The Catholic Message Board

Merry Christmas everyone!

And to you and to all.

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas!

God bless us, every one!

Every year, it gets a little harder to do the Midnight Mass thing, I like going at Midnight, but every year it is a little harder to stay up late enough to attend. Worse, after I get home, I can't go to sleep, so attending Midnight Mass means I am awake for at least 36 hours. But, my priest is older than me, so I figure that if an older guy can do it, I can as well. One of these days, probably soon, I will have a priest who is younger than me, at that point "If my priest can do it, then I can do it" is not going to be convincing anymore.

I went to midnight Mass once in my life, just to see what all the fuss was about. Never. Again. I like my

zeno wrote: ↑Wed Dec 24, 2025 11:06 pm Merry Chrisrmas everyone!

Fixed the title for you.

Doom wrote: ↑Thu Dec 25, 2025 6:01 pm I like going at Midnight, but every year it is a little harder to stay up late enough to attend.

Shoot. I gave that up years ago. The only real draw would be the choir singing for 45 minutes before Mass begins.

anawim wrote: ↑Thu Dec 25, 2025 7:09 pm I went to midnight Mass once in my, just to see what all the fuss was about. Never. Again. I like my

I'm going to throw out my guess as to the missing word... you went to mindnight Mass once in your 'pajamas'?

Merry Christmas all.

I haven't done actual Midnight Mass in years. The official title in the Missal is now "Mass During the Night," and I have been celebrating it at 10:00 p.m. I call it "Midnight-ish Mass."

Midnight is the most authentic experience, in the Early Church, midnight was the only Christmas Mass; if you couldn't make it, you didn't attend Christmas Mass at all. It was only centuries later that the Mass at dawn was added for all the poor souls who couldn't make it at midnight. As long as Midnight is an option and I am capable of attending, I am going to do so.

Obi-Wan Kenobi wrote: ↑Thu Dec 25, 2025 5:53 pm Merry Christmas!

God bless us, every one!

I knew it was going to be you.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kSyx6DaUwxA

Doom wrote: ↑Fri Dec 26, 2025 8:27 amin the Early Church, midnight was the only Christmas Mass; if you couldn't make it, you didn't attend Christmas Mass at all.

Source? I'm not having much success verifying this. In fact, it depends on what is meant by "early" since Christmas, as a festival distinct from Epiphany, took several centuries to emerge.

Obi-Wan Kenobi wrote: ↑Fri Dec 26, 2025 2:26 pm

Doom wrote: ↑Fri Dec 26, 2025 8:27 amin the Early Church, midnight was the only Christmas Mass; if you couldn't make it, you didn't attend Christmas Mass at all.

Source? I'm not having much success verifying this. In fact, it depends on what is meant by "early" since Christmas, as a festival distinct from Epiphany, took several centuries to emerge.

The earliest recorded reference to Christmas is in the Calendar of 354. This is the earliest evidence of the Liturgical Year that we have. So Christmas goes back as far as our knowledge of the liturgical year does.

Before that, both Hypolytus of Rome and Tertullian mentioned that Christ was believed to have been born on December 25, a full 150 years before the Calendar of 354.

The earliest known celebration of Christmas at midnight predates the first mention of Christmas itself. The custom started at Jerusalem sometime in the late second or early third century, when Christmas would lead a candlelight procession to Christ's birthplace at midnight. The first reference to Midnight Mass dates from the year 381 in Jerusalem, and the custom then spread West reaching Rome in the early 5th century.

So yes, it is true that we hear about Midnight Christmas Masses a couple of centuries earlier than we hear about them being done later in the morning.

That's a bit of an argument from silence.

Merry Christmas everyone!

I prefer the Mass during the day/morning of Christmas
My reasoning is that worship is an act of the will (?), so I'd rather do it mindfully instead of when I'm half-asleep and yawning during Mass.