Is not formal worship, some ask, an irrelevant waste of time? Perhaps it can be so construed. For candles and flowers are as irrelevant as the song of birds, hymn and chant are as non-utilitarian as a lover’s kiss, prayers and litanies are just words—cheap as children’s smiles.

And yet, that is the whole point of it—that we who are poor bring to God who lacks nothing that which costs us nothing to bring, but which expresses to him our faith and devotion; and before the world, our dependence.

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Gender-neutral version:

Is not formal worship, some ask, an irrelevant waste of time? Perhaps it can be so construed. For candles and flowers are as irrelevant as the song of birds, hymn and chant are as non-utilitarian as a lover’s kiss, prayers and litanies are just words—cheap as children’s smiles.

And yet, that is the whole point of it—that we who are poor bring to God who lacks nothing that which costs us nothing to bring, but which expresses to God our faith and devotion; and before the world, our dependence.