However, there are more reasons than this for attending it. Going to Mass is a way of following the Commandment ‘keep the Sabbath day holy’, as well as obeying Jesus’ instruction of ‘do this in memory of me’. For it is at Mass alone that a Catholic can truly remember their Lord in the form of the Eucharist – re-living and becoming a part of the ultimate sacrifice that he made for us.
A Catholic would say that Mass gives structure to their religion. It involves setting aside time for God, even if it is just an hour a week. People set aside time for eating, for sleeping, for seeing friends – so why should God be any less important? By actively making an effort to attend Mass, Catholics are showing that they understand the importance of making a real commitment to their religion. It would be so much easier to just sit at home and ‘talk’ to God over dinner, and easier still to forget about him altogether.
Finally, Catholics believe that Mass is so important because of the fact that it involves people of the same beliefs coming together. Jesus once said, ‘If one or two are gathered in my name, there am I'.
Not all religions put so much weight on the idea of Mass though. Most Christian Churches recognise the importance of holding services – it is a way of recognising you as a member of their religion, as well as a way of helping these members organise their prayer and effectively move closer to God – but would not regard not attending them as a sin. In many other forms of Christianity, the Mass is much less formal. For example during a Quaker service, a ‘society of friends’ come to Church just to sit in silence, speaking only when they feel the Holy Spirit has moved them to. In a way this is private prayer, but the fact that they still come together to do it shows the importance of unity in the Christian religion.
I personally feel that private prayer is the most effective, although that’s not to say attending Mass isn’t important. It’s a comfort to be able to go about your life knowing that God’s there to turn to when you find yourself in a spot of trouble, but the amount of help that he can give you in such times depends on what you yourself put in. If you regularly attend Mass and receive God in the form of the Eucharist, then you will probably feel his presence much more strongly than a Christian who hasn’t set foot in a Church for years. However, what’s even worse than that is when people attend Mass every Sunday with their minds pre-occupied, always wanting to be elsewhere, only to rush off at the end of it and forget about God until next Sunday comes around. In cases like these it would be more beneficial to take any spare moments you may have to improve your relationship with God in private, rather than making time you don’t really have and then feeling as though your religion is a liability.
