Oh, we’re
all so very busy. And nobody is busier than young church musicians
who are in school somewhere. One discovers this when folks like me—aging
church administrators who have become unskilled substitute organists—try
to speak with one of them in order to ask them to sing or to play
at something liturgical.
“Oh . . . I'm so busy! I have twenty-five
classes that day, and my sophomore recital is coming up, and I just
have to find time to get my hair recolored, and, oh, my.”
Or . . . “Oh, my teacher says that I’m
really not ready to play for any service until I acquire my AAGO,
my FAGO, my NPM certification, my own 25-rank organ, and my licentiate
in sacred theology.”
Or . . . “My parole officer says I can’t
do anything like that yet.”
What frequently works is “The stipend is $125.”
These kids haven’t been on earth long enough to generate that
much self-importance to merit such busyness. They also carry around
a 2-pound appointment book—but more on that a little later.
Then there are the members of our peer group who are so busy that
it is impossible for them to punch the “Reply” button
on their e-mail, if they even choose to open their e-mail that day.
It’s totally acceptable to respond with “Can’t respond
to that right now. But I will soon.”
Their cousins are the ones who do not return phone calls within a
48-hour time frame. It’s totally acceptable to answer the call
right away, which will probably be received by one’s own answering
machine. “Thanks for calling. I can’t talk right now,
but I'll try to reach you within the next 48 hours.”
These folks are the ones who squawk the loudest about being professional
and rant about not being treated like professionals. They also tote
around these enormous leather-bound appointment-address books that
have their lives doled out in 10-minute parcels.
I’ve never looked, but each volume probably contains Donald
Rumsfeld’s secret number.
How dreadfully important we have all become. The Grand Book of Hours
and the latest phase in appointment making is the Palm Pilot, of course.
With such powerful life-planners, these folks—like me—still
are late for appointments and are intolerant of anyone who makes them
wait.
A superb observation on the this contemporary “Book of Hours”
is made by Gary Eberle in “Sacred Time and the Search for Meaning”
(Shambhala Publications, 2002), printed in Martin Marty’s Context,
volume 35, number 16:
People treat their daily planners the way monks and nuns used to
treat their prayer books. They keep them close at all times. They
clasp them with missionary zeal as they head from meeting to meeting.
. . .
Like medieval displays of conspicuous piety, the planner announces
to the world that you are one whose life and time are worth something.
. . . The parallels between religious books of hours and
our contemporary ones reflect our respective sets of values.
While the intricate Celtic knots of the Book of Kells invited us
to contemplate the interrelationship between the world of time and
the world of eternity, the various interactive sections of the modern
planner show only the interweaving of the various clock-bound schedules
that make up the fabric of our contemporary lives. . . .
. . . Yet none of this points beyond our horizontal realm
to the vertical realm in which we also live.
You can reach Fred Moleck via email at fmoleck@earthlink.net
