What do Catholics get from attending mass daily or weekly?

I believe in God and I go to mass. I do it mainly out of obligation to be honest, it is kind of a small sacrafice for God. Give something back instead of always asking and taking.

I usually attend weekly. It is a connection with community, but also a ritual connection with my higher power, almost like a structured meditation.

I belong to a very liberal parish. I enjoy listening to the sermons as a way to involve one’s faith in the modern day world:how to be of service, how to accept everyone as God’s children, the importance of forgiving.

A day free of guilt, and there is no guilt like Catholic Guilt.

The false sense of security.

For the same reasons Jewish folks go to synagogue and protestants go to church and on and on through all the assorted faiths on the face of this earth.

@rooeytoo that doesn’t explain it. Protestans take mass too [once a month usually]. It’s less likely that if you are a Catholic and you take your mass daily [or weekly] it’s for the same reason like other Christians. And I’m sure the other faiths have something similar to the mass and they don’t do it daily. So a Catholic takes his mass daily and doesn’t do anything else for his faith… while a muslin prays more than 6 times per day.

@Hibernate Most Protestant denominations have weekly masses. Some of them do Communion once a month.

I don’t know about this but here 95% of them take it once a month not once a week. But for communion .. the personal relationship between the members .. I don’t really know because I don’t attend all churches every day.

@Hibernate Well I’ve attended Anglican, Lutheran, and Pentacostal churches on a regular basis throughout my life and I’ve never heard of regular services once a month. Maybe if it’s a special type of healing/prayer/youth service, then it’ll happen once a month. I also have many friends who are Reformed Christian and Baptist and I’ve never heard of them doing once a month services either.

The question is about “mass” :P Regular services are done more frequent than that for msot churches.

While not the main reason, I expect that it’s easier to keep current with your confessions if you go daily.

@Hibernate Mass is the Catholic term for service.

Roman catholic priests are required to say a mass every day, the congregation is not required to attend daily, only weekly on Sunday or Saturday evening. Protestant services are generally held only once a week because their clergy have no requirement as the priests do. That said, the catholics who attend daily or weekly do it for the same reason as any other religious person practices their beliefs, I guess because it gives them food for their soul.

So you’r telling me the liturgy is done every day? poor priests. They worship every day… how many attend mass daily then? If not so many come [or none ]I don’t understand what’s the point of it since nobody benefits from the actual service. Or is it just me here?

Usually, there are at least a few elderly people who go on a regular basis.

I guess it is like muslims pray, what is it 6x a day, priests are required to say mass once a day. It is for themselves as well as anyone who choses to attend. I personally have yet to come across a religion I think is sane, they all have what to me are weird quirks. Where I grew up there were amish who thought the devil resided in internal combustion engines, so they worked the hell out of their horses instead of using tractors or cars. They get retired race horses and drive them until they die. There are other groups who think the engines are okay but the devil lives in the chrome so they paint the chrome flat black. There is a group in NG who worship a lizard, goanna looking creature. They dress it up in gold clothes and replace it when it dies.

I would like to have a belief system to feed my soul, find me a sane, believable one that doesn’t try to take my money and I will join!!!

I thought Muslims prayed five times a day?

I knew to be five too but then someone explained that they are obliged to do it AT LEAST five times per day and most like to be above the limit so they do it six times.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salah#The_five_daily_prayers

Ok. However, the requirement is morning, noon, afternoon, sunset, and evening.

And the old people are only reqired to go to mass once a week, but they go everyday. They are being good little people. Sorry for sticking my nose in this. I mean I just don’t see how out of all of that you pull “muslims pray 6 tiimes a day”, and then try to argue it. Maybe this isn’t my place, but I needed to add my two cents to that.

@Schroedes13 yes but most muslims I meet do it more than five times. They are determined to keep the schedule up.

I don’t much care how many times a day muslims pray, what I think is hideous about that religion is the cruelty to animals. Australia recently stopped live exports of cattle and sheep because of the way they torture the animals, supposedly in the name of allah, before they actually kill them. What kind of god would demand this sort of cruelty??? Something about they have to bleed before they die.

So I amend what I said before, I would like to have a belief system to feed my soul, find me a sane, believable one that doesn’t try to take my money, or do stupid stuff like wear doileys on my head or cover my entire body except my eyeballs, etc. and I will join!!!

I am Jewish, not Catholic. Speaking from personal experience, I know that there are weeks when I do not feel like praying at the synagogue on the Sabbath, but I will go anyway, largely to connect with the community. I like being a part of a community that assembles at least once a week and I think that getting together regularly on a routine basis really fosters strong connections. I would guess that it is not so different for weekly church goers?

Communion with their God.

Regarding daily Mass, it’s not just “little old people” that go to Mass daily, but people who are able to make it each day in their busy schedule. It is a bit of a grounding time to reflect and meditate on the day. It is calming.

@Nullo “Confessions” (actually, Reconciliation) are not heard daily. And since Vatican II most active Catholics only go to a reconciliation service once or twice a year.

Weekly is a spiritual obligation. It’s a mortal sin if you ditch mass if you’re not ill.

Daily I guess people go for a sense of calmness, peace, and meditation. Things like Adoration are times when people can just go and be close to and feel close to God.

( Not catholic, but I get dragged to mass weekly. D: )

How did “good little people” become “little old people”?

They go daily @jca, or weekly to pray, to be unified with the Church by sharing in communion.

Many of the people that go daily do so as the first thing they do in the AM. Their first “meal” is the sacrament of Holy Eucharist.

It’s a ritual. Rituals help us feel right about what we are doing. They ground us. They help us put things back together. They can move us out of our minds and into our bodies. They can help us understand we are part of something larger than ourselves. They connect us to the community.

Oh God! So many things rituals do, and I’ve barely even started.

By the way, this is true for the rituals of any religion or the rituals that are not religious. Rituals attract us because they are very useful. And if someone thinks they never do any rituals at all, let me know if you ever brush your teeth or set the table or drink coffee in the morning.