{Traditional Latin Mass attending Catholics will be happy}
“For me, Catholicism was much more a matter of the invisible world.” Jerry Garcia
I believe in one God,
the Father almighty,
maker of heaven and earth,
of all things visible and invisible.
From the Nicene Creed,
2011 (English Translation Update): Catholic parishes adopted a new translation of the Roman Missal, changing “We believe” to “I believe” and replacing “seen and unseen” with “visible and invisible”.
I believe in one Lord Jesus Christ,
the Only Begotten Son of God,
born of the Father before all ages.
God from God, Light from Light,
true God from true God,
begotten, not made, consubstantial with the Father;
through him all things were made.
For us men and for our salvation
he came down from heaven,
and by the Holy Spirit was incarnate of the Virgin Mary,
and became man.
For our sake he was crucified under Pontius Pilate,
he suffered death and was buried,
and rose again on the third day
in accordance with the Scriptures.
“For me, the most real thing about Catholicism, was my presence in the Church and the awesome sense that the church could fill you with just the reality of it and the rumbling of the Latin mass, the sensual”— from Jerry on Jerry, The Unpublished Jerry Garcia Interviews, edited by Dennis McNally
Jerry on Jerry: The Unpublished Jerry Garcia Interviews (Black Dog & Leventhal). Edited by Dennis McNally , used w permission.
I recall seeing and hearing Garcia say in a television news interview something to the effect that when the Church moved away from the Latin mass, (to the Novos Order mass,) away from the incense, the bells, the mystery, the ancient language, “they, (meaning Grateful Dead fans) came to us”. Oh boy. That interview may be in the UC Santa Cruz library archives.
Celebration of the Latin Mass was in decline in 1965 and after, but the traditional Latin Mass, now in the 21st century is having a great resurgence.
At that time in the Church, soon after Vatican II, the Church swung open wide the doors, and as Paul VI wrote that through some fissure, the smoke of Satan entered in.
Referring to the situation of the Church today, the Holy Father
affirms that he has a sense that “from some fissure the smoke of Satan
has entered the temple of God.” There is doubt, incertitude,
problematic, disquiet, dissatisfaction, confrontation. There is no
longer trust of the Church; they trust the first profane prophet who
speaks in some journal or some social movement, and they run after him
and ask him if he has the formula of true life. And we are not alert
to the fact that we are already the owners and masters of the formula
of true life. Doubt has entered our consciences, and it entered by
windows that should have been open to the light. Science exists to
give us truths that do not separate from God, but make us seek him all
the more and celebrate him with greater intensity; instead, science
gives us criticism and doubt. Scientists are those who more
thoughtfully and more painfully exert their minds. But they end up
teaching us: “I don’t know, we don’t know, we cannot know.” The
school becomes the gymnasium of confusion and sometimes of absurd
contradictions. Progress is celebrated, only so that it can then be
demolished with revolutions that are more radical and more strange, so
as to negate everything that has been achieved, and to come away as
primitives after having so exalted the advances of the modern world.
This state of uncertainty even holds sway in the Church. There was
the belief that after the Council there would be a day of sunshine for
the history of the Church. Instead, it is the arrival of a day of
clouds, of tempest, of darkness, of research, of uncertainty. We
preach ecumenism but we constantly separate ourselves from others. We
seek to dig abysses instead of filling them in.
Elsewhere Jerry is quoted saying, as preserved in McNally’s book –
“The Excelsior district of San Francisco was ethnically mostly Italian and Irish. My family was pretty much Spanish-Irish, a stricken combination of Catholicism’s Weirder Interpretations… So one block, scarcely 100 yards from the door at 87 Harrington, was God’s House! In those days they still had the wonderful Latin Mass with its resonant sonorities and mysterious ritual movements, the incense, the music, choir, organ, bells, candles, the muted light through the stained glass window”. Above from Jerry on Jerry, The Unpublished Jerry Garcia Interviews, edited by Dennis McNally Copyright 2015 Jerry Garcia Family, LLC
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Jerry mentions his mother’s death, and his Roman Catholic upbringing.
In this below link, you will observe Jerry almost say, a word, which I believe was to be unfortunately, yet he quickly catches himself for whatever reason, at 12 min and 42 sec in and does not say the word. Very telling.
Watch this interview from 12 minutes in:
If the interviewer had observed that moment, it could have been an area to further explore.
Did Jerry almost say, unfortunately, that he didn’t get more of a Catholic upbringing, or intimate that he wished it stuck a bit? Even then in the mid 1970s, was Jerry aware that some of the choices he had made aided his life to go a bit sideways? Jesus Christ was close to Jerry as He is to all of us. God can be close to all of us, less so, if we block Him out. Yet, God does write straight, with crooked lines.
Garcia did have a Christian funeral service in August of 1995 celebrated by the same Episcopalian priest, Matthew Fox, that officiated over Jerry’s Christian marriage ceremony. Despite not “practicing” his Catholic faith, there is a tremendous amount of grace that comes through the sacraments, and Jerry did receive at least three of the seven sacraments – baptism, penance/confession and reception of the Eucharist/communion. I am unsure if he was confirmed. Perhaps some of his Irish and Spanish ancestors going back hundreds of years, were holy and devout and they were in some ways able to pray for their descendant. See Hebrews 12 : 1
Here is a link to an article where Garcia speaks a bit on his belief in God.
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When Jerry Garcia talked about religion and if he believed in God. article Rafael Polcaro
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There is plenty of mysticism and mystery in the life of Christ, the Saints, the Holy Spirit, and true spirituality. Sometimes people look for love and truth in dangerous places, and sometimes with some bad medicine men in the scene. Taking drugs to obtain spiritual insights is not necessary, in my opinion.
Turn to Jesus Christ something calls for you…
Above, more on smoke of Satan entering the Church
