With a smile, with patience, with compassion, with an encouraging word. Our world needs families keeping the Eucharist at the center of their hearts and homes.Īnd you can help make that happen even in one small way. Our Church needs families keeping the Eucharist at the center of their hearts and homes. Our society looks on many days to be crumbling to pieces, and the horror of the devil’s attack on families is bewildering in a way that leaves many of us utterly breathless. We need your children in our Church!” I imagine them receiving support and kindness, gentle smiles and solidarity.Īnd that difference will make a huge difference in the future of our Church and the future of Catholicism. And I imagine them just deciding that it will be too hard to start all over with their child or children, and I imagine them deciding to never come back.Īnd then I imagine the difference it would make, if no matter their child or children’s behavior as they do their best, people go to them after Mass to say, “Your family is beautiful - it is so great to see you here. I imagine people staring, giving them displeased glances (which I have certainly received) as they start back at square one, and the plethora of other ways people can be tragically unwelcoming in Catholic Churches everywhere. It is a leap and act of faith - a leap and act of love.Īnd I just imagine all the ways it could go to either bolster them in continuing to return to the Eucharist as a family or drive them away. But I think very often about the husband and wife who may look at each other one weekend and say, “Well…let’s try in-person Mass again with the kids,” who get their children in the car to try for their first time back. There are many who will never return, some who will return only to attend on Christmas and Easter. It is no secret that Catholicism has lost many Mass attendees due to the pandemic. The reason I am writing to you today is to ask for a renewed and revitalized support, patience, and compassion for families who are at Mass. Some of us want to audibly shout, “THANKS BE TO GOD!” when the priest has finally said, “The Mass is ended, let us go…” Many of us are already totally fried by the Gloria (a.k.a. Many of us are exasperated, tired, and filled with dread as we drive into post-pandemic Mass on Sunday imagining how it will go with the children. It has not been easy - at all.Īnd I am just one of millions of parents who have had to start back at square one with children and Mass. When the church opened back up, we had to start at square one. As you can imagine, the pandemic ruined all of the rhythm, routine, and predictability of attending Mass for him. He was accustomed to the rhythm of it, to the routine of it, to the predictability of it. There have been an infinite amount of difficulties every single individual has faced due to the pandemic, but today I want to speak to attendance at church with children, and only that, and ask one small thing of you.Ĭan you imagine, if it was confusing for adults, how confusing, frustrating, and difficult it was for my 2-year-old son? Pre-pandemic, he and I attended Mass together every day. It was confusing, frustrating, and difficult for every adult trying to attend Mass with faith and joy. First it was Mass on TV, then we were out on the lawn, then we were in the parish hall for two weeks, then back on the lawn, then back in the parish hall, then in the parking lot for months. My husband, two sons, and I attend Mass together, and did throughout most of the pandemic when we were allowed to attend Mass outside. I write to you as a post-pandemic mother of two small children.
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