This is excellent and exactly how I feel. I very much dislike the informality and social scene that has become prevalent before and after and even during Mass. It is meant to be solemn, quiet, peaceful, prayerful, not full of chatter, laughter, and commotion. I also dislike it when people use the Kiss of Peace to move about the Church & converse with people. STOP. I want the quiet, sacredness of Mass. I saw a column from NRC today which was about children making noise at Mass and how we should welcome it because their parents are bringing them up in the Faith and their presence is a sign of community. I HATE when parents allow their children to make tons of noise at Mass. Obviously babies will occasionally make noise but this lack of parental supervision, where children bang loud toys, chatter, and parents are oblivious is not alright. I don't want noise at Mass.

Your brother should do as a friend of mine did. Talk to to the Pastor about putting up a sign at the church entrance that says,FROM THIS POINT ON SILENCE,PEOPLE AT PRAYER!!

Ah Elizabeth. I also do not like excesive noise in the Baptist church I attend in NZ. Worshipping God in the community which is the body of Christ overides any noise made by children, musicians, sometimes rain and sometimes seagulls on the roof. Can you give your brother a pair of earpugs for Sundays?

I can sympathize with you and your brother. I know what you are talking about. I have considered earplugs. On particularly bad days, I have considered ripping all the Hagan, Lord of the Dance out of the song books to stuff in my ears. Both would work I guess.

I hope your brother has enough sense not to receive the Eucharist at those weekday masses. As a Catholic, he is obligated to attend Sunday Mass & Holy Days of Obligation. Period! Otherwise he may very well have a mortal sin on his soul & more so if he receives Communion during the weekdays & not attend the required masses.

I can sympathize w/you & your brother. I actually had to travel through 2 towns to find a parish that celebrates the mass reverently (with chanting & some of the prayers said in Latin) & correctly by 3 outstanding priests who preach wonderful homilies 100% of the time.

If I couldn't find such a parish, I would still go to Mass on Sunday simply because it's not about me & my view on how the Mass should be celebrated. It's about Jesus Christ & how much I need to consume the Holy Eucharist to help me serve others better, regardless of the hustle & bustle taking place before the Celebration or for that matter during. As long as the Epiclesis in the Eucharistic Prayer is prayed correctly by the priest, ultimately that is all that really counts IMHO.

This is not a bad idea. Maybe I will start attending my parish's 7:30am Mass. Of course I do like to get a little extra sleep on Sunday mornings, but the 9:30 is the children's Mass, which means the parents just show up and let the kids run free (well, almost), and the 11:30 is hit or miss. Sometimes the music at 11:30 is wonderful, other times it's new stuff that makes me want to shout STOP! Add to that the fact that the main cantor in our parish shows up late every 11:30 Mass and it's weird. He starts singing a good 15 minutes or more into the Mass, prior to that it's generally somebody with a not so wonderful voice. Now I have to decide, do I do with less sleep and miss the incense and such that often attend out 11:30am, or go to 7:30am and have more silence?

By the way, I'm starting to wonder if there aren't people in our parish who go out of their way to not let it be silent. I can't tell you how many times I've stayed late with the kids to pray after Mass (most Masses) only to have folks seemingly go out of their way to stop and talk right near us so we can't think or pray. And they do not use their quiet voices. It's very upsetting. Oh boy, have I become a grumpy old man?

Joe Tomaino, we have one of those signs. After a while signs don't work. People have to first recognize their own need to quiet down. Then they might recognize it in the needs of others, too, and behave accordingly, but it starts with understanding the value of recollection, to begin with. Something that fundamental is no longer obvious to our very distracted culture.

I have to agree about the noise at mass and the KIDS. Now I have 6 kids (3 still at home) of my own and when they were too young to know when to be quiet, I didn't bring them to Church. I went to one mass; my wife went to another. Just as I wouldn't dream of being a young boisterous child to a classical music concert, I wouldn't want them distrurbing other people at mass. And not just little kids either. I've been at mass where 9, 10, 11 etc. kids pull out gameboys during mass and the parent is just oblivious to it all. What's wrong with those people? Finally, don't get me started on Cheerios. Tell your kids they can eat afterwards or take em OUT of the Church to have their snack, but don't be opening up a feeding trough in my pew - please!

Jeannine:

I'm sure her brother goes to the Saturday vigil. Though at my parish it may be the worst as far as reverence goes. The majority of folks who attend that Mass at older folks who are Vatican II spirit types. That and they come late and leave early. I was amazed at how many leave early when I attended it years ago. It was a very large percentage of elderly folks making for the doors to be first out of the lot.

As a priest, when I travel outside my Diocese, I sometimes have to attend Mass as a lay person, especially because of recently increased security measures for priests wishing to minister outside their own dioceses. When I'm only going to be in town for a day or two, I prefer not to go through the hassle of clergy clearance letters. As a result, after three decades in the priesthood, I am appreciating the lay persons' experiences of Mass as never before. I agree with Elizabeth Scalia on the main thrust of her argument. However, I do not believe her brother is exempt from Sunday Mass, unless his problem is pathological. In most dioceses, there are always a few churches where Masses of a quiet nature are available. You may have to drive a longer distance, or get up earlier, but we Catholics are expected to make sacrifices for our faith. If worse comes to worst, one could use earplugs.

At our Sunday Mass at 9:30 in a Chicago suburb, the noise before Mass got so bad that the pastor had the 40 person choir start singing about 10 minutes before Mass, every week. The congregation found that they had a difficult time trying to talk over that much singing and now the worshipers are more focused when it's time to start the Sacrifice. The regular music on Sunday still features a drum set though...

It sounds to me that your brother is using epikeia fittingly. Epikeia to this day is the best hidden virtue in Catholicism. And not just clergy hide it in their books to protect laymen from themselves. Read layman Germain Grisez's "Way of the Lord Jesus" (moral theology tomes) and with a high powered magnifying glass, you will find epikeia but surrounded with so many warnings, you'll think you're reading the warnings on the side of an esoteric pill bottle.
Aquinas explained that outside natural law in the realm of written Church or civil law, the lawgiver cannot foresee every situation. Epikeia is the virtue whereby the individual person knows that he is exempt not from the intention of the law but from the letter of the law in his case. E.g....you are driving a seriously bleeding
person to a hospital at night. If you stop at red lights, he may bleed to death. You
slow down but go through every red light as you see no car going through the
green. "That's epikeia"... (sung to the tune of "That's Entertainment").
In fact I had Jesuit teachers for 8 years and I can't say they mentioned it for sure. I could have found it deep in the empty moral theology section of their
library on a rainy day. Christ repeatedly uses it against pharisaical versions of the Sabbath. No matter...Church writers will hide it til Elijah returns. But I suspect your brother knows his stuff in this area. He is honoring the intention of the law through the Mass attendance on the other days while fleeing what is morally demoralizing in his case with his particular emotions.

At our parish, no one talks before Mass. Maybe it helps that there isn't really a gathering space on the way to the-you just go straight into the Sanctuary basically, and it is quiet in there. I totally agree though that kids who are old enough and adults ought to enter Mass quietly, pray silently, and then sit and wait for Mass to begin, and set-up ought to be as quiet at possible (certainly free of noisy distracting laughter etc).

I do take issue with the attitude of people like"Jane." While yes, there are parents who need to parent more at Mass because their children are not behaving age-appropriately, I think there are many more parents who don't feel welcome at Mass because we are afraid that, despite our best efforts, our kids won't be quiet enough to satisfy grumpy people who "don't want noise at Mass."

My husband and I have been attending Mass seperately for almost a year because our toddler is noisy. He's 2 1/2, & he is age-appropriately noisy, and getting better each week at sitting still and being quiet. But he's not there yet. And frankly, I'm sick of the idea that some people think their "right" to a noise-free Mass trumps my family going together or my son going at all. So much for "let the little children come to me"

(I appreciate Ms. Scalia keeping the focus on the behavior of adults. Although a discussion of noisy kids and having attitudes welcoming of life could be an intersting topic for a future column perhaps!)

Great post and very true. This reminds me of the monthly "All Night Adoration" at our parish. Great idea, but I don't go because there is very little quiet. The very well meaning lady who runs it is constantly doing "guided meditations" or leading the rosary, or playing music off of a "boom-box," or having a special guest speak. When I go to adoration I want to adore Christ - not listen to a CD of some little child prodigy singing Ave Maria.

One thing I think would help keep parishes quiet would be if the churches turned the lights very low. Now I know you may think, well you can't read the bulletin or the missal, etc. BUT, if you turn the lights very low (assuming you don't have one of those very sunny bright churches with lots of windows) and have lots of candles, it automatically tones people down, brings quiet, more peace and a prayerful atmosphere. Think of the Orthodox churches in the Holy Land. The masses in the catacombs only had a few candles and the early Christians did not need missals. You are actively discouraged from talking to a neighbor when lights are low, and children quiet down too. Everyone has less stimulation. Maybe if we did this the old hard-of-hearing people, and the rude, will take their conversations outside where they belong and we can actually pray.

I too have found that quietness at yoga. I have tried to bring that sense of setting an intention before yoga when I say my prayers before Mass starts. I think the socialization in the pews with some has become crazy. A hushed hello or other greeting is fine. We also enjoy seeing families at Church. For goodness gracious they are the future and so happy to see families attending. Most by us recognize when kids are beyond a little fussiness, take them out then rejoin us. I wish there were more chants and traditional music. I hate feeling like I am at a concert where we all are waiting for the 'band' to finish their set before we can continue our worship.

And what did the first Christians do, as recorded in the Acts of the Apostles and other documents? For that matter, what was the likely mode of worship that Jesus attended? Neither Temple, synagogue, nor house worship fit the model you describe as preferable.

I love silence. I love awe and hushed tones and refraining from chit-chat. I also love medievalism and the nostalgia of "the way things were when I was a kid." But I don't confuse those personal preferences with worship imperatives. Learning is state-dependent, and I think learning worship is most state-dependent of all. The way that you learned to hear God and praise Him is a mother-tongue and not amenable to change. Nor do I see any particular reason why people who learned worship in a 1950's American Catholic style (itself descended from other styles that have worked for a lot of folks over the centuries) should feel any disquiet that this is who they are and how they worship.

But neither do they have any right to demand that others learn their "mother tongue," nor acknowledge that it is superior.

But, but, but...we know about awe, and respect, and sacred time - and those others are missing something that they should learn about For Their Own Good. Sorry, it doesn't hold.

Most worship innovations are indeed abhorrent. I am reminded of CS Lewis's statement that the command was to feed my sheep, not do experiments on them. What in the world are people thinking? Yet the way out is forward, not back. There are no buses leaving for our childhood. My own hope it that a combined revival of two older traditions, one of festival worship (and Catholics have been especially good at that) the other of contemplative, can be done as a package, though each falls to the ground on its own.

By accident I found myself in an SSPX chapel lately (I didn't know it was an SSPX chapel until I sat down and looked at their parish pamphlet, by then the Mass had just started so I stayed...but did not take Communion). It was the first Traditional Latin Mass I had ever attended. It was a low Mass. Very quiet. I actually found myself praying in Mass. I was able to think, and offer my thoughts to God. I actually left the church feeling refreshed and at peace. Usually Sunday Mass leaves me completely stressed out and frustrated (and at times angry). We need to return to a sense of reverence and silence. I don't know how much of loud, busy Masses I can take anymore. I think I am going to find me an approved Latin Mass in my area. I am not a traditionalist, but I need to be able to think, pray and decompress at Mass. (Oh, and by the way the SSPX seemed to have a great sense of parish community...loud well attended coffee hour, parish outings, etc. but in the church proper you could hear a pin drop...awesome).

Crunchy Con Mom says: "And frankly, I'm sick of the idea that some people think their "right" to a noise-free Mass trumps my family going together or my son going at all. So much for "let the little children come to me"
----

Let me ask you a serious question CCM: If you were going to a classical concert or to a play, would you allow your toddler to make noise and roam around the aisle playing with his/her toys? I think I know the answer by the fact that you do what I did when I had toddlers, ie go to a different mass from my spouse.

I want parents to have the same respect for the people around them at mass as they would at a concert or a play. It's not a question of "rights" as much as question of charity.

Jesus did say: "suffer the little children to come to me" but I don't think that equates to: "let the little children come to me and let everyone else suffer!"

I have four young children, and for the most part they keep quiet during Mass, but Con Mom is correct. We are far better off tolerating slightly noisy children. An aging population like ours in the U.S. tends to have increasing intolerance for all things children. This is an evil we must strive to avoid. Just look to Europe for a good example of what such intolerance breeds.

I have to second Crunchy Con Mom. My family also has stopped going to church as a family because we're tired of people glaring at my noisy 1 1/2 year old. And frankly I resent my fellow parishioners who think they have a right to bully us into this arrangement. It's just not fair for people to say oblivious parents allow their children to act up. Our church doesn't have a cry room or even a vestibule, so short of leaving him home there is absolutely nothing we can do to silence him. And I don't know when bringing a baptized person to mass became unacceptable behavior.

Before I had kids, other peoples' noisy babies never bothered me. (The only babies I found distracting were adorable ones flirting with me.) And I have to wonder if maybe the reason I was able to tune them out is I didn't allow myself to sit there mentally running down their parents. A mere noise is much easier to ignore than a calculated insult, and if you allow yourself to assume that every unruly kid is culpably being inflicted on you by a selfish parent, well yeah, you're going to find them a big stumbling block. But if you just view it as inevitable ambient noise, well your mileage may vary, but personally I never found it to be a problem.

Bill Bannon,
Not attending Sunday Mass because 1 is physically unable due to sickness or caring for someone or not within driving distance is not the same as freely choosing not to attend as Elizabeth's brother is doing. I think you are misinterpreting the spirit of Aquinas (And I wouldn't reference Grisez. He is not 100% in line with true Catholic moral teaching.)

As a mother of 7, with the youngest now 10, I can assure you that it is possible to train your children to sit quietly for one hour (only one hour!) at 1 year of age. We had family friends who practiced with their children starting at 6 months, sitting and holding them still for one hour each day; we followed their example with our twins, who needed the extra practice. :) And what a blessing it is to know that you can attend a wedding or funeral or concert with your children and know that they are capable of proper behavior, because they do it every Sunday. It's not a matter of ability; it's a matter of our lowered cultural expectations. What do you think the Quakers did? Their kids came to church!

Another twist: I'm a missionary to Mexico since 1977. When Mexicans go to the States, they tell me they are saddened that the Anglo Masses are so "dead". This is what attracts many of them to Pentecostal and Evangelical sects...

I went to visit my daughter in NY couple of years ago and attended Sat evening mass. No arm-waving, handshakes, hand holding or singing. Loved it. Almost went again Sunday morning. I'm an old-timer who grew up when it was Latin and quiet. I don't miss the Latin but would like to be able to concentrate on prayer and not be distracted by constant singing and 20-minute sermons....

This morning I saw an article by Nancy Frazier O'Brien on the website Catholic News Service, which quotes a contemporary sociologist:

"In short, sitting alone in the pew does not enhance one's life satisfaction," Putnam and Lim wrote. "Only when one forms social networks in a congregation does religious service attendance lead to a higher level of life satisfaction."

With the preponderance of "grey hairs" at our Masses it is a joyful thing to hear babies crying and children fussing. They are the future of our church. Praise God our parish is approaching more baptisms than funerals! Bring the children to Mass. We can take it!!!

At the risk of sounding like a Cranky Old Lady, I think much of the source of this sort of problem--we have it at my Anglican church, too--is that children are no longer trained to be still and silent at a young age. My mother was unbelievably strict about my behavior both in church and at symphony concerts, which I began attending when I was about five years old. And she wasn't alone. In grade school, I attended Young People's Concerts at the old San Francisco Opera House. The ushers were ever vigilant and unbending in their enforcement of proper behavior during those concerts. Years later, when I took my own children to Young People's Concerts in San Diego, I was shattered by the noise and unruly behavior. Never went back.

Jeanine,
Christ actually calls us to juggle two balls: law and freedom. You are juggling one ball: law. I blame that on a Church culture that rarely speaks of epikeia (I'll bet it's nowhere in the catechism though it saturates the Christ/Sabbath struggles in the gospel).
Hence because you are juggling one ball, you dismiss the inner struggle of Elizabeth's brother. His struggle is trivial to you. The pharisees did this exact thing to Christ and the apostles as they picked grain as they walked and ate it on the Sabbath. Because the pharisees were juggling the one ball of the law, they trivialized or dismissed the hunger of the apostles as no hunger at all as you dismiss a man's spiritual/ emotional needs on the Sabbath. Christ didn't do that because He said the law was made for man not man for the law (again...nothing to do with natural law which when known, has no exceptions).
Watch Christ as He places the hunger of his apostles above the written, non natural law....ergo the hunger is real to Christ...not to be dismissed by a reading of the law...if sick, if too far etc.

"When the Pharisees saw this, they said to him, "See, your disciples are doing what is unlawful to do on the sabbath."He said to them, "Have you not read what
David did when he and his companions were hungry, how he went into the house of God and ate the bread of offering, which neither he nor his companions but only the priests could lawfully eat?"

We have to ask ourselves who would we have sided with if we lived then. Would you Jeannine have felt the pharisees had a point and Christ was being liberal and jesuitical? Why couldn't the apostles fast til they got to a cafe? Why didn't they carry day old bread? Why didn't Christ miraculously produce some as before.
I think we are all lucky we did not have to face the test the pharisees faced. I think all of us at varying times in our Catholicism, would have accused Christ of breaking the Sabbath.

4 elements of a healthy spiritual life: Time in private prayer, committment to social justice, having a humble heart, and community prayer (Holy Longing, Ronald Rolheiser). Balance is the key. M-F is "Brother Scalia's" private time, Sunday is where he can work on the other 3.

Never miss a column Elizabeth - keep up the good work!

Anne says: I resent my fellow parishioners who think they have a right to bully us into this arrangement. It's just not fair for people to say oblivious parents allow their children to act up. Our church doesn't have a cry room or even a vestibule, so short of leaving him home there is absolutely nothing we can do to silence him. And I don't know when bringing a baptized person to mass became unacceptable behavior.
=======
Whoah. whoah. First of all, it's only politeness for parents to ensure that their children are not a distraction to others in the Church. If you want to call that bullying, then you might as well call the Rules of Etique, "bullying". I raised my 6 children to be quiet and respectful as mass. No, I didn't bring them to mass until they were capable of that behavior (which occurs at much younger age than most people think) and so yes, I did often go to separate masses from my wife. It didn't kill us.

But I will tell you that if you insist on good behavior from your children, you WILL get it. But you have to be ready to remove them at the slightest sign of trouble (get your seat on aisle and near the back the first few times.) They learn very quickly how to behave, believe me, I've done it. Also, NEVER bring distractions to mass. No cheerios. No picture books. That only leads them to think that the pew is their play area. You have to teach them that the pew is a different place, a sacred space.

But if you want to insist that you have a "right" to have your kids act in any way you choose and that other people are bullies if they don't like it, then you'll have a much harder time training your children how to act appropriately in mass.

If you want to listen to consistently good church music go to a Baptist service. They can sing! CAtholics are so-so at best.

I pondered this question about silence in church when, In a chapel that I visit for daily mass & adoration, I came upon three parishioners(eucharistic ministers) boisterously conversing & laughing like they were in front of a barbeque pit. They immediately stopped & dispersed when I came in but it became the point of my reflections in the chapel. I should not be bothered because people respected my need of quiet in the chapel, right? Wrong.

A common solution for a noisy Sunday Mass is to find one done at a convent, abbey, priory or formation house for religious. Some are noisy as a parish, but quite a few are much more respectful for silence.

Last week my husband and I took our 8-month-old baby to see a medical specialist at Sacred Heart Hospital in Spokane. This required finding care for our other 5 children, borrowing a car, and beginning our drive at 4 am. As we were walking back to the car, we paused by a heavy door that said CHAPEL and impulsively entered.

Inside it was blessedly quiet and sacred and such a welcome relief from the hurry and worry of the day that we ended up staying for half an hour.

We're LDS, and are accustomed to very noisy Sunday services. Half the noise probably comes from our own children who, despite being obedient, homeschooled kids, are still young children and forget about chapel voices and chapel manners. We are told they are very well-behaved, but I still worry excessively about the judgment of others.

What's funny to me about it is that my kids are both noisier and far nicer than I am. They have a purer offering; if anyone doesn't belong in the chapel, it's me, even though I'm quieter. Luckily church is all about loving the obnoxious and including jerks, so I'm welcome there, too.

For sacred peace and quiet in the LDS faith, one attends a temple, where everyone is in white and words are spoken in hushed whispers. Among the reasons this works is likely that the only people in an LDS temple are adults judged worthy. But of course this means that LDS people who aren't currently worthy of a temple recommend have no such predictably silent place of worship.

Last week I holy-envied Catholics for having chapels open where anyone can attend and contemplate the Savior. I am tempted to say something snarkily reproving about not welcoming children into chapels, but I can't. I felt welcomed and succored in that hospital chapel last week, and I get cranky with my kids when they interrupt my silent yoga time. So. I guess we're all human.

I feel blessed to belong to a rural parish of about 350 families who are very reverent before Mass; some arriving as much as one hour before Mass starts. During this season of Lent our Pastor and all ministers will take their seats 15 minutes prior to the start of Mass for quiet reflection.

Perhaps if you're looking for a Mass "less ordinary" you should instead seek out a Mass that is "extraordinary" - as in, the extraordinary form. To be honest, I clicked a link I saw to this article thinking that this was the topic.

I attended the new Mass for the first 25 years of my life, and found that it could sometimes be reverent or make room for silence, but more often than not was busy and distracting. I've attended the Traditional Latin Mass for nearly the last 9 years, and no matter where I've gone, my experience of the silence and ability to pray has been the same. There is a reverence, a sense of sacred space. It doesn't matter if it's in Texas, Arizona, New York, Virginia, DC, or Salzburg, Austria. The ambiance is the same.

When reverence is optional, rather than a central focus of the liturgy, it's hard to know what to expect.

Yes! We recently moved to the New Haven, CT, area and have become parishioners at St. Mary's Church (administered by the Dominican Fathers). It is silent before Mass, except for the choir practicing sacred music (and quietly, far away in an invisible choir loft!). It is such a change from our previous 4 parishes, where we were seen as "unfriendly" because we didn't make small talk before Mass. Trying to pray after Mass was a joke: we would kneel (and instruct our children to kneel), and people would come up, clap us on the backs, and start talking. Really? We are so blessed right now with a parish where the altar is sacred, the Eucharist is a Real Presence, and the other parishioners come to meet Him--not me.

South of Reality,

I try to prevent my children from distracting others. But if I do not succeed and people think it is therefore okay to turn around and scowl at me, give a frosty handshake at the Kiss of Peace, whisper snide remarks, etc, then yes I call that bullying. They are using nastiness to control the my behavior. My husband and I didn't decide to go separety because we have been convinced that's the right thing to do, we've stopped going because I broke down in tears myself one day in church.

That's great that you have found a way to get your kids to behave, but you know, not everyone has the same personality, and what is possible for one person is not possible for everyone. For example, as I mentioned in my last post, I have never had a problem with finding kids distracting. But you seem to feel the same feat is just not possible for you, and it is not something you should even be asked to try. Why exactly do you think it is easier for kids to learn to behave than for adults to learn to concentrate?

I also find the comparison of going to church with going to the symphony extremely problamtic, from two directions actually. First, church has a completely different purpose from the symphony. We go to church to worship God, not to concentrate on every subtle nuance of sound. Extraneous noises are not as inherantly distructive. Also, children are not capable of appreciating a symphony, but they are capable of picking things up in church - e.g. my older daughter (whom we always took to church) when she was my son's age, picked up saying "Alleluia!" whenever she saw a crucifix. That's worth something, and my son is missing out on it.

Second, it's not clear that the theater and the symphony need to be such a silent zone either. I learned in college English class that in Shakespeare's day, the theater had more of a ballpark atmosphere, with vendors walking around in the audience hawking food, and that sort of thing. And yet audiences still managed to demand and appreciate quality drama. Also, I recall an article in the New Yorker about four years ago, that stated that the requirement of silence in the symphony only dates to the invention of the phonograph, when people got used to listening to music by themselves at home in silence. Before then, concerts had more of a nightclub atmosphere. And, the article argued, perhaps it is not a coincidence that no composer since then has managed to become popularly beloved.

I converted to Catholicism a few years ago and one of the things that attracted me to the church was the strict silence before mass, unlike the Protestant churches. This is a MAJOR issue because it means that people are forgetting that we are in the Real Presence of Christ. Thankfully all of the Parishes where I have attended mass still adhere to this. It is a beautiful thing to see people come in and immediately kneel. Everyone is very aware that the real presence of Christ is with us and we better be respectful. I have young children and I am training them that we are in God's house and they need to be silent. I am thankful for my Parish and I hope we can spread this to all parishes in America. What can we do?

There is a big difference between small children making noise/disturbing others during the Mass and adults who should know better chatting and laughing when others are trying to pray. Children learn to behave in church by going to church. Adults who have never learned to behave in church - where do they come from? Didn't their parents take them to church on Sundays every week and glare at them if they made a sound? Weren't they taught that they had to sit quietly and follow along with the Mass whether they wanted to or not? How can you possibly be a good Catholic parent if you aren't doing that, and how can any good Catholic parent teach their kids how to behave in Mass by not taking them to Mass?

Without disagreeing on the importance or scarcity of reverence, sacred silence, and respect for others' prayerful quiet time, I want to offer an experience in dealing with noise and chatter at Mass. For what it is worth, it may be helpful for those who have trouble taking it. After years of frustration, it occurred to me one day during Mass that our Lord endures all of these indignities by adding them to all of our other sins for which He atones. After this observation, I began to offer my own annoyance and disappointment with these distractions as part of my participation in the Mass, in an effort to unite my own small trials to the sacrifice of Christ. Initially this seemed kind of frivolous, but I realized eventually that, at least for me, I needed to push back a little on my desire to find only consolation at Mass, and to accept that even being at Mass might sometimes have to be accepted as a sacrificial gift to Our Lord. Perhaps paradoxically, it has proven for me at least to be a way to find an interior sacred silence even while others nearby are making plans for brunch so loudly that I still remember what they planned on eating. And instead of reinforcing the vices of impatience and vengeful thinking during Mass, it helps me practice, however imperfectly, the virtues of patience and sacrificial charity.

I can concur with your brother as I am in a similar situation (quiet daily Masses and noisy, distracting weekend Masses). I've spoken to my pastor about this several times, as have other parishioners. He is the boss and thinks people need the social interaction at Church. We have vocal performances before Mass as well so there's never a moment of peaceful silence. In fact, the various ministers are often the worst distractions before and during Mass. When are the Bishop's and priests going to wake up and insist on abiding by the rubrics and Canon law instead of fulfilling the wants and needs of the people? Our real need in the Catholic Church today is for leaders with backbones!

To Anne:

I absolutely agree with you that people who scowl at other parishoners during mass are out of line and rude. Despite what I wrote, I would not do that to any parent. I was responding to the impression I got from your post that merely the expectation that children should be quiet during mass is tantamont to bullying. And that I could not agree with.

I hope and pray that you continue to strive and succeed in raising children who are reverent and holy. It sounds like they have a great mother.

I feel the same way...You practically described our parish. I am so dismayed at the loud chatter before liturgy. What I find myself doing, also, is attending the weekday service at 830 am (I have to be at work at 900, but my parish is a quick drive from my place of employment). If I can't attend the weekday morning service, I often take a late lunch and sit and absorb the silence in the sacred place on weekday afternoon. But Saturday evenings and Sundays--not only prior to the start of mass, but even during--are very noisy.

As Thomas Merton said, "Silence is the voice of God."

dd

ditto Anne: Church and a concert are two totally different things. I am proud of my faith, and am proud to have them grow up in the church. My daughter talks too much at the best of times, and I am trying to help her learn, but how does a child learn but by doing? Abandon the 9:30 to us harassed parents, and go to an earlier one if you must.
In addition, how does this "leave your kids at home" work for single parents or parents in mixed faith marriages? Do they not go to church at all because their child is loud?

Samantha:

Excellent question: "What can we do?"

Our pope, in his "Summorum Pontificum", allows each priest to offer the Extraordinary rite, in addition to the Ordinary rite. The steadying influence of the Latin Mass on the Novus Ordo Mass, if allowed, would ameliorate many of the problems Conservative Catholics routinely complain about, as the current article does.

In addition, let's not overlook the influence of some types of Liturgical Councils on the Novus Ordo Mass. Keep in mind that from a certain point of view, things like the presence of the tabernacle, kneeling during consecration, receiving on the tongue, silence, reverence, praying the rosary, are viewed as expressions of a reactionary cultural and political attitude, out of step with modernism.

So, what can Conservative Catholics do, short of becoming Traditional Catholics? Organise, and then ask for the Extraordinary rite to complement the Ordinary rite. Get informed about the political posture of the local Liturgical Council - for a start, get a complete list of all Catholic and non-Catholic organizations your parish is affiliated with.

If you want the sacred, attend the old Mass. A low mass will provide the quite you are looking for, and a High Mass will be a combination of quite time, and angelic music that raises your soul to the third heaven.

I can definitely sympathize. My parish has started adding 2 lay person "announcement" right after Holy Communion. No time to contemplate the Lord in the Eucharist.

I do hope your brother starts going to Sunday mass. I hope he at least doesn't make five sacrilegious receptions of Communion every week. I'll pray for him.

There are great truths to be found in moments of silent prayer and meditation, to be sure. You have made a very important point. Sometimes it is extraordinarily difficult to teach people to simply turn off their babbling psycho-physical machinery and listen for a change. On the other hand, as it is said in Ecclesiastes, "To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under heaven." And I have also found the True Presence in exuberant corporate worship at times, both Catholic and Protestant. I believe there's a time and place for both.

"Didn't their parents take them to church on Sundays every week and glare at them if they made a sound? Weren't they taught that they had to sit quietly and follow along with the Mass whether they wanted to or not?" The sad truth is kids don't behave at mass because they are not taught how to behave at home. As for the bias against a sung mass, well it really depends on which facet of spirituality you are, ad arguendo the singing is done with the purpose of pleasing the Lord alone and not the people in the pews. Those who complain about the"noise" in a sung mass might not like it in heaven....

“Prayer is not something you tamper with lightly, and you’d better be sure when you do that it’s manifestly better,”. Children with this behavior is just as normal as it is since they were children, but what important is parents should thought them how to behave in a way they understand.

South of Reality,

It is kind of you to praise my parenting.

Perhaps I should have mentioned that I'm living in Germany at the moment, where scowling at strangers is much more socially acceptable than in the US.

ianthis says:

ditto Anne: Church and a concert are two totally different things.
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Not during the times where we are trying to listen to the readings. Not during the times when we are trying to listen to the homily. Not during the times when we are trying to listen to God in our prayful reflections.

I totally symphasize with parents who are trying to keep their children quiet during those times and fail. At least I know they have their hearts in the right place. I have NO sympathy for parents who act as if I'm in the wrong because I feel those times should be quiet.

And as I wrote above, parents CAN succeed in teaching their children to be quiet and respectful during mass. I've done it and my friends have done it. However, if you start out with the attitude that keeping your children quiet at mass is an unreasonable burden placed on you by mean grumpy parishoners, then yeah, you'll fail.

It's all a question of charity. I will be charitable towards you and not scowl when you fail to keep your children quiet; you be charitable to me by respecting my desire for quiet.

FWIW, the altar in Greek is--and has always been called--"aghia trapezi" or "holy table", and that has not prevented reverence (though there is some pre-service activity with people lighting candles and venerating icons).

I am like the author’s brother insofar as I will often attend daily Mass (roughly two or three times a week) in order to avoid the distractions identified in this article. Obviously, this is not consistent with my Sunday obligation, but nothing makes me sadder than being so mad when I leave Sunday Mass after another needlessly extended encounter with “busy, noisy, overstimulated worship.”

There is one other reason why I tend to favor daily Mass: better preaching. My pastor is a good man (trying to keep three churches running by himself and two retired priests who live in the area) but he is not a gifted (or well prepared preacher). He almost always preaches without notes and tends to needlessly recapitulate the readings without making a larger point. As such, he rarely, “says it in seven [minutes].” At daily Mass, the retired priests (freed from their administrative burdens) tend to be more thoughtful (and sensitive to the time constraints of those of us who give up our lunch hours to be there).

Long story short; I’m not proud of my choices with respect to Sunday worship and I always look forward to visiting my parents or my in-laws (whose home parishes are blessed with reflective, quiet liturgies and thoughtful preaching). But, in the end, as things are, I’d rather go to daily Mass if Sunday Mass is just going to drive me upset.

PS. Last week I did go to Sunday Mass. (Part of my Lenten devotion to be more faithful to my Sunday obligation). As I waited for the second collection with envelope in hand, the woman next to me told me (with a certain tisk-tisk, you clueless, part-time Catholic tone directed at yours truly) that the pastor announced a few weeks ago that from that point forward, both collections would go in the same basket. At that point, I realized my daily Mass self-righteousness came with a price.

PPS. While commenters ought to avoid commenting on the state of the soul of another (cf. Matthew 7:3), as a preemptive measure, I note that I am conscious of my shortcomings and seek out the Sacrament of Reconciliation on a regular basis.

This reminds me of a discussion my wife and I recently had. For the past few months we have been attending a FSSP (Extraordinary Form) parish on Sundays (it is too far away to go during the week). My wife has always naturally favored the Ordinary Form, so she initially resisted this change, but now has come to appreciate it more fully. She has come to the conclusion that she really only favors the Ordinary Form on weekdays. "I can't stand what they do to the Mass on Sundays!"

By attending the Extraordinary Form on Sundays, and the Ordinary Form during the week, we feel like we are getting the best of both worlds. But in all honesty, it is a shame that this is the case - every Mass should be an opportunity to encounter the Sacred without all the "busyness" and self-centeredness of most Sunday Ordinary Form Masses.

People talking about going to Mass during the week because Sunday Masses are too irreverent/distracting/otherwise don't meet your desire for reverence, peace, etc.:

Grow up.

Mass on Sundays is NOT optional.

My pastor used to talk about people who missed Sunday Mass. His spiel went something like this:

"They say to me, 'I fell closer to God on the golf course' or 'I feel closer to God in the mountains' or 'I feel closer to God on the beach.' But this is not about what you feel. You don't come to Mass to FEEL good. You come to Mass to give glory to God."

Folks, if your local Masses are REALLY that bad, and if you REALLY can't find a tolerable Sunday Mass within an hour or two--consider this:

Everything that you see at the Mass, Jesus sees too. If it hurts you, think about how much it must hurt him. If it makes you mad--so be it. Go anyway. Go and keep Him company.

It's not about you and how you feel. It's about Jesus.

Your brother is a man after my own heart. I,too, enjoy the daily mass much more than Sunday but I go because I must. I, like you, try to go to 7 am for all the same reasons. Very good article; you've hit the nail on the head.

TGWWS
Can you give me Church dogma (not private revelation of saints which is non binding) that says that Christ feels hurt in Heaven as you've just said He does. I don't see how it could be a peaceful, joyful Heaven of an unchanging God if the glorified Christ or anyone is feeling hurt there.

Bill Bannon:

A good Catholic should do BOTH of these two things, among others: he or she should be 1) prepared to to practical works of charity; but then 2) ALSO at times, be spiritual and pray. And for that matter? To make some observance of the Law ... but then too, to remember the "freedom we have in Christ."

It's not one or the other, either/or. I'd say it's both.

Just reading this article and these comments shows me again the impossible responsibility of those who design parish liturgies. With so many different understandings of God, and God's creation in the other people at Mass with us, it is near impossible to please everyone, or even anyone. Yet we join at Mass together because it is the holy place were our God visits us and we connect with our God and all of us are doing the best we can to survive this experience. Our Mass had to be about our God and the rest of the pieces must not distract us from our God! May God grace each of us with life enhancing focus at Mass for the building of God's reign in our midst on earth.

Before each and every Mass here in the unchurched Northwest, at Queen of Angels parish, Port Angeles, Washington, a rosary is said, led by a member of the Legion of Mary or another group within the parish. When you walk into Mass the first thing you are likely to hear is "Hail Mary . . ." -- many voices. when this is over, there is usually a minute or two of silence, and then the Mass begins. I guarentee that this puts parishoners in the "right" mood for being with Jesus and the saints. And we recieve God's graces also in the process which cannot be quantified. There should be no socializing in the pews before or after Mass. A smile or wave is okay, but we are in God's house for an hour and should remember that. God Bless

Mass is not anything about what we enjoy or what we appreciate, it is only about what God appreciates. All this selectivity or should I say sensitivity just goes to show that people who nitpick about the nuances or nuisances of their masses are far removed from the objective of the mass which is to participate in the communion with God. It really is all about focus and knowing what you are there for. I wonder how you all would've been during WW II when masses where held in air raid shelters in the midst the carpet bombings. Your preference for one type of mass over another sounds like you're choosing one restaurant over another, means you're missing the point. Mass is not about you, it's only ALL about HIM!

As a post-Vatican II baby I hate to sound like a square but ... We absolutely have to return the Masses to Latin. I wandered into a Tridentine Latin mass four years ago and I have had a different attitude ever since. Before, in the normal Novus Ordo masses, I had gotten used to a kind of informality, and I had even been affectionate about it. At the Extraordinary Form (I am trying to use the correct term) people just naturally fall out of that chit-chat habit. It is evident that something very sacred is going on, and so you fall silent.

Mass should not be about us and -- I hate to say this, as a former organist -- but it is not about getting people to sing or be outwardly involved, i.e. doing readings or "bringing up the gifts." It is about praying and thinking about what is actually going on up there. If people realize this the rest of it would fall into place.

If you have a casual liturgy, it promotes casual behavior. That is what has happened in the Church and we should work to fix it. We have had cruddy music and uninspiring words and so people naturally think there is nothing there to take seriously. I would like to suggest to everyone that you find a Mass in Latin and go. Even if you do not think you would like it (I never thought I would). It will make all the difference. Pax tecum!

To many I would say we are developing an internet oral tradition and oddity of expression occasioned by debate reaction in saying the Mass is not about us, it's only about God. Try finding the Vatican saying that. They won't because if the Mass is only about God, what happened to the one flesh mystery of Ephesians 5 in the marriage of Christ to His Bride the Church who...us... He feeds with Himself at Mass in the Eucharist. There is no need to distribute the Eucharist to any human being at Mass if the Mass is only about God and not about "God with us"...Emmanuel.

Great article. I did laugh at the usage of "shut your pie hole" followed by "Is our lack of decorum connected to the words we use?"

I have had to live through this since I was in my mid teens ( I'm now 62 years old ). If it were not for the true presence in the eucharist ( holy communion ) I would not attend and worship at Sunday Mass at all.

We have deafening noise from the pews, terrible elevator music ( Haugen, Haugen and more Haugen ), the same excruciating songs repeated each and every Sunday ( except for a few Sundays over the Easter and Christmas seasons ), the self-same song at the beginning AND the end of the mass, three sermons (at the beginning of mass, at the appointed sermon time, and again at the end of mass), the enforced greetings and back-slapping at the start of mass, apart from the enforced mingling and handshaking at the appointed time, and then also the "thank you for coming" message from Father as part of his third sermon. I gave up long ago hoping for a sermon which was not banal, dry, boring and coherent.

I have tried to engage with the priest, deacon, organist, choir mistress, liturgy committee and the Parish Council. The shutters come down over their eyes but they have the good grace to smile even as they refuse point blank to concede that anything is amiss ; I'm told with strained patience to get with the modern world. I have tried to find another less modern parish, to no avail. Some have suggested I go to an Anglican or Lutheran church.

I have lived through the frantic and wholesale tearing down of perfectly good and beautiful churches, the complete disappearance of the tabernacles in many cases, and the stripping of statues, and stations of the cross images.

I am close to giving up and am hanging on by a thread. But I have found a way to survive and still receive communion. I'm willing to take my chances before God when I'm judged and will plead in mitigation that I could not forego holy communion in his one true Church.

Here's what I do. I wait outside until the opening song, the first sermon and the first hello's are over. I often read the gospels and commentaries during the main sermon--and when the crescendos get too loud I go outside to read. Then I leave just before the closing sermon and the closing ( oops, sorry, I should have said the repeat of the opening ) song commence.

I have a real chuckle, however, when I see and hear some of the moderns wringing their hands together and complaining bitterly about these "new changes" recently introduced. I wonder how they would have survived the destruction I lived through ?

Catholics born after 1979 have a Sunday Mass attendance rate of 23%.
Here...5th paragraph..

http://www.womenofgrace.com/blog/?p=10147

At that rate, this whole debate will one day be moot. We are fulminating at Elizabeth's brother who attends instead during the week with considered reasons. Frankly I think the Pope would be delighted if he could get the missing 77% of millenial Catholics to do what Elizabeth's brother is doing. I think he'd smile. In Church law, there is the letter of the law and there is the intention of the law....not just the former. The intention of the law of Mass attendance is to save the souls of Catholics. The Father already received the perfect offering by Christ at Calvary. That one same offering is "made present" in every Mass for the application of His merits to those who attend with charity and faith and hope and especially to those who receive.

While I agree with the desire to have a sanctuary and liturgy that has an "otherworldly" air to it, I'm stunned at the lack of charity pervades these comments.

Perhaps that parent who's not bringing their unruly child to heel has his mind on a dying parent or a broken marriage. Or maybe they're just selfish and rude. But, either way, they're at mass, and it's a chance for the Holy Spirit to work through them and in them. As far as I'm concerned that's one more for our side.

Instead of focusing on how everyone is messing up the mass, try this: consider your frustrations and anger to be a form of mortification. Offer up your suffering for the good of others. Try to relate your suffering to that of Christ. Then go home and find a quiet spot and contemplate and pray.

Bill, I could turn your argument around by saying that if there was no church, the heavenly hosts would be singing praises to God in heaven with one voice. The Lord's prayer says, "Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven", where they obviously don't quibble about the center and focus of worship. So when I posted that the mass is not about us I really meant that the mass is a celebration of the Lord's command, "Do this in Memory of me" and therefore all about HIM. The nuances and nuisances fall into the "Martha and Mary" syndrome.The celebration of the holy mass is based on the last supper, see CCC below:

1323 "At the Last Supper, on the night he was betrayed, our Savior instituted the Eucharistic sacrifice of his Body and Blood. This he did in order to perpetuate the sacrifice of the cross throughout the ages until he should come again, and so to entrust to his beloved Spouse, the Church, a memorial of his death and resurrection: a sacrament of love, a sign of unity, a bond of charity, a Paschal banquet 'in which Christ is consumed, the mind is filled with grace, and a pledge of future glory is given to us.'"135

So who has the "better part"?

First of all: yes, of course, I totally agree that our culture "has lost" a state of reverence (though, as a Church historian, I think we might recognize what a perennial problem this is). Yes, I totally agree that the music, buildings, and attitudes promoted at churches today is destructive in a whole host of ways. And yes, of course, I agree that cheerios, gameboys, and letting kids do whatever they want is inappropriate and destructive.

However: sometimes we have to check our work by looking at the conclusions our principles lead us to. Ms. Scalia begins and ends with an apparent commendation of her brother skipping Sunday Mass. For those of us who are orthodox Catholics, that is a mortal sin, grave matter, no questions asked. No, it's not "between him and God" -- unless you are a Protestant, and think that the teachings of the Church don't apply to you. I can understand some of his instincts, but if they lead to mortal sin, those instincts should be checked. If an article began by saying I sympathize with people who have decided to start taking the Lord's name in vain as a matter of habitual practice, or worshiping other gods, dishonoring parents on principle, murdering, lying, thieving, lusting, or committing adultery, I would not take that article seriously. The Lord's Day is a commandment, and has always been treated as a commandment, most recently in two solemn documents from Bl. John Paul II.

Similarly: great, it's swell that SSPX has quiet churches. They are also schismatics, which the Church has also always treated as a mortal sin. The point, I guess, is that if you value silence more than you value the Mass itself, and more than you value Church teaching or communion with the Church -- then, gosh, I think maybe you should evaluate whether your idea of reverence has become a false god. I absolutely agree we should be reverent -- but there are other issues, as well.

Finally, as to kids: gosh, I have four little ones. We try to attend daily Mass. Our parish is welcoming and loving to us, but we have been driven out of a couple places -- in Ms. Scalia's Washington. I am trying to teach my children reverence. I absolutely do not give them game boys, cheerios, or toys, and I do not let them rampage in the pews. But they are not perfect. The notion that parents should have a harder time going to Mass then single people do should, um, give us pause. Single people (and people with older children, who are remarkably forgetful of how incredibly difficult this phase of life is) should maybe cool it about complaining about those of us who are doing the heavy lifting unless they want to volunteer to spend their whole Sunday morning -- and weekday mornings -- babysitting (free!) so that we can go to Mass. Seriously, when parishes define their orthodoxy -- as some do -- by attacking pious families who try to go to daily Mass, or who try to teach their children about the Mass, on the grounds that their children are not perfect, no wonder pious families are so hard to find. Imagine, Ms. Scalia and friends, if you were told that for the next twenty years of your life, you were to engage in the most challenging constant battle you've ever imagined, and you were going to be deprived of the sacraments precisely because you were trying to serve the Church and live her teachings. This is not easy. Give us a break. (Especially those of you, like Ms. Scalia, who were raised in families that could afford nannies, etc. Sorry, we're not all rich; when people proclaim that only the rich should be allowed the sacraments, something is profoundly wrong -- profoundly untraditional and unorthodox.)

We were driven out of one parish because a single man came to me, one day at daily Mass, when I was sitting literally in the very back corner of the church with my two year old, who, yes, was cooing a bit -- not rampaging, but cooing -- and said that he would physically hurt us if we didn't leave, because we were "ruining" the Mass for him. (My wife was recovering from birth -- turns out that living the Church's teaching on marriage and family is overwhelmingly challenging.) Our pastor told me he didn't want to take sides. Anyone who thinks that the cooing of children "ruins" the Mass does not understand what the Mass is.

The other parish we were driven from the priest asked us "why do you bother coming to Mass," since we don't behave perfectly. Sorry, that guy doesn't understand what the Mass is. I bother because it is the source and summit of the Christian life. Don't tell me I should skip it if I don't like the atmosphere, or that being a parent means I should skip it for the next twenty years. (Twenty? We started having kids when we were about 25; I expect to have little ones well into our forties.)

Some of the commenters are comparing the Mass to a concert or play. Sorry, wrong analogy. I am sad that I can't go to concerts and plays frequently -- and, of course, I don't, because I can't afford babysitters and obviously I can't bring my children to such things. But concerts and plays are not the source and summit of the Christian life. I can live without them. If you think I can live without the Mass -- well, maybe you should read some Catholic theology. And if you think my little ones can "ruin" the Mass by cooing -- start reading. That's not what the Mass is.

Oh, I know that some places in the 1950s children weren't allowed at Mass. I also know that in the 1960s and 1970s those children repudiated the faith with incredibly unanimity -- and their parents rose up in astoundingly unanimous rebellion, to ignore every teaching the Church gave about the liturgy (not to mention issues of family: Humanae Vitae) in order to give us the mess we have inherited. Don't give me 1950s advice on how to make the Church strong.

Yes, reverence. Yes, absolutely, reverent music, less rampaging of children and grown ups in the church, yes, parents have a huge responsibility to remove their children when they are making more than the most minimal noises. But please, tone it down a little. Take a reverent attitude, also, in the way you talk about the Mass, and the way you talk about families -- and the way you talk about schism and mortal sin.

Edmund
You for whatever reason don't see that the catechism citation you give, is more communal than your emphasis of God only; it is about the one flesh of Christ and His people of Ephesians...the very thing I mentioned in a post. The millenial Catholics will shrink to no percent attending Mass if we tell them they are nothings, ciphers in Mass and that it's only about God and in no wise about them with God in a marriage. Ephesians 5 is not a mistake. This is a love affair in which God loves His people not like a neighbor but like a wife and it didn't start in Ephesians:
Isaiah 54:5
" For he who has become your husband is your Maker..."
I have no doubt you know this but internet debates push people into reactive phrases in order to counter what others are saying. Your reaction: "Mass is not about you, it's only ALL about HIM!" is something no Pope or Vatican document will
say formally. And your catechism quote certainly doesn't say it.
The youngest Catholics are going to Mass the least of any Catholics. If the Newman Society commissioned study of our colleges is to be believed, 50% of our Catholic college girls and 41% of males are involved in premarital sex. And look at what we are debating...an area of Mass etiquette whose solution will offend someone because some humans need perfect quiet and others need hellos between the pews or they feel like they're at a funeral. Let's have a noisy Mass and a perfect silence Mass at different hours and move on to actually saving our young from apostacy.

Eric
What happened to you when a strict Mass goer threatened you with physical harm because your cooing child was ruining his Mass actually supports Elizabeth's brother in his action. The Mass had not only become a near occasion of sin to the man who threatened you, but he did in fact sin in threatening you. The third commandment is to keep holy the Sabbath. The Church through Church positive law determines that that is done by Mass inter alia but susceptible of dispensation for good reasons which none of your other listed sins are susceptible of since they involve natural law: " If an article began by saying I sympathize with people who have decided to start taking the Lord's name in vain as a matter of habitual practice, or worshiping other gods, dishonoring parents on principle, murdering, lying, thieving, lusting, or committing adultery, I would not take that article seriously."
Merton noted in one of his books on the hermit life that Carthusian hermits are sometimes dispensed from Sunday Mass obligation for months perhaps due to being in a season wherein they are experiencing infused prayer. No one in the Church is dispensed from your list of allegedly similar sins: murdering, lying, thieving, lusting etc. Mass attendance is not of natural law as they are. It is positive law which means it can be dispensed from which means it is not intrinsically demanded as chastity and truthfulness are.
Your threatener at Mass would be better advised by his pastor to stop attending Mass at all until the pastor determines that Mass has ceased to be an occasion of sin to this particular man who has crossed over into an extremism which makes him put charity second to worship perfection as he defines worship perfection. Scripture says that charity is the apex of all virtues but your threatener may have defined his worship as charity while failing to see that worship cannot be charity when it leads to threatening others. Biblical charity requires that love of God and people are joined.
Elizabeth's brother may experience Mass also as just such an occasion of sin if it's de facto reality of people being gregarious in church tempts him also to sins of judging them every single week of his life. Then God would prefer that in his unusual case, he attend on weekdays.
But remember....Sunday Mass can be dispensed from and that makes it different from the obligation to avoid lust, murder, lying etc. Put them on the same plane and you are forced to judge Elizabeth's brother's action too rigoristically.

@bill bannon:

I was trying to appeal to y'all's largeness of heart. Guess I should have stuck to plain old argument.

I was making two separate points: (1) Mass on Sundays is mandatory and (2) Jesus likes it when we go to Mass. I don't recall asserting that either point was a dogma.

I did not intend to suggest that our neglect now means that Jesus suffers in heaven NOW (whatever "now" means in regard to heaven). That Jesus suffered at SOME time for all our offenses is (I suspect) not in dispute.

To clarify my original points further, and to support the claim that missing Sunday Mass IS an offense ...

First, for what it's worth, even if it is ONLY a tradition that Jesus suffers internally because of our sins, still it IS a tradition endorsed by popes as well as saints. (For example, regarding the Sacred Heart, see Pius XI's Caritate Miserentissimus Redemptor, Pius XII's Haurietis Aquas, and Leo XIII's Annum Sacrum.)

Second, regarding the claim that Mass on Sundays is mandatory, the Catechism of the Catholic Church (2180-2181), citing the Code of Canon Law, says: "'On Sundays and other holy days of obligation the faithful are bound to participate in the Mass.' ... unless excused for a serious reason (for example, illness, the care of infants) or dispensed by their own pastor. Those who deliberately fail in this obligation commit a grave sin."

I would also note, since you elsewhere reference Vatican II, that the council refers to the Sunday obligation as well. For example, see the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy (106): "By a tradition handed down from the apostles which took its origin from the very day of Christ's resurrection, the Church celebrates the paschal mystery every eighth day; with good reason this, then, bears the name of the Lord's day or Sunday. For on this day Christ's faithful ARE BOUND [emphasis mine] to come together into one place so that; by hearing the word of God and taking part in the Eucharist, they may call to mind the passion, the resurrection and the glorification of the Lord Jesus, and may thank God who 'has begotten them again, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, unto a living hope" (1 Pet. 1:3).'" For a further appreciation of Sunday Mass, I recommend JPII's "Dies Domini."

Finally ... It's worth pointing out that we are excused from Sunday Mass for "serious" reasons. "I live two hours away from the nearest Church" or "My shift as a hospital nurse lasts all Sunday" or "I've got the flu" are all reasons based on physical hardship and/or charity, and therefore seem fairly serious. "I get distracted" or "I can't take the noise and irreverence" are reasons based on personal emotional distress, which seem, to me at least, pretty frivolous.

I'm not sure that what I am going to write connects to what Elizabeth wrote but I think that it does.
Quite a few years ago it caught my attention that an increasing number of people dressed for Mass as though they were going to hang out with their friends, maybe catch a game or stroll the mall. I dressed as I always did and do; jacket and tie, you know as if I were going to something special.
This past week I noted that of the 5 or 6 hundred people at Mass I was the only one dressed this way and one of only several that seemed to have given any thought to dressing for the occasion. Could there be a connection? Now I am not saying that a tie etc. is necessary for true worship but NASCAR T-shirts and plumbing advertisements seem somehow, dare I say, inappropriate.

Eric says:
Some of the commenters are comparing the Mass to a concert or play. Sorry, wrong analogy. I am sad that I can't go to concerts and plays frequently -- and, of course, I don't, because I can't afford babysitters and obviously I can't bring my children to such things. But concerts and plays are not the source and summit of the Christian life. I can live without them. If you think I can live without the Mass -- well, maybe you should read some Catholic theology. And if you think my little ones can "ruin" the Mass by cooing -- start reading. That's not what the Mass is.
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You're responding to my post. Eric when my kids were too young to sit quietly at mass, you know what I did? I went to one mass and my wife went to another. And it worked out just fine. And if I had my kids with me and they were acting up, I simply made sure I sat near the back of the Church at the end of the pew and ushered them out, instructed them now to behave, went back in at an opportune time and did it again if necessary.

In other words, it was important to me not just to have my kids there but also to have them there and acting in such a way as to not be a distraction to others.

Your long post implies that you feel if you have right to be there with your kids and if your kids are acting up, well that's just too darn bad. Of course you're right to extent that no one should be denied the graces of the Mass, but I can't help but feel that you and the person you rightly condem for his angry attitude towards you, share an unfortunate belligerence in your different positions.

TGWWS,
I'm going to go with Augustine and Aquinas repeating him 800 years later: "there is no misery in Heaven" since your sources are saints and the ordinary papal magisterium which has been wrong on such things as the Holy Spirit supporting burning heretics (Exsurge Domine,1520 A.D.) now refuted by Vat. II on non coercion in religious matters not to mention sect.80 of "Splendor of the Truth" on torture.
You are trivializing the fact that Sunday Mass can be an ongoing occasion of the sin of judging for some people which threads like this make patently clear. So we are to believe that the flu excuses from Sunday Mass but the tendency to assault
others every Sunday for child noise (see Eric's Mar.9 post) does not mean such people should go rather on a weekday by epikeia or by the pastor's dispensation with an ok from the Bishop's office. I think some Mass goers would feel safer with the flu person sneezing than with a Catholic pharisee threatening them physically in the prescence of their children. I really can't get over Eric's incident wherein he was threatened physically for his child cooing. It's like Catholicism attracts the pharisee convert who previously condemned others through another church but now can do it with greater clarity with a clear catechism; or Catholicism brings out the pharisee in active cradles thanks to a by the book simplicity of law which is somewhat necessitated when a catechism is addressing over a billion people. Add clericalism in the mix wherein the repeated use of Sabbath epikeia by Christ IS NEVER DISCUSSED in Catholic documents or schools and voila...we have Ross Perot's "it's as simple as pie" legalism which makes it's purveyors feel like the last 8 people on the ark. Many on the Catholic net feel they are saints because they are not other Catholics. It's default sainthood. I'm not them so I must be the remnant.
Have you cleaned behind the refrigerator for your wife in the last 15 years? No...I've found another way of sainthood...I'm not that Catholic over there.
Yet Christ does not talk that simplistic way of the catechism about His apostles using epikeia on the Sabbath...in fact He gives David breaking positive law from God as an example of how to act when the dilemna is positive law versus duress...Christ excusing the disciples said to the pharisees:
"Have you not read what David did when he and his companions were hungry, how he went into the house of God and ate the bread of offering, which neither he
nor his companions but only the priests could lawfully eat?"
Which is more nuanced and adult then on Sabbath obligation...Christ or the
catechism? Looks to me like Christ as a portrait artist would have been Rembrandt and the catechism writer as a portrait artist would have been Giotto.

bill bannon,

I never said there was misery in heaven, nor do the popes I referred to or the saints of whom I was thinking (Margaret Mary and Faustina, primarily). I DID say Jesus "at some time" suffered internally for our sins, which has the backing of St. Thomas (go ahead and reread the section of the Summa where he talks about the Passion, and see his interpretation of Jesus' "my soul is sorrowful").

You note Jesus' release of his disciples from observing the strict Jewish Sabbath. Notice that Jesus did not release them from the obligation to worship, but only from the (excessively strict) restrictions on their non-worship activities. The analogue today to the disciples' actions would be if we were to drive or cook on Sunday, not if we were to miss Mass.

I would also be very, very cautious also about rejecting the Catechism of the Catholic Church in favor of personal interpretations of what Jesus says.

If Sunday Mass is an occasion of sin, I am heartily sorry for those who find it so. I don't mean to dismiss occasions of sin. But Sunday Mass as an occasion of sin is like any other duty being an occasion of sin: you STILL have the duty, and so it is your responsibility to work on your emotions until the duty becomes no longer an occasion of sin for you.

If every parent who found their children an occasion of sin decided to avoid them ...

If every worker who found his coworkers an occasion of sin decided to avoid them ...

If every spouse who found their spouse an occasion of sin decided to avoid him/her ...

I'm not trying to judge you, or Elizabeth's sister, or anyone on this comment thread. I'm simply calling for you to extend a little charity and patience to your fellows in the pews. If Jesus were to visit your Church would he shun Sunday Mass because of the crowds that irritated him? "This man eats with sinners." "And they were pressing against him." C'mon, think about it ... What would Jesus do? What DOES Jesus do? He visits your church anyway, in the Blessed Sacrament, crowds or no crowds, irreverence or no irreverence.

TGWWS,

You have a short memory. Here is your original post quote:

"Everything that you see at the Mass, Jesus sees too. If it hurts you, think about how much it must hurt him. If it makes you mad--so be it. Go anyway. Go and keep Him company."

You're reducing the goal of Heaven without noticing it. You're telling people that if they persevere unto death in the Faith, they'll reach Heaven where they can still get hurt and where they will still need company like Christ. He's at the right hand of the Father and you see Him as needing company.
There is no point in my answering the rest. You see only one half of positive law....the letter. The other half...the intention of the law is invisible to you because you want to be able to judge others from afar which is only possible in positive law if you can remain ignorant of the intention of the law. The intention when frustrated makes law cease for the subjective person. The man who threatened Eric should not be attending Mass at all because it's intention has ceased in his subjective case...this is why Christ said David and his men could act against the law about not eating the loaves of proposition. The intention of that law had ceased for David and his men through duress of hunger. The intention of Mass attendance to save the soul and worship God has ceased for a person if the physical real time context of the Mass in his world and generation has made the man worse morally.
The catechism is too simple to say that because the average worldwide IQ of one billion Catholics which the catechism addresses is lower than the real complexity of law. Think of it this way: most Catholics live and die without penetrating the epikeia passages of Christ. Besides... the catechism has the Noachic covenant ending at the time of the gospel in ccc #58 and then has it lasting til the end if the world in ccc #71....on the same page...two different writers I'll bet on two different days.

Bill, you posted,"if we tell them they are nothings, ciphers in Mass and that it's only about God and in no wise about them with God in a marriage." No one would ever tell them that. We are part of the spiritual body of Christ with Christ as our Head. My comment is certainly about what you perceive is the "need for perfect quiet vs. the need for a noisy mass". Perhaps both types of mass goers will be satisfied with the type of mass that makes them feel holy or inspired. My point is, it really is not about the mass goers satisfaction. Case in point, 9 out of 10 catholics have left the chruch for a "more meaningful" worship service. A worship service that is really just to satisfy the "feel good" need. The worshipper comes out of the worship feeling fulfilled, blessed, enlightened, on fire, etc., then they call that true worship. What about God? What did He think of the mass? of the worship? What was He feeling when he read the thoughts of those who begrudged the noisy mass? What did He feel when He listened to the gripes of the charismatic renewal people who can't stand a silent mass because it has no "feel" to it?

bill bannon,

I stand by what I originally said ... Jesus is hurt by offenses people commit at Mass. In the original quote I don't say when/where that hurt hits him; you're reading into it.

Nowhere do I say I see Christ as NEEDing company. That WE need HIS company, even in heaven, would be blasphemous for a Christian to deny.

As for the Catechism--if you're going to dismiss it so readily, then we are clearly never going to agree, since one of us regards it as pretty authoritative, and the other does not.

Edmond
God is in perfect beatitude and says of Himself..."I am the Lord and I change not". He is not a cauldron of mutating feelings....we are. Here's Aquinas' schema about God having Love period, but willing justice and punishment not out of feelings like we do at times but out of wisdom. Aquinas was describing how there is no wrath or anger in God despite scripture using such words of Him repeatedly. Aquinas notes they are anthropopathisms (use of emotion words to stand for the Will of God).
Aquinas said in humans, there is a higher part of the soul in which e.g. you lastingly love your wife unto her salvation; and he said there is a lower part of the soul in which you have changing emotions like affection and wrath. Your affection
for your wife is a feeling that can change instantly if your wife forgets your birthday
but your love for her, in the higher part of the soul, remains the same. Aquinas then says that God only has the higher part of the soul and that speaks to His being unchanging. He loves people perfectly but not with our lower part which includes changing affection and anger and sadness (except when the Word took on our lower part of the soul during His life on earth). God would not be in perfect joy, love and happiness if those three could be interrupted in Him by His having a lower part of the soul filled with changing wrath and changing affection.
Thus changeable feelings in scripture attributed to God are not changeable feelings in Him at all but are human language symbols for changes in His will. There are 7 billion people on earth. If God had changing feelings toward each of them, He would be a veritable volcano of changes. " There is in Him no change nor shadow of alteration" James 1:17..."I am the Lord and I change not" Malachi 3:6

Bill, thanks for the lecture. What about Matthew 15:8 which has people "praising Him with their lips but their hearts are far away?" This is more to the point. Secondly, none of us are qualified to confirm that our spiritual offering was pleasing to Him, save that it is done in Spirit and in truth.

Sometime, I join my wife in attending a service at her Methodist church, and I want to share with all the words my wife's pastor uses to begin her service *every time*. I have heard this on several occasions and find it remarkable that it is needed, and is very effective.

After a short preface about current goings on, the weather, the kids or what-have-you, she says, "Let's go from getting here, to being here." (And, she emphasizes the word "being".)

Perhaps, it is easily useful to a priest to say into his wireless microphone before he begins to process into Mass.

Just a though...

Only made it to around 3 o'clock on the sixth, then I jumped down here to add my two cents.

Quiet in church, no silly songs (real hymns are OK). What's a real hymn? To paraphrase a supreme court justice's comments about pornography a while ago, I know it when I hear it.

Visiting time. In front of the church, in the annex, in the ?narthex? but please, not in the pews. Some of us are trying to get our heads straight here.

Noisy kids. At the Saturday Evening Mass I attend, there's often a little kid across the aisle from where I place myself. Looks like kid, mom and grandmother. Kid is normally quiet. But there are times he acts up. Sometimes mom will take him out to the narthex. Other times she'll just let him carry on there. We have a kids' room in the church. *Why don't parents use it?*

Yoga. Ahh - - socializing in the hallway, quiet - dare I say reverent - in the yoga practice room. Hmm. Yoga. Isn't that a different religion? Isn't practicing a different religion against the rules?

When I was stationed in Japan thirty years ago, Father Rocky would have Saturday night Mass on what we called Security Hill (where many of the folks worked shift work). It was quiet, it was reverent, it was hymnless and songless. Those were some of the nicest Masses.

Well, it's time for my Saturday afternoon pre-Mass nap.

Love to all.

I bet the problem is partly caused by the awful, theater-in-the-round architecture of newer (60s and later) churches, that encourage the communal at the expense of the sacred.

One of the things that would help keep parishes quiet would be if the churches turned the lights very low. The Mass is meant to be solemn, quiet, peaceful, prayerful, not full of chatter, laughter, ...

Thank you for this article. It is so timely as I have been anguishing over this very issue. I'm Lutheran, but we've got the same problem (both before and after the service) with the focus on greeting each other. Before the service I want to prepare to receive God's Word and Gifts and after the service, having just received the Holy Sacrament of the Altar, I want to remain in prayer for a few moments before joining in the after-church fellowship. Somehow, I'm just not in a hurry for a doughnut and coffee when i've only recently received the Most Precious Body and Blood of Christ.

By the way, despite the defensive comments by parents, I see nowhere in the original article where the writer complains about children. That is not the type of disturbance she is speaking of. Although children, when the are old enough to understand should be taught that God's House is a special place -- but they can easily learn that from the way their parents act.

Distractions are part and parcel of worship; whether in solitude/silence or in the presence of others. They are the work of the devil. What is more important than having it our way is to refocus on the real meaning of why you are attending the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass in the first place. I know from personal experience that when I am focused on what is happening in the Mass proper, I notice nothing around me. I also know that I can be easily distracted; where I either try to refocus or simply continue to allow myself to be distracted.

It is at times easier said than done, but it is not impossible as we do have the ability to control ourselves. In the struggle we can demonstrate to the Lord, just how important He is to us.