had with me being the oldest at the age of eight if she was confined to bed, She knew that my father was going to be of absolutely no hope, in fact he was most likely going to be a bigger problem than us four boys.   That is when my grandmother stepped in.  For nine months my grandmother came over early in the morning to take care of us and she stayed late into the night making sure that we were fed and that the housework was done.  My mother is convinced to this day that if it was not for my grandmother’s unselfish service that my sisters would not be here today.  My mother told me that every time she thinks about giving up or screaming at my grandmother, she simply remembers all the selfless acts of love that grandma did for her.  
  
My mother’s reasoning struck me as being very profound I did not realize how profound until I came across this story.
  
Once some disciples of a famous rabbi approached him and asked: “Why do you answer all questions by telling a story?  Why do you always tell stories?”  The disciples then steeled themselves, certain that, true to the tradition, that the rabbi would necessarily answer such questions about story with a story.  But the rabbi, after a loving, lingering pause, responded. “Salvation lies in remembrance.”
  
 The story of my mother and my grandmother was for me a clear example of this profound teaching. “Salvation lies in remembrance”.  My mother finds the strength to care for my grandmother despite her own personal weaknesses and struggles by remembering the love that my grandmother demonstrated for her.
  
 The key to this insight is that my mother chose to remember.  My mother could have walked away from my grandmother and not have anything more to do with her but instead she chooses to remember and because she remembers she obligates herself to a life of service.  A life of returning that love she received. 
  
 We choose to obligate ourselves to a life of service each and every time we come to celebrate the Eucharist.  When we come to fulfill the Lord’s command: “Do this in remembrance of me.”
  
 Nowhere is this more evident in our Catholic liturgies than on Holy Thursday night where we remember how our Lord humbled himself to come among us as a servant king and how he demonstrated this by washing the feet of his disciples commanding them to regard themselves as servants to the lowly.
  
 But at almost every point of the Mass God’s Word is jumping out in signs, gestures, words, and songs urging us to remember how he loved us and thus commit ourselves to a life of service to our brothers and sisters.
  
 At the beginning of each Mass, we call upon the name of the Lord for throughout salvation history, when people make or renew their covenant with God, they call on His holy name in order to invite God to act in their lives and to express their firm commitment to live in covenant with Him. 
  
 We mark ourselves with the sign of the cross drawing from the images in the Book of Revelation as being marked with a seal on our foreheads.  The sign that sets us apart as God’s people and protects us from divine judgment.
  
 We remind ourselves of our sacred mission when we remind ourselves that the Lord is with us every time, we announce the “Lord be with you,” “and also with you.”  From a biblical perspective these words represent a divine summons, an invitation to a daunting undertaking. 
  
 Throughout Sacred Scripture, when God calls someone to an important role, He gives assurance that He will be present to provide that person with the strength necessary to fulfill that role.  We have only to look at Moses, Joshua, and Mary to see the power of those words.
  
 Throughout the Old Testament and the New Testament people cried out to God to have mercy on them and we are no different.  At the beginning of the Mass, we cry out Lord Have Mercy three times for it forces us to remember that our God has forgiven our sins and demands us to forgive those who sing against us.
  
 We sing the songs of the angels at Mass, the Gloria, to enable us to remember that our God loves us so much that he sent his only Son.  We sing the song inspired by the angels at Mass to remember that our service should be done with the joy of Christmas.
  
 The Liturgy of The Word invites us to remember in a particular way all that God has done for us in salvation history.  The stories of the Bible come alive to us in a way that shows us how God is working in our lives today and of our obligation to service that comes from remember God’s actions in the history of the world.
  
 We profess our faith by praying the creed.  We do so in order to better understand our identity as the Church of God as the Body of Christ on earth.
  
 The prayers of the faithful help us to remember that our God did not stop loving us 2,000 years ago but rather keeps on loving us today.  He is the loving Father, Jesus taught us that He was, and he truly does care about our needs and us.
  
 As we enter the second part of the Mass we are drawn deeper in to the mystery of God.  At the heart of the Eucharistic prayer is the retelling of the last supper.  A chance for us to participate in not only the Last Supper but also in our Lord’s sacrifice on Good Friday.
  
 Perhaps though the most telling sign of the commitment that we make when we choose to remember how Christ has died, Christ is risen, and that Christ will come again is contained in the word Mass itself.
  
 This word Mass comes from the Latin word Mission.  It is the same Latin word that gives us the word mission in English.  Once we have fulfilled the Lord’s command to do this in remembrance of him, and when we have received him in the Eucharist, we are sent forth to bring Christ to those we meet.
  
 We do this all as we call to mind the closing words of today’s Gospel.  "Do you realize what I have done for you? You call me 'teacher' and 'master,' and rightly so, for indeed I am. If I, therefore, the master and teacher, have washed your feet, you ought to wash one another's' feet. I have given you a model to follow, so that as I have done for you, you should also do."

Transubstantiation is the word Catholics use to describe the change that takes place in the bread and wine at Mass turning it into the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ.  In Transubstantiation we believe that the accidents (the outside things that we can see, touch, taste, smell, and hear) remains the same but the inside stuff (that which makes it what it is) has changed. 
 
 For years I have been looking for an easy visual way to show what we Catholics mean when we use the word Transubstantiation.  The other day I wanted to watch a movie with a friend of mine and so we picked up the Star Wars DVD opened up and pressed play but instead of Star Wars coming on the television screen Dora the Explorer came on.  How could this happen?  It happened because my friend's daughter had performed transubstantiation.  The outside of the case did not change.  It still read Star Wars and listed George Lucas as the director and Mark Hamiliton and Harrison Ford as staring in the movie, but she did change the inside of the case because now instead of containing the Star Wars DVD it now had a Dora the Explorer DVD. 
 
 The little girl was able to do this because she was smarter and more powerful than the DVD cases and so if she could do it with DVDs I believe God can do it with bread and wine because God was able to create the world from nothing, split open the Red Sea, raise Jesus from the dead and God was able to spread the Catholic Church from 11 scared men in a small upper room to now cover the globe. 
 
 I truly believe that God has the power to make the simple bread and wine we offer at Mass into his Son's Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity.

I thought I would share with you some reasons, I believe that the Catholic Church reserves the right to withhold the Eucharist from non-Catholics.
  
 1.            I was recently preparing a couple for marriage and she was not Catholic. She asked me “why is it that non-Catholics cannot receive the Eucharist?” As I said a quick prayer to the Holy Spirit for help and image came into my mind and I would like to share it with you now. I responded by talking about if she was to invite me into her house for dinner with her and her fiancé, there is a certain comfort level with me being in the living room and the dining room but she would not appreciate it if I started rummaging through her underwear drawers or medicine cabinet because these were very intimate and personal things for her. In much the same way we Catholics hold the Eucharist as being very dear and intimate to our faith. It is more than just a symbol or a sign it is our Lord being present to us in a very special way and we know that not everyone holds the Eucharist in the same way that we do and so we ask out of respect for our beliefs that non-Catholics refrain from receiving the Eucharist.
 
 I went on to talk about how different people have different levels of comfort also and that we are called to respect the other person’s comfort level and not assert our rights. I told her for example, I have more freedom in one of my brother’s house because he is a bachelor and does care if people roam his house but my sister on the other hand is a neat freak and does not like people going through her house out of fear that her visitors may find some dirt in her house. When my bachelor brother goes and visits my neat freak sister he does not force his way on her but rather respects her way. If he were to force his way on her he would be considered rude. In much the same way each faith has its own rules and if we are to be truly respectful of each others’ religion it has more to do with respecting their traditions than asserting our rights.
 
 2.            I also believe that true ecumenism (unity and respect between religions) can only happen if we acknowledge our differences and respect them. I do not ridicule a Muslim for praying five times a day or a Jew for not eating pork and so I would expect the same courtesy when it comes to my protection of the Eucharist. I know that peace only exists in my family when we acknowledge our differences and respect them.
  
 3.            There are some items in life that mean more to certain people than others.  For example, one of my family heirlooms is a small glass cup that we call “grandma’s biscuit cup.”  This small cup was the same cup grandma used to make her homemade biscuits.  For us the cup has special meaning because it reminds us of our now deceased grandmother.  The Eucharist for Catholics is even more special because for Catholics the Eucharist is more than an object that stirs up memories of a deceased person.  We believe that the Eucharist really is Jesus Christ.  So if we treat my grandma’s biscuit cup with great respect should we not treat the Eucharist with even more reverence?

The guidelines for receiving Communion, which are issued by the U.S. bishops and published in many missalettes, explain, "We welcome our fellow Christians to this celebration of the Eucharist as our brothers and sisters. We pray that our common baptism and the action of the Holy Spirit in this Eucharist will draw us closer to one another and begin to dispel the sad divisions which separate us. We pray that these will lessen and finally disappear, in keeping with Christ’s prayer for us ‘that they may all be one’ (John 17:21).
 "Because Catholics believe that the celebration of the Eucharist is a sign of the reality of the oneness of faith, life, and worship, members of those churches with whom we are not yet fully united are ordinarily not admitted to Communion. Eucharistic sharing in exceptional circumstances by other Christians requires permission according to the directives of the diocesan bishop and the provisions of canon law. . . . "
 Scripture is clear that partaking of the Eucharist is among the highest signs of Christian unity: "Because there is one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread" (1 Cor. 10:17). For this reason, it is normally impossible for non-Catholic Christians to receive Holy Communion, for to do so would be to proclaim a unity to exist that, regrettably, does not.
 Another reason that many non-Catholics may not ordinarily receive Communion is for their own protection, since many reject the doctrine of the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist. Scripture warns that it is very dangerous for one not believing in the Real Presence to receive Communion: "For any one who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment upon himself. That is why many of you are weak and ill, and some have died" (1 Cor. 11:29–30).

If you wonder by what means you can most please God, the answer is: celebrate the Eucharist.  There is no prayer, no meeting, no ceremony that is comparable to the prayer and sacrifice of our Lord on the cross. - Cardinal Van Thuan

1. When we think about being in God's presence the first thing we must realize that it is simply alright to be doing nothing. One of the major aspects of prayer is that is not so much what I am doing that matters but rather what God is doing. If we come with too much of a plan for our holy hour we might not allow God to have His way in time of prayer.

2. Part of prayer is also simply reminding ourselves that our value does not depend on what we are doing or what we are producing or how busy we are but rather are value comes from the fact that we are children of God. Therefore, just sitting there in front of the Blessed Sacrament can be of a great value in itself

3. You may try journaling during your time in front of the Blessed Sacrament. Write God a letter and let Him know what is going on in your life.

5. Reading Scripture can be another good things if you read in a prayerful way and not just race through it. Imagine yourself in the story and ask yourself what is God trying to say to you now.

7. Talk to God in your heart or softely outloud. There is no wrong way to pray as long as you are trying to pray and not just simply past time. Who cares what other people may think if they hear you mumbling to yourself as long as you don't share with them in appropriate material and or not disturbing them by talking with an "outside" voice.

8. Sometimes it is important to just ponder the great mystery that the God of the Universe has deemed it necessary out of love for sinful humans to lower Himself to take the form of Bread and Wine so that we could be in His presence but yet still have our free will.