Do you ever leave mass early?

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Frankie65 said:
Sorry Petra. I read your post too quickly and I thought you wrote , my husband left the church screaming

Sorry!
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I don’t think I would have waited so long, had he left the Church screaming, lol…
 
PatK63 said:
@LilyM

Benediction isn’t the mass but it is adoration of Jesus. Far more important than a rosary!
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Yes, but that doesn’t change the fact that the faithful can elect to go to a Mass followed by Benediction and elect not to stay for Benediction. We had altar servers that usually did that, as it was a full holy hour. You don’t know if they were making a sacrifice just to be there for Mass. That is not at all the same as going to Mass and deciding to leave early for no particular reason other than to get out of the parking lot first.

After all, what about parishes with perpetual adoration? Nobody ever gets to go home?
 
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In my case I was talking about benediction that took about 10 minutes!
 
It’s pretty obvious to me that the family who were hassling the person for leaving after Mass and before Benediction saw it as a “teachable moment” to emphasize to the person how important Adoration was. I have to admit that if it were my kid and they said they walked out on Benediction I would probably be all like “What is the matter with you, that you couldn’t stay a few extra minutes to adore Our Lord? It’s not like you had another appointment you had to rush off to.”

Good Catholic parents teach their kids to go beyond the minimum requirements, not just check off the Mass box and ignore everything else.
 
PatK63 said:
In my case I was talking about benediction that took about 10 minutes!
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Yes, it is more praiseworthy to stay and unlikely that there is a pressing need to leave. Having said that, those are still two separate liturgies and so it isn’t the same as leaving Mass before it has concluded for no compelling reason. You missed a chance for Benediction; you did not leave Mass early…and I will bet that if you literally had left Mass early, you would really have been in some hot water!
 
Yup. To add to the story a bit, I was a higher profile member of the church I attended for over 2 decades; led songs and prayers, MC’d variety nights, as I did at work for many years. Then I was suddenly overwhelmed with mental illness in the form of panic attacks and depression.

For the last 20+ years I have been a happy recluse. But I learned through this that my personality has always wanted extreme privacy. I came out of my shell for a while but realize the way I am today is the way I was as an adolescent and a teen and I am very, very comfortable with this. The internet is my social life, apart from family, and I feel this is where I can contribute best. I go to Mass, sit at the back, and slip out as soon as I can.

I’ll tell you something else as well. The first thing I loved about Mass, and this was on my very first one about four years ago; no one talked to me. I was allowed to sit and pray, meditate, browse the hymnal, or just enjoy the quiet and peace of a room filled with people connecting to God. If I had tried to sit alone prior to a service at that other church people would assume I needed company and would come and talk. It got to where I wouldn’t enter the church until the last possible minute so I could have some quiet time before it began.

Anyway, sorry to ramble. I’m very glad to be where I am today. 🙂
 
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I knew better than that. A good number of people left and I thought why not? I learned different. I did not put up a defense. But it was also a case where following the crowd was not the best choice!
 
Tis_Bearself said:
It’s pretty obvious to me that the family who were hassling the person for leaving after Mass and before Benediction saw it as a “teachable moment” to emphasize to the person how important Adoration was. I have to admit that if it were my kid and they said they walked out on Benediction I would probably be all like “What is the matter with you, that you couldn’t stay a few extra minutes to adore Our Lord? It’s not like you had another appointment you had to rush off to.”

Good Catholic parents teach their kids to go beyond the minimum requirements, not just check off the Mass box and ignore everything else.
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With all possible respect, I am well aware of the importance of Adoration. I am equally well aware that there are dozens of different ways to worthily adore the Lord after Mass. Benediction is only one. And there is not some hierarchy whereby it has been objectively determined to be the best of possible ways, either.

I happen to think that spending time with the family God gave you and showing them His love, as the OP did, is an important and very praiseworthy way to spend time after Mass, and not at all deserving of condemnation. -

After all, we are literally told to GO at the end of Mass, not to keep our keisters indefinitely parked in our pews. And that is what the OP did. She didn’t leave to go shopping or to the football, or for any unworthy reason.

I strongly resent the implication that people who don’t do as you would are automatically not going beyond the bare minimum requirements. Again, there are many ways to do so, not just your preferred one.
 
You’re reading an implication into my post where there is none. For whatever reason, this family felt it important to emphasize Benediction. Who knows, maybe they felt the person who left had issues with spiritual laziness. If some other family thought it more important that the kid hurry home to spend time with the family, hopefully they made another time during the week for adoration. I’m just saying it’s not unreasonable for a family to emphasize Adoration time. It’s rather a good lesson as I see it.

There seems to be a trend on CAF lately for people to take all kinds of statements as personal disparagement if it expresses a different view. I’m not going to play that game, sorry.
 
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It seems this has come up on here before as I found two old threads relating to this topic, one of which is:-

For a trip down memory lane - found this old thread from 2011 - Leaving Mass before the last song has finished? which had 88 replies…

From within that thread:- Don’t leave Mass early!!! [humor]

Baltimore Catechism #948 " Q. 948. What is important for the proper and respectful hearing of Mass?

A. For the proper and respectful hearing of Mass it is important to be in our place before the priest comes to the altar and not to leave it before the priest leaves the altar. Thus we prevent the confusion and distraction caused by late coming and too early leaving. Standing in the doorways, blocking up passages and disputing about places should, out of respect for the Holy Sacrifice, be most carefully avoided."

An interesting article (no date on article) I found at How Much of the Mass Must I Attend? - mentions "Before Vatican II, moral theologians and canonists would talk about the three principal parts of Mass as the Offertory, Consecration and Communion. If you missed any one of those parts, they wrote, you would not have fulfilled the obligation of hearing Mass.

Today, canonists and liturgists do not use that terminology. They speak of the gathering, the Liturgy of the Word, the Liturgy of the Eucharist and the commissioning as the main divisions of Mass."
 
PatK63 said:
I knew better than that. A good number of people left and I thought why not? I learned different. I did not put up a defense. But it was also a case where following the crowd was not the best choice!
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Yeah, you’re obviously from an “if everybody else jumped in the lake I suppose that means” household, lol.
 
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Tis_Bearself said:
You’re reading an implication into my post where there is none. For whatever reason, this family felt it important to emphasize Benediction. Who knows, maybe they felt the person who left had issues with spiritual laziness. If some other family thought it more important that the kid hurry home to spend time with the family, hopefully they made another time during the week for adoration. I’m just saying it’s not unreasonable for a family to emphasize Adoration time. It’s rather a good lesson as I see it.

There seems to be a trend on CAF lately for people to take all kinds of statements as personal disparagement if it expresses a different view. I’m not going to play that game, sorry.
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PatK63 makes clear the “reason” - they acted like she was doing something sinful and accused her of abandoning Jesus. Both of which are wildly incorrect and in my view a serious overreaction to opting out of what is after all an optional devotion. As well as deeply personal - how could it not be?

If a child is spiritually lazy, the remedy is the same as if they are physically lazy, for example reluctant to exercise. You don’t decide the child needs to swim, drag them the swimming pool and tell them to swim or else. You talk to them to find out what sorts of exercise they enjoy and find beneficial, and encourage them in those. Not berate or guilt trip or criticise them for not doing your preferred one.
 
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Even though I am usually early and leave late, I have left early in the single digits. Twice I was with relatives that left early, once traveling from a scouting trip and I was just beat. I might have done it some other time, though never at my own parish. Travel is always involves somehow.
 
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