How do you worship?

The above picture is from this past weekend at a retreat down in Texas where over 100 teens learned, experiences, and shared their faith on a much deeper level.  Many people never thought you could worship our beautiful trinitarian God in our Catholic faith through Hip Hop, yet time and time again I have been led to do so for many.

Reflecting upon this image and just this weekend in general, I decided to write this blog post where I want to explore not just the title question, but a few things....

First - What is worship?
Second is - How do we worship?
Third is - Is there any proper way?
And perhaps many other questions can be addressed along the way. I do not intend to answer these questions myself one by one, but instead present some thoughts that we can apply when approaching worship.

But first, just using a simple google search, let's find common language for what "worship is" by giving it a definition.

In general "worship" has to do with us looking outside of ourselves to someone/something that we hold in high esteem, and value.  In many ways, we see this person or thing as ideal and our hearts/minds are oriented towards it in some way.  This can be a celebrity, teacher, parent, friend or even a spouse or even our favorite clothing brand. Whatever this may be, the more we worship, the more we become like the thing we worship.

Anything that we worship that is less than God however, will only limit us in growth.  As my good friend Alex Gotay said on "Let Me See Something" about the mystics, "If we're not moving forward, then we're moving backward." So let's think about it.... if the thing that we worship has a limit, then our worship will have a limit; and if our worship has a limit then our growth has a limit.... Fill in the blanks.

​Now about how we worship.... Well, we do so in action and in word... In song, and in art... In our thoughts and reflections and intentions... That's worship.

Obviously the actions and output of our internal intentions of worship should reflect an orientation towards the thing we worship.... And if that which we worship is God, would not the words, art, actions, etc be oriented towards what is good, true, and beautiful?  Good logic and analysis of our world around us can tell us what is good and true, however beauty is relative so the content of our worship would definitely look similar if true, but its presentation may take many different forms.

Before I move forward, remember that I am Catholic.... And I do believe and stand by the teachings of the church, so I am not saying that salvation is true by other means than Christ, and of course I believe in the scriptures, sacramental life, etc. but sometimes we have fallen into a state of getting caught up in what we would call "lower case 't' tradition" and confuse it as "capital 'T' Tradition".

I end this with two scripture quotes as thoughts to reflect on our current forms of worship...

"So whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do everything for the glory of God." - 1 Corinthians 10:31

"...every good tree bears good fruit, and a rotten tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a rotten tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire. So by their fruits you will know them." - Matthew 7:17-20

​- The Symbol
- All is Love