Attending Mass At Different Parishes

[HomeschoolDad]

And I’ve never understood this thing of “leaving right after communion”. You can stay the entire hour to receive, but you can’t manage that last 10 minutes?

I don’t think so. Missing everything after the communion rite isn’t essential to having attended Mass. Missing the entire Liturgy of the Word, or even worse, missing the Canon of the Mass (Eucharistic Prayer) would be another story.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not condoning missing any of the Mass whatsoever. Absolutely, strictly speaking, once the priest has said “the Mass has ended, go in peace”, Mass is over and you could leave that very minute. In fact, when I first became a Catholic, I reasoned, “well, it’s over, it’s OK to leave”, and I did precisely that. It does speed things along and lets you avoid the scrum that takes place when everyone else leaves at the same time. Then I realized, first of all, that you need to stay after Mass to make a proper thanksgiving (doesn’t have to be that long), and secondly, to leave while the priest is processing, or while the recessional is still playing, may not violate the letter of the law, but arguably, it violates the spirit.

 

[ThomasMT]

Absolutely, strictly speaking, once the priest has said “the Mass has ended, go in peace”, Mass is over and you could leave that very minute.

That’s what I always figured… staying after that, I always regarded a matter of decorum. When I was younger and dumber it used to drive me bananas when the priest would hold up that “green light” for the sake of seemingly never ending announcements

Another understanding I always had (whether correct or not) is that if I am late, my Mass is valid as long as I arrive in time for the Gospel reading.

 

[TomH1]

I suppose this is one way to respond. To find reasons not to do what one ought. Sad people can’t work as hard to do the opposite.

 

[Glennon_P]

And, as I alluded to above, it’s an American attention span thing.

I’m a history geek and enjoy watching TV news shows from the 1950s-1970s on YouTube. It’s fascinating to see how much longer the film clips were back in the day - some of them would be 45 seconds or a minute long. Broadcast journalism students in the 1980s were taught to limit them to 20-30 seconds. Today…it’s a 5-7 second sound byte.

 

[Tis_Bearself]

Missing everything after the communion rite isn’t essential to having attended Mass. Missing the entire Liturgy of the Word, or even worse, missing the Canon of the Mass (Eucharistic Prayer) would be another story.

The Catholic Church does not mandate what parts of the Mass one must be present for in order to “count” as having “attended Mass”.

Many priests, canon lawyers etc have posted their opinions online, but it is just that, opinion.

It seems more likely that the situation of whether you have “met your Mass obligation” is dependent on why you came late/ left early/ missed part of the Mass etc and whether you made a good faith effort to be there, not on whether you were in the worship space (or out in the nave with your toddler listening on the loudspeaker etc) when the entire Liturgy of the Word or even the entire Liturgy of the Eucharist was going on.

 

[whatistrue]

Sad people can’t work as hard to do the opposite.

Very sad that some cannot understand that their preferences are not laws of nature or of the Church. Welcome to the Ignore bucket.

 

[Cor_ad_Cor]

I have never heard that. Just putting it bluntly, Catholics don’t have a concept of “that guy was rude” in Mass — we go for the sake of Almighty God and our own sanctification, and Catholics typically neither know nor care what the other guy does. Catholics tend not to be judgmental about other people’s behavior — everyone is more or less “doing their own thing”.

Ideally and in theory, yes, I’d agree; in practical reality, not so much — just read these forum threads! “I saw this guy at Mass the other day doing ___. What’s wrong with him?!”

I’ve even heard priests give differing opinions on the matter of when to leave and whether it’s rude or not.

especially as it invalidates fulfillment of holy day obligation

Nope; the Church does not define any specifics about parts of the Mass you must be present for to meet your obligation, whether the final blessing, the Gospel, the Eucharistic Prayer, etc.

 

[ThomasMT]

Nope; the Church does not define any specifics about parts of the Mass you must be present for to meet your obligation, whether the final blessing, the Gospel, the Eucharistic Prayer, etc.

So I am hearing… but taking it to the other end of the extreme, can I just come in to cross myself, light a candle and call it good?

 

[Cor_ad_Cor]

No, not to fulfill your obligation; you have to attend Mass - the Church just doesn’t define what that means in a rigid way.

 

[HomeschoolDad]

Missing everything after the communion rite isn’t essential to having attended Mass. Missing the entire Liturgy of the Word, or even worse, missing the Canon of the Mass (Eucharistic Prayer) would be another story.

especially as it invalidates fulfillment of holy day obligation

OK, folks, I’ll take your word for it. What you say makes sense. I thought I had read somewhere (and in 46 years of being Catholic, there is a whole lot of “reading somewhere” in my past) that, at the very minimum, you had to be there from the Gospel through the end of the Eucharistic Canon.

That term “Sunday obligation” sounds absolutely horrible. To non-Catholic ears, it makes Catholics sound like these horrible little creeps who, if they weren’t bludgeoned into being in a church for an hour a week through threat from Rome of eternal damnation (and not everyone cares about that kind of thing anymore, it was quite different 75 years ago), would only show up for Easter and for midnight Mass at Christmas time. Couldn’t the Church find a more flattering term?

 

[Tis_Bearself]

You probably did read that somewhere, because like I said, priests and canon lawyers love to give their opinions on this question online. Kids also used to be taught in Catholic school that you had to hear certain parts of the Mass in order to qualify as having been to Mass, even though the Church hadn’t taken a position on it and this was just opinion on the part of the teachers.

We’ve had past threads on it here because people have asked the question. The Church doesn’t take an official position on it and just leaves it up to people’s individual consciences to decide.

 

[ThomasMT]

We’ve had past threads on it here because people have asked the question. The Church doesn’t take an official position on it and just leaves it up to people’s individual consciences to decide.

In that case, maybe it’s best to simply show up on time and stay until the final blessing, like big boys and girls… reasonable impediments aside. Whenever I find that too unbearable, I try to meditate on how bearable it would be to hang from a cross instead. Speaking from personal conscience. Happy Sunday folks )

 

[Tis_Bearself]

I think you have the right idea. I am often late to Mass during the week because it is challenging to fit a Mass around work and other weekday activities, but rarely late on Sunday because of the obligation - I want to make sure I attend a full Mass. Occasionally I’m late if there’s a traffic issue or I’m feeling sick but not sick enough to miss Mass, or something like that.

 

[JanR]

Hey, it just so happens I STILL like burnt orange and avocado furniture and appliances, and it’s too bad they’re so hard to find, today. I love those colors, along with the once popular harvest gold. Those are delightful, sunny and cheerful colors, as opposed to the drab almond, sterile white and cold stainless steel we have in today’s kitchens and elsewhere in the home. Black appliances – not quite so bad.

Anyone remember when we could get decorator bath tissue to go with the color schemes in our bathrooms? Someone raised a stink about the dyes causing allergic reactions in some, but certainly not all people, so now everyone has to settle for plain old white.

What ever happened to respecting the personal aesthetic tastes and preferences of individuals? Or to creative imagination, which also seems to be in short supply, today. Maybe it’s the artist in me, but I miss these niceties.

I even loved the colorful shag carpets of the 1970s – brilliant oranges, greens, golden yellows – it was a colorful time, and I saw and still see nothing wrong with it.

And before someone flags this for being off topic – it isn’t. HomeschoolDad made mention of it in his post.

 

[HomeschoolDad]

Hey, it just so happens I STILL like burnt orange and avocado furniture and appliances, and it’s too bad they’re so hard to find, today. I love those colors, along with the once popular harvest gold. Those are delightful, sunny and cheerful colors, as opposed to the drab almond, sterile white and cold stainless steel we have in today’s kitchens and elsewhere in the home. Black appliances – not quite so bad.

To this day, I still have a couple of burnt orange towels, that I use for bath mats. Polyester was designed to last forever. And don’t forget mauve from the 1980s.

Anyone remember when we could get decorator bath tissue to go with the color schemes in our bathrooms? Someone raised a stink about the dyes causing allergic reactions in some, but certainly not all people, so now everyone has to settle for plain old white.

I always wondered what happened to that stuff.

I even loved the colorful shag carpets of the 1970s – brilliant oranges, greens, golden yellows – it was a colorful time, and I saw and still see nothing wrong with it.

Shag carpet was pretty cool, but extremely difficult to keep clean. That stuff could get nasty. I had a friend in college who, God rest his soul, had a biohazard for a home! Not the most meticulous housekeeper. He had shag carpet in abundance.

I am reading entirely too many obituaries of classmates these days. We’re getting to that age.

And before someone flags this for being off topic – it isn’t. HomeschoolDad made mention of it in his post.

Thank you. “Sources, please” sticklers and “that’s off topic” police are a real buzzkill on a forum such as this one, which I think of as more a vibrant community of faith and reasoned discussion, than a strict academic forum. I think Our Lord would want us sometimes to drift away from these serious, eternal-life-or-eternal-perdition conversations into something lighter and more pleasant, to make life a little more bearable and bring things down to human scale. I don’t doubt that Christ and His apostles didn’t sometimes “shoot the breeze” over mundane matters having nothing to do with faith.

 

[JanR]

Oh, yes. mauve and turquoise, the favorite combination of that time. It actually went quite well together.

 

[HomeschoolDad]

Oh, yes. mauve and turquoise, the favorite combination of that time. It actually went quite well together.

And don’t forget burnt orange and turquoise, the signature livery of Howard Johnson’s.

I would pay $10 extra per night just to stay in this room, just because.

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[JanR]

I don’t doubt that Christ and His apostles didn’t sometimes “shoot the breeze” over mundane matters having nothing to do with faith.
[/QUOTE]
I suspect that Jesus may have had pets. Fullest in humanity as well as in Divinity.

Yep, I’ve been reading obituaries of folks around my age and, sadly, much, much younger, due to the drug culture and youthful recklessness. Kids driving on ice and snow at race car speeds with bald tires – meth, opiates, cocaine overdoses – we have it all up here, and it kills a lot of folks.

I heard it once said that once we reach 70, we’re living on borrowed time. Not so true, anymore, but still, it reminds us of our mortality.

As for Mass at different churches, somehow, I can’t connect well with converted gymnasiums, or with arena-type arrangements where people in the very back can’t hear anything because of the distance and inadequate amplification. Those feel more like stadiums than churches. I was in one like that in California, and couldn’t hear a word of the homily or anything else, because the projection was so poor.
I will say this for it – the place was packed.

 

[Shasta-Rose]

The father and his retinue recess out. Most of the rest of stay till close to the end of the recessional hymn. I stay till the last notes are dying out. Always did that in the Lutheran church in days gone by. The pastor and his helpers recessed out, followed by the choir. If you tried to run out too early, you would run the risk of trampling the choir!

 

[Phemie]

To this day, I still have a couple of burnt orange towels, that I use for bath mats. Polyester was designed to last forever . And don’t forget mauve from the 1980s.

Forget mauve. I painted my bedroom deep purple and white back in 1973. After I got married and left home permanently in ‘75 Dad repainted. I think it took him 6 or 7 coats of white to cover the purple. Don’t think the paint store guy told him about painting with grey first.