What I Saw At Mass This Evening

[Dave]

I went to Mass this evening with some friends I was visiting. Right in front of us were a young couple with a young son -- probably around 3 years old -- who wouldn't stop talking despite their shushing him. Finally, during the homily, an usher came and suggested that they take their child to the cry room. I don't know just what he said, but I'm sure he tried to say it as tactfully as he could. Well, the woman whispered to her husband, "We're leaving!" and they all got up and walked out of the Church.

Do y'all think the usher was justified? I don't know what to think. However, I can't help but fear that perhaps that incident will result in them leaving the Church, if it hasn't already. I mean, some people's faith is so immature that if a priest or fellow parishioner so much as looked at them cross-eyed, they'd leave the Church!

Thoughts?

[ReformationNow]

If he whispered it, he's much more tactful than I would have been

I think he was justified. You shouldn't let the service be interrupted like that.

[Dave]

Yes, he whispered it. :)

[Guest jrob8503]

My youngest brother was being a bit of a pain during the priest homily. My mother grabbed him and was going to take him into this little sitting area where the service's audio is piped in through speakers.

The preist said (at the pulpit), "Please don't take him out. I've talked through plenty of crying babies before."

My mom was pretty embarassed needless to say.

[dUSt]

Once, a priest said that every time a baby starts crying, sure, the baby may bother some people, but just think how much the priest is bothering that baby!

[ReformationNow]

Once, a priest said that every time a baby starts crying, sure, the baby may bother some people, but just think how much the priest is bothering that baby!

ROFLMHO!

[ReformationNow]

When I was a kid, my parent's used to have to take me out of the service all the time 'cause I'd be climbing over and under the pews, and kicking the back of the pews. I never learned. I remember getting spankings back in my dad's office from my mom because I wouldn't sit still.

Hard to believe isn't it? I'm such a good kid! Honest!

[Trooper4DaHolyG]

Once, a priest said that every time a baby starts crying, sure, the baby may bother some people, but just think how much the priest is bothering that baby!

hahahaha so funny, yet so true!

True Christian babies can sleep sound through sermons! *jokes*

Christian Parents should discipline their children, if they learn to listen @ a younger age they will reap the benefits when they are older!

Dave,

Its so sad, that people will leave the Church over these things! It happens in all churches including mine! It shows who is committed and who isn't, like that forward going around about the guerillas who held up a church too see who would die for Jesus, 70% ran out and then the Guerillas said "there you go Pastor here are the real Christians."

[ReformationNow]

hahahaha so funny, yet so true!

True Christian babies can sleep sound through sermons! *jokes*

Christian Parents should discipline their children, if they learn to listen @ a younger age they will reap the benefits when they are older!

Dave,

Its so sad, that people will leave the Church over these things! It happens in all churches including mine! It shows who is committed and who isn't, like that forward going around about the guerillas who held up a church too see who would die for Jesus, 70% ran out and then the Guerillas said "there you go Pastor here are the real Christians."

I slept thru a sermon once. It wouldn't have been so embarrassing if I hadn't started sleepwalking.

[littleflower+JMJ]

True Christian babies can sleep sound through sermons! *jokes*

."

yes i am proud to say that i was a true christian baby!!

always quiet as a mouse

then i learned how to talk!

:lol:

[Kilroy the Ninja]

You know it's hard to say if that usher was right or not. Personally, I don't think it was really right. I've had to sit in the cry rooms and they are lousy. Most parents think the cry room means its a romper room and let their kids go pell mell all over the place, eating, drinking, carrying on and even playing with toys. It's impossible to hear or pay attention to the mass.

On the other hand I can understand where a child would be disruptive in the sanctuary. But, children have just as much of a right to be out there in with the general populace. Trying to keep a ten month old still AND completely quiet is almost impossible.

So what is the right answer? Too many times it is simpler to just stay home than to make the huge effort to get to church only not to hear the mass at all. Does it really count if you couldn't participate?

:ph34r:

[Carrie]

At my parish, there are plenty of crying babies...and we don't have a cry room (my church is teeny tiny compared to some others around here). Whenever a baby starts to cry, the priest pauses to say "isn't that a beautiful sound" and continues on.

When the priest shows such patience and love, it makes it easier for everyone else to do the same thing. Instead of being annoyed, the priest's comment makes us appreciate that those cries are coming from big miracles in little packages.

[ironmonk]

Dave,

I would say that the lady was looking for a reason to leave... a very ignorant Catholic.

The usher is not the Church, if she left because of the usher, then she didn't want to be there in the first place.

Your Servant in Christ,

ironmonk

[jasJis]

Dave,

Hard to say if he was right or not, but I think he was trying to be right in this circumstance.

Lot's of times I don't mind a crying or disruptive baby. I'm able to ignore them or feel slightly amused. I personally always was able to correct my children at Mass when we went, and they were disruptive only briefly.

On the other hand, I've been to mass where toddlers and babies have fussed or cried or talked or generally disrupted continuously when I really, really, really needed the graces of Mass and was thouroughly annoyed and distracted by them where I felt like I got nothing out of Mass.

I've talked to my Mom about this. (She raised 6 kids, none of us "angels"). Her opinion was that the parent needs to be the adult. It is the parents job to bring children to mass to teach them about the Mass, etc. It is the parents job also to learn if their child is old enough to learn to behave. She said of the 6 of us, no two were ready at the same age. If we were continually disruptive, we weren't taken for a while, and were taken out. Sometimes she had to leave with 3 or for kids. My dad would stay home with those who were too young or too disruptive. She said it was great when we all were old enough to come together as a family. She said parents make the mistake that they feel they can 'force' their kids to behave, or, make the mistake that it doesn't matter if their kid behaves. My parents felt that only a little disruption can be tolerated, but they shouldn't overestimate a child's ability to behave when their young.

Pray for the parents. We rarely are 100% 'right'. You don't know if maybe 1 parent wanted to have a babysitter becasue the child cannot behave yet and go to mass with the spouse and the other spouse wanted to go to Mass as a complete family despite the child's behaviour. It could be about a disagreement between them, not with the Church.

[Anna]

Something very similar happened to me two years ago.

It was very painful.

And I did not return to my home parish for many weeks.

When I did return, it was not the same. For many more weeks, I was very self conscious and upset if any of my children made the slightest move or sound, thereby annoying others. I had no peace!

Ultimately, I began attending Mass without the kids. Very disfunctional...

All because of the unkindness of a..."Greeter."

My circumstances were different, in that Mass had not yet begun.

My husband had a military drill, and I was managing the two year old twins in a front pew.

People were dashing back and forth, preparing for Mass.

My 7 year old left the pew, with my permission, to use the bathroom before Mass.

The altar servers were coming and going from the vestibule to the sanctuary, etc...Not in their albs yet.

I was saying my penance.

The twins weren't making any noise, but they were figitting in our pew. One asked my permission to leave the pew (I thought) to greet a family friend across the aisle. I misunderstood. He had asked if he could greet the altar server passing by, and ske-dattled after her! I got out of my pew and returned him to me.

Then, the greeter came to me and, in a hushed tone, read me the riot act. Three times I told her that "I'm doing the best I can." And each time, she became more forceful in her argument.

Her argument went from "I" to "we" to "they."

The first thing she said to me was, "Once Mass begins, I don't want to see your children passing through the sanctuary."

I responded, "I'm doing the best I can."

More insistend, "Look, a lot of us have important jobs in this parish. We need to be able to get back and forth from our pews to the altar. We don't want little children in our way."

Again, "I'm doing the best I can."

The third time, she was truly indignant, and said, "It isn't me, you know, it's them. The old people. (She is elderly too.) They are complaining about you. They're walking and seeing you up here and saying, 'Oh, no...not the children.'"

Now I was really hurt, and I didn't quite believe her.

But the only words that would come out were, "I'm doing the best I can" a third time.

As I sat in that pew waiting for my 7 year old to return from the bathroom, with a two year old under each of my arms, I kept hearing her words over and over, and I could feel that I was about to burst into tears.

As I assembled my purse and keys and took the hands of my boys, turning to leave, elderly parishoners were whispering as I passed them, "They weren't bothering ME!"

No, they were bothering the Greeter.

I left my church that day and drove in tears to a parish a half hour away. After Mass, three different people complimented me on what a beautiful family I had, and how well behaved they had been.

What an ointment is a kind word!

If I had been of weaker faith, I would've stopped attending Mass altogether.

The usher did GREAT HARM!

What would Jesus have said????????

Luke 18:15-17

[15] People were also bringing babies to Jesus to have him touch them. When the disciples saw this, they rebuked them. [16] But Jesus called the children to him and said, "Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. [17] I tell you the truth, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it."

There is lots more to this story. This is the condensed version! :lol:

[Anna]

And I cry again, just reading about it. :(

[cmotherofpirl]

I always sat with my kids in the back of the church, so if they misbehaved we could go out the back door quietly. When they were little I nursed them if they fussed. When they were bigger they knew if the misbehaved in church they would be punished at home. So they usually read their "God books" and sat in the pew.

If someone had complained to me like your idiot did, I probably would have gone to the priest after Mass and ask if he welcomes children or not to his Masses. Most priests are much nicer than the greeters and ushers.

Ignorant people need to reported.

Some of those people act like the Church is their own private property.

Edited October 5, 2003 by cmotherofpirl

[Anna]

I often sat in the back with my family, as well...but there are lots of misbehaving peeps in the back for that same reason, and not all of them are children!

I had sat up front on that occasion, to say my Penance, as is just my custom, I guess! In the meanwhile, folks began entering to prepare for Anticipated Mass.

So many people rushing back and forth, and talking out loud...My little guys at least were very quiet, but active.

Can you believe that I later learned she has been stirring things up regarding me and my children with whoever would listen for months before she ever approached me!!! She said she had seen one get out of his pew once during a First Friday Adoration, and that he had toddled up to the St. Joseph altar. When he looked back at me, I gave him a look of disapproval, and he "ran" all the way back to the pew (where I sat or knelt with his twin and other little ones). She said that was most disrespectful.

Ever since that, she went about complaining about me, until there was a posse of disgruntled old folks, waiting for my kids to make a wrong move in church!

She pointed out my twins figitting up front to the priest, who was in the back, greeting parishoners with her. He told me later that he thought she was going to offer me some help with the little guys! So he gave her permission to come speak with me.

To make matters worse, she phoned me the following Monday to tell me that she was sorry if she had offended me, but I had it coming, cuz I don't control my kids, and in her day, children were seen and not heard...etc. She told me that Father had sent her up there to speak with me. And, that's when she detailed the Adoration story.

I later was told from another source that my friend had been present during a conversation where the Greeter was complaining about my kids, and my friend had responded, "Isn't life beautiful? Aren't those children just wonnnnnnderful gifts from God? How she and your parish have been blessed!"

But I can tell you that this Greeter sewed a lot of discord between people who I've never meant to harm in any way, and my children. I don't even really know this Greeter very personally...we've just attended a couple of the same parish workshops and such. She was very outspoken and opinionated at them, but being single, healthy, and well-to-do, she is involved in everything in our parish. She has the freedom and wherewithall to do so.

I was able to tell her, however, that the job of a Greeter should be to make people feel welcome. Instead, she presents herself as the Pew Police.

I've since learned that she's done same to other large families, (and they sit in the back!)

Maybe y'all could pray for her, cuz... I don't ...can't. ............won't? :huh:

Edited October 5, 2003 by Anna

[FreeSoul]

I think it's a blessing to have antsy spirited bawling children in Church. I love to hear them cry. It makes me remember when I was six and antsy...and trying to fidget, but I loved God...so it was o.k. because I grew in my own time.

My mother and I were in Church once (I was a teenager by then) and the priest was reminding parents to try and keep their children quiet..he was being pretty testy...my mom got SO mad, she was like...you have kids and THEN tell me about keeping them quiet...

Sometimes, it's not about the discipline...but just letting children be around the sacrament...let them be with Jesus in their own whiny, antsy, flip-through-the-hymnal, not paying attention way...

It may be a little harder to consentrate, but then again, it allows us to remember that the Church is for all..Perhaps for the toddlers they can do what my grandmother did...give us lifesavers. we'd smell of elderberries on them and shut right up...give us a little book and let us do our own thing...and if once and a while we end up singing ...then so what? Then again, I WAS a perfect little angel....lol :rolleyes:

[Norseman82]

One time during the sign of peace I told a lady with some particularly unruly little ones "Peace be with you.....you need it!" She laughed and one of the kids asked "What did he mean by it?" and she explained to them I was referring to their unruliness.

Last week at 9:30 AM mass, there was one particularly unruly kid (about 3 or 4 years old, I would guess) who was running up and down the side and cross aisle and I was wondering "Where are the parents??". Finally, the father walked down the side aisle and the kid came back to him, but then proceeded to remove the kneeler pads from the kneelers at one of the side altars - right under the gazeful eyes of the father! I was about ready to call the usher (keep in mind this was going on through a good portion of the mass including the consecration) when finally the father put the kneeler pads back on the kneelers.

Of course, what drives me up the wall is when the grown adults talk through the homily making it hard for me to hear.