"You'll come for the ashes, but stay for the cross"

I do not know why so many people in the clergy think that the laity want their theology lite and their liturgy feel good. Today, Good Friday, the local parish church was packed. The same was true of yesterday, Palm Sunday, and Ash Wednesday. Of course the reason for this is that many people who don't go to church regularly come "for the ashes". Fr Neuhaus mentioned the same thing on Ash Wednesday; that people like to go get ashes even if they aren't Catholic now, or never where. I don't want to sound like I am pessimistic about this, I am very happy it. Nor do I think that it is great only because it can bring a lot of people back into the Church. In fact it might bring very few people back. I say that because, speaking from my own experience, if I ever left the church I would still go to mass on Ash Wednesday and service on Good Friday. There is just something about these two services that is so transcendent I don't even know what to say it transcends. Maybe its bing reminded where are mortal in one, and that we bow to something greater than ourselves (in the veneration of the cross) in the other. Pretty soon though we are going to have to start calling, to borrow a term, thes guys "lenten" or "Holy Week" Catholics, instead of Christmas Catholics.