This week's Roamin' Catholics: Body and Soul ventured ten miles from home base to the 5:00 Saturday evening mass at St. Mary's Catholic Church in Rockville, MD. After a quick read on their website, I learned the Parish was established in 1813, the first mass in their new church was held in 1817 and in the 1960's a new church was built (presumably because the Church was growing and a larger building was needed). There was debate as to whether to tear down the old church or not... the decision was made to keep it and restore it.
HER OBSERVATIONS:
Quite frankly, I love the look of the old church, but I am not a huge fan of the newer one where mass is held. It has a sort of "church in the round" structure to it, so seating is 180 degrees around the altar. I found that when we walked it (on the side) I immediately had to establish connection to the pews directly facing the altar. I think this is just a personal preference. As an interior designer, there was one part of the altar that had me scratching my head. It was the large gold "lotus leaf" supported by four large columns. I took a picture because I knew I would be bring this up. My question is "WHY?"
So, the mass... For me and my lack of singing ability, I felt that I had hit the double jackpot when I learned that this was a Saturday evening mass with NO SINGING! We were always told at St. Patrick's Grade School that "when you sing, you pray twice". What if you weren't blessed with the singing gene? How about when you cook, you pray twice? How about when you sew, you pray twice? How about when you're nice to someone, you pray twice? I think with only two blog posts, you know my thoughts on singing in church. I know that if I had been blessed with a good voice I would feel differently.
I want to spend my time on the homily. The priest had an accent, so I really had to pay attention. And I am also finding that due to this blog, I am paying more attention at mass because I know I am going to report what I've learned to the blogosphere. The priest spoke about everyone having to find "their thing" and what made them happy. He then tied this into making God a part of "your thing" and what makes you happy. He was saying that without God we would continue to search for our happiness and not find it. I'm not timing the homilies, and maybe I should? As a sidenote, I will say that some of my most memorable homilies have been less than one minute long. Can I refer to these as "drop the mic homilies"? He had potential for one of those if he only said his closing statement. That was, "Let's move towards God, not run away from Him".
BEST PART: Holding Lou's hand while saying the "Our Father"
WORST PART: Atmosphere
Now onto feeding the bodies Our grub spot this week was a restaurant neither of us had ever heard of called Botanero in the King Farm section of Rockville. I picked it solely based on Google and Yelp reviews.
We had a 6:45 reservation but got there about 45 minutes ahead of schedule. So we took a seat at the bar for a glass of red. We were handed several menus... it was Restaurant Week so there was a menu for that, plus their regular menu and then the menu of all menus, Happy Hour - where everything on the menu was five dollars!! A five dollar glass of wine in the DC Metro area? Yes please! We learned many things after sitting for about ten minutes. This place does regular meals, but they also do "small plates" (many on the Happy Hour menu). I love small plates! I can try a variety of items and not commit to an entire meal... yes, I have decision making issues. The other thing we learned is that this restaurant just won, The Best of Bethesda 2018. This is quite an accomplishment, especially considering the restaurant is not in Bethesda.
We ended up canceling our table reservation and spent our time at the bar. We sampled several of their small plates. Most noteworthy were the empinadas. Since they were so delicious, I was afraid that nothing else we tried would compare, but I was happily mistaken. We also tried the figs stuffed with goat cheese and wrapped with bacon (yeah, don't judge, they were delicious). Lou was especially fond of the pork soft tacos. Our bartender, Nahu, was very courteous and helpful with the menu. I could tell he took pride in working at such a wonderful restaurant. We will definitely be back!
BEST PART: Everything
WORST PART: Leaving
HIS OBSERVATIONS:
St. Mary’s in Rockville is a church that we have been to before just not during our year long Roamin’ Catholics 2018 odyssey. I’m not a fan of the “modern” church architecture and it seems this church was built during that movement's heyday. The lighting was dark and the church did not have an uplifting feel that one would expect to get from a place of worship. That said, this particular Saturday evening Mass was short by weekly standards and contained no singing. For this lifelong Catholic, a welcome plus. Our celebrant had an accent and was a little hard to understand given the acoustics. At times he seemed to forget that he had a co-celebrant in the Deacon that was on the altar with him. The most memorable moment during Mass was a bit bizarre. During the sign of peace (the traditional time during Mass when you turn to those around you and offer a gesture of peace. It could be anything from a nod, a hug or a handhake), no one in our vicinity extended their hand to either of us. Mary and I gave each other a kiss as is our practice but those around us (everyone) only gave a, “yeah, I wish you peace, but not too much, don’t touch me…” kind of look. To each his own. In full disclosure, some churches have you stand and greet those around you before Mass starts. I must admit, I am not a big fan of this.
HER OBSERVATIONS:
Quite frankly, I love the look of the old church, but I am not a huge fan of the newer one where mass is held. It has a sort of "church in the round" structure to it, so seating is 180 degrees around the altar. I found that when we walked it (on the side) I immediately had to establish connection to the pews directly facing the altar. I think this is just a personal preference. As an interior designer, there was one part of the altar that had me scratching my head. It was the large gold "lotus leaf" supported by four large columns. I took a picture because I knew I would be bring this up. My question is "WHY?"
So, the mass... For me and my lack of singing ability, I felt that I had hit the double jackpot when I learned that this was a Saturday evening mass with NO SINGING! We were always told at St. Patrick's Grade School that "when you sing, you pray twice". What if you weren't blessed with the singing gene? How about when you cook, you pray twice? How about when you sew, you pray twice? How about when you're nice to someone, you pray twice? I think with only two blog posts, you know my thoughts on singing in church. I know that if I had been blessed with a good voice I would feel differently.
I want to spend my time on the homily. The priest had an accent, so I really had to pay attention. And I am also finding that due to this blog, I am paying more attention at mass because I know I am going to report what I've learned to the blogosphere. The priest spoke about everyone having to find "their thing" and what made them happy. He then tied this into making God a part of "your thing" and what makes you happy. He was saying that without God we would continue to search for our happiness and not find it. I'm not timing the homilies, and maybe I should? As a sidenote, I will say that some of my most memorable homilies have been less than one minute long. Can I refer to these as "drop the mic homilies"? He had potential for one of those if he only said his closing statement. That was, "Let's move towards God, not run away from Him".
BEST PART: Holding Lou's hand while saying the "Our Father"
WORST PART: Atmosphere
Now onto feeding the bodies Our grub spot this week was a restaurant neither of us had ever heard of called Botanero in the King Farm section of Rockville. I picked it solely based on Google and Yelp reviews.
We had a 6:45 reservation but got there about 45 minutes ahead of schedule. So we took a seat at the bar for a glass of red. We were handed several menus... it was Restaurant Week so there was a menu for that, plus their regular menu and then the menu of all menus, Happy Hour - where everything on the menu was five dollars!! A five dollar glass of wine in the DC Metro area? Yes please! We learned many things after sitting for about ten minutes. This place does regular meals, but they also do "small plates" (many on the Happy Hour menu). I love small plates! I can try a variety of items and not commit to an entire meal... yes, I have decision making issues. The other thing we learned is that this restaurant just won, The Best of Bethesda 2018. This is quite an accomplishment, especially considering the restaurant is not in Bethesda.
We ended up canceling our table reservation and spent our time at the bar. We sampled several of their small plates. Most noteworthy were the empinadas. Since they were so delicious, I was afraid that nothing else we tried would compare, but I was happily mistaken. We also tried the figs stuffed with goat cheese and wrapped with bacon (yeah, don't judge, they were delicious). Lou was especially fond of the pork soft tacos. Our bartender, Nahu, was very courteous and helpful with the menu. I could tell he took pride in working at such a wonderful restaurant. We will definitely be back!
BEST PART: Everything
WORST PART: Leaving
HIS OBSERVATIONS:
St. Mary’s in Rockville is a church that we have been to before just not during our year long Roamin’ Catholics 2018 odyssey. I’m not a fan of the “modern” church architecture and it seems this church was built during that movement's heyday. The lighting was dark and the church did not have an uplifting feel that one would expect to get from a place of worship. That said, this particular Saturday evening Mass was short by weekly standards and contained no singing. For this lifelong Catholic, a welcome plus. Our celebrant had an accent and was a little hard to understand given the acoustics. At times he seemed to forget that he had a co-celebrant in the Deacon that was on the altar with him. The most memorable moment during Mass was a bit bizarre. During the sign of peace (the traditional time during Mass when you turn to those around you and offer a gesture of peace. It could be anything from a nod, a hug or a handhake), no one in our vicinity extended their hand to either of us. Mary and I gave each other a kiss as is our practice but those around us (everyone) only gave a, “yeah, I wish you peace, but not too much, don’t touch me…” kind of look. To each his own. In full disclosure, some churches have you stand and greet those around you before Mass starts. I must admit, I am not a big fan of this.
With respect to dinner (feeding our body), we dined at Botanaro in King Farm. This is a small plates establishment and they had a
phenomenal happy hour. Their HH menu featured $5 food items as well as
some excellent $5 wines! This week starts restaurant week and they had a
prix fix menu for that occasion but we opted for the cheaper bar menu and were
not disappointed. We satisfied our hunger by dining on a variety of small
plates including, empanadas, tacos, bacon wrapped dates, and tempura
shrimp. It was nice to get to try a little bit of everything. My
favorite was a toss up between the tacos and the empanadas. This were
excellent given that this was not a “Mexican” restaurant but billed as a Spanish
restaurant.
We've decided to end each post with what we are now calling a "SOULFIE"...
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