Convert dilemma

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htolley

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I beacame a catholic last Easter. I love the church very much. Last may I became very ill , I was sick thru July. I could not go to church during this time. I went back to church for 2 Sundays and my sister became very ill and died . I missed 2 more weeks . I am very hurt because during all this time no one missed me or got in touch with me. No one else in my family is catholic, but me . I go to church alone every Sun. Shouldnt they have noticed my envelope was missing or something? I am anxious to hear what you have to say about this.
ellen tolley
 
htolley,

Sorry to hear about your illness. All I can say in defense of this happening is that our Parishes are large, people go on vacation for extended periods of time so being “missing” is not necessarily an abnormal thing for those who might know you or expect you at Mass.

Do you know others in the Parish? Do any of them know you well enough to call? How about if you miss someone for several weeks from Mass? Chances are they were on vacation (especially over the summer months) or went to a different Mass for several Sundays.

I know in my Parish (the largest in New Mexico) others only comment about my not being there when I attend Mass with them again. We have 7 Masses from which to choose from so concievably I could attend Mass for seven weeks before I am back to my “regular” Mass time and it is usually assumed I went to a different Mass…

Also, I have been known to forget my envelopes at home so they don’t get put in the collection basket sometimes but once a month (not always, but sometimes). Missing envelopes isn’t a reason to check-up on someone either.

Because of the size of our Parish though we have a separate ministry that deals with the infirmed, newly ill, just ill or those in need for whatever reason. The thing is, the ministry directors don’t know if someone is in any of these situations unless someone calls them and lets them know 🙂

Brenda V.
 
in our parish the envelopes are counted by a team of several people, and the date entered into the computer by a secretary. there is no way anyone would assume someone is absent based on no envelope, since less than half the parishioners give financial support, and only about half of them use the envelopes. Since we have 5 weekend Masses, each with over 300 people attending, no way anybody would be able to say for sure who was there and who wasn’t.

you may be missing a sense of fellowship you experienced in your former congregation, something some Catholic parishes have not yet learned to emulate, perhaps that is how you can help your new parish grow.

we do have a team of visitors to the sick, and a book in the back of church and in the office to record prayer intentions, but someone has to call and let us know. our geographic territory is quite large, includes families with kids in any of 3 high schools, 5 junior highs, and a dozen elementary schools, so it would be very hard to know families and individuals personally.

these are just excuses, I know, but functioning as a real community is a goal parishes should be trying to achieve, as you kindly remind us.
 
So very sorry about your illness and your sister’s death. Please know that all were praying for you and your sister at every Mass even if they didn’t know about it, as we include prayers for all the sick and dying at Mass.
As the others have explained about the envelope’s to you, I won’t go into that again.
Please call your Parish when you need a Priest or an Extra Ordinary Minister of Holy Communion to come to your house when you are ill. Also, check and see if your Parish has a group to help you through your grief.
One other thing, no matter where you are in the world, you are welcome at any Mass and it is a great thing indeed to go to Mass when someone you love is dying, (of course if you were caring for her and couldn’t make it there, it would be alright to call the closest Parish to where your sister lived and explain your situation and a Priest or Extra Ordinary Minister of Holy Communion could have come and given you Holy Communion while you were caring for her.)
You will remain in my prayers. I liked what puzzleannie said about how you might possibly head that up for your parish, ask your Pastor about it.
 
I used to work with a woman who left the Church, and her sister as well, because, the church sent her letter saying about “missing her envelope” which she interpreted as being after her money.

I would have tried see it more charitably, like “are you OK? Is anything wrong?”

Oh well.
 
Many parishes have a bulletin that asks us to pray for the sick. Call teh parish secretary and have her put your name there. This way others know and can reach out to you.
 
The envelope thing was already addressed, and also remember that there are usually several Sunday Masses so maybe those who are used to seeing you just assumed you were attending a different Mass.

I wouldn’t really notice if someone who attends Mass on Sundays were missing, but I would notice (for obvious reasons) if a daily Mass person were missing. I most definitely would inquire about them being missing, as did some parishioners when I left for a 7-day retreat that they didn’t know about. It was nice to return and discover they had gone to others in the parish to make sure I was ok. I’m sure it’s the same in most parishes, it’s just that they’re large with multiple Masses so maybe no one knew you were gone.

Penitent
 
Ellen, I am so sorry about your sister. And I hope you are back in good health. I agree with the others who have commented. Catholic parishes are huge and unless your envelope was always the one with the $1000 check in it, the counters could easily have missed it.

In my parish, the first year after I was received I participated in a Cornerstone retreat just to get to know some of my fellow parishoners. Then I signed up the next year to be part of the team that presents the retreat. That 10-member team are now tight as sisters. If I had been going through what you went through I would have sent out an e-mail, and 10 women would have been organizing my dinners for the whole month . . .

A lot of becoming “noticed” in a big Catholic parish is about getting involved at some level. The small group thing is great. Or if you’re ALWAYS at the Wednesday night Rosary, and you don’t show up, somebody would notice – hopefully you had introduced yourself and everyone would know your name.

As a reader, last Sunday before Mass a new reader went up to every EMHC and said: Hi, I’m Carol, what’s your name? And she said everybody’s name over and over . . . We’re ALL going to remember Carol!
 
Most Catholic parishes have many different groups, I would join one if you feel like you need a little bit more fellowship.

I commonly go to other parishes since I am in California and we like to drive. Since all Catholic Churches are the same, it is pretty common for Catholics to go to other Catholic parishes, so many times people don’t notice when you are gone assuming you are just going somewhere else.

God Bless
Scylla
 
There is of course the complications introduced by the HIPPA act (another government overseeing program that has been horribly mis-applied and probably casued more problems than good).

In the good ol’ days, you’d get sick, the hospital would call your priest, you’d get a sick call visit. Now a lot of places won’t release such valuable private information about you to the parish. So it is very easy for no one to know you are even there. We have an old nun that makes calls on parishoners in the hospital and old age homes, and she was complaining about this when it first started. On the plus side, many places are coming to their senses now, and putting common sense back into the equation.
 
Ellen, God bless you. I will pray for you and your sister.

I am a recent convert too, and didn’t know anyone. No one in my family is Catholic. Also, I’m relatively young, and I felt like everyone is older than me. I’m from PA, and living in SC, so I’m an odd Northerner too! To top it off, I’m relatively shy, and not a talkative guy who likes to “network” and meet new people and junk.

But since I was received into the Church I’ve been involved in religious ed, RCIA, prayer groups, adult classes, Bible studies, etc. I also joined the Knights of Columbus, and want to become a tertiary Dominican.

All these things really help: I’ve made many friends, and it is a joy. Being Catholic is the BEST.
 
Sorry to hear about your illness, and deeply sorry for the loss of your sister.

Long, long time ago- about two or three years or so, maybe a little more- a parish could call the local hospital and ask which of their parishioners was there. No more. HIPPA has stopped all that.

A young woman I know had a baby, then the baby had complications. Her husband, a protestant/ agnostic, did not know he was supposed to call the parish. He assumed the hospital would do it. The baby recovered, but both of them were angry with our pastor and the ministry team until they found out that NOBODY KNEW, EVEN THOUGH SHE LISTED “CATHOLIC” AND HER PARISH ON HER FORMS. None of us knew until the baby got out of the hospital.

So please- if ANY of you get sick, if you are going to schedule surgery, CALL THE PARISH. If you can’t call, make sure you know somebody will call for you.
 
Ellen, both you and your sister are in my prayers. Most of my thoughts have been stated very well in prior responses, but I think you should give Thomas More’s suggestions special attention.

God bless you.

Charliemac
 
This thread is a dilemma that I think is common in city Catholic parishes as opposed to traditional mainline Protestant congregations where the number of families in a Catholic parish is traditionally larger than a Protestant congregation which also has fewer different services on Sunday. In the rural communities, everyone knows everything about everyone but this is not so in our cities where bonds are not necessarily intimate within a neighborhood that has unique characteristics, ie Irish, Italian, etc.

The situation is made worse because Catholics easily not only attend different Masses but don’t hesitate to cross town because they have something going on over there (probably the only downside to our universality and that the focus of our Mass is the Eucharist and not the charisma of the Preacher). For these reasons, parishioners problems fall through the cracks.

I’ve advocated in our parish that we monitor envelopes and not for the financial aspect. I believe that those parishioners that don’t use envelopes are usually the marginal Catholics that our evangelization efforts need to focus on and get them more involved. I also believe that someone who uses envelopes but changes their giving level is usually someone who is experiencing personal hardship or a crisis of faith-both of which are calls for one of our ministry efforts or even the Priest to contact the family. Unfortunately from my perspective, we have not done this for fear that people will think that it is only the money we care about. A classic Catch-22.

The problem of HIPPA is also very real. While I or my family have not needed medical attention lately (Thank God!), I understand that it is being reformed to some degree but I’m sure that it will still err on the side of cautious non-disclosure.

This being said, I think that we need to take some responsibility ourselves. Upon reflection of this thread, I’m going to talk to my wife, children, siblings and parents about mechanisms in the event of an emergency or tragedy. In addition to getting something for their wallets/purses that says “I am Catholic. Please call a Priest” and includes their parish information, I’m going to talk to them about if they’d like a medal or bracelet that would say the same thing (Christmas/Birthday shopping just got simpler!). Despite being relatively active in our Parish, if we were to not show up for a month (especially in the summer), I don’t think it would set off any bells as even those we are close to would just assume we have been attending different Masses, different parishes or traveling. As most of our close Catholic friends attend a neighboring parish (we actually live outside the boundaries of our parish as we moved across town four years ago but have chosen to stay at our original parish), I’m going to talk to them about making sure they notify our parish in the event of a personal tragedy.

It would break my heart if my parish family didn’t respond if we needed them. But I also know that it would break their heart if they didn’t respond because they didn’t know we needed them. Thank you Ellen for sharing your experience so the rest of can take steps for us to avoid it happening to others.
 
I cannot concur with my neighbor ChcgoBurbs strongly enough; the infamous HIPAA (“Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act”) has radically increased the difficulty of providing pastoral care to the sick from their own parish. Even though HIPAA is supposed to allow things like a parish minister to ascertain names of those parishioners in the hospital, in practice the hospitals fear perceived liability. By all means drop a call to the rectory or have someone call on your behalf; the parish staff desperately want to know when parishioners are hospitalized!
 
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