Getting rid of kneelers

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We have marble too. I don’t think it particularly enhances my mass going experience, do you Katie? 🤔
 
I live on the other side of the planet, and I visited an Orthodox monastery not far from the Romanian-Ukrainian border.
The monastery Church on Sundays is always crowded. The first hour from 8.00 to 9.00 read Okapis. ( or Akafis, Psalms prayer)
It seemed to me that the service went on for 3 hours, and all this time some people stood, and mothers with small children participated in the divine service by kneeling down, during the all service time.
In addition to morning and evening service, at 3-00 every night are the night divine service.
In the morning the Church is crowded so sometimes people stand in tight, in the evening and at night more spacious.
 
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I always rest my rearend on the pew when kneeling. Kneeling upright hurts. With my hearing loss, echoes are a pain, and more fabric in the church, even banners on the side walls, helps immensely. Carpet, of course, is the best option.
 
Being a Christian in North Korea is dangerous. Kneelers? Not so much.

That said, nobody should shame anyone into kneeling if they aren’t physically able.

Personally I never liked being coerced into holding hands during the Our Father. Fortunately where I live now, they don’t do it.
 
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I agree with the person above who said removing kneelers only stops people from kneeling in church. Not everybody of course but for the most part. Yes, kneelers can break, they can be a tripping hazard, make noise, and nothing annoys me more than seeing someone lounging on a pew with their feet propped up on a kneeler. But there is a good reason people want to get rid of carpets in their homes in favor of tile or hardwood flooring because carpets get nasty. And it doesn’t take long for them to get dirty, germy, harder to maintain, and wear out fast. That is what people’s shoes step on, too. Most people just wont get directly on the floor in a public place. That said, it is also harder for many older and people with less mobility to kneel on floor level vs kneelers, yet many such people still try to use kneelers. Really, the list of cons goes on.
 
Ardent_Fire said:
Personally I never liked being coerced into holding hands during the Our Father
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Even when the priest asks us to do it I don’t. I also see some other people don’t as well. But most do what the priest says.
 
Stone floor (but that is often too expensive), tile or simple polished/pigmented concrete. I personally prefer the polished concrete. Some churches had stained their concrete, but I believe that is being found to be not too durable, and I think if a new church is being built, the preference is to pigment the concrete.

I will another reason carpet is discouraged that I forgot: cleaning spills in a proper manner of the precious blood becomes very problematic.
 
My wife and I actually hate the kneelers my parish has and don’t use them. They are narrow and hit your knee in a place that will cause knee pain and stiffness if you use them often enough. I think they probably concentrate pressure on the patella tendon.

It is far more comfortable for us to kneel on the floor. The floor in the pew areas is carpeted using a very low pile carpet. Kneeling on tile or, sadly, concrete is less comfortable for me over time. I can’t say I’d be as enthusiastic to kneel on a really hard surface for a long time.
 
Jerusha said:
I always rest my rearend on the pew when kneeling. Kneeling upright hurts. With my hearing loss, echoes are a pain, and more fabric in the church, even banners on the side walls, helps immensely. Carpet, of course, is the best option.
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Carpet is not the best option to reduce echoing, it is simply the easiest. There are many others. One can install cushioned pews and do just as much good, although that comes with its own set of problems, ie cleanliness and durability (you will replace the pews within 25 years). Properly places acoustical panels on walls will eliminate the problem almost completely. You can find old churches that have almost perfect acoustics and do not have carpet or cushioned pews.
 
Very good point about people no longer prefer carpet in their homes. Wall-to-wall carpeting was a fad in homes, no need for churches to keep doing it. If its not good enough for your home, why is it good for the Lord’s home?
 
phil19034 said:
Talk to father and then if that doesn’t work, talk to the Bishop before those kneelers are removed.
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Before the action is taken is definitely the proper time. After they are removed and re-purposed , its quite the expense to bring them back.
 
A church I attend when I’m in Norway doesn’t have carpet – the pews and the kneelers are pretty hard wood for the most part with not a lot of padding, but they have nice little felt padding and pillows available next to the entrance for people to use if they want them. They’re pretty helpful.

The little pillows are nice for the rear end when it’s very cold during those winters there, too 🙂
 
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ratio1 said:
Are there any other reasons for not using carpet?

Here in Oz it is quite common to have carpet.
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Yes, makes for lousy acoustics. It deadens the sound. And in Canada, with our severe winters, with people plodding into church wearing slushy boots, the carpet would rapidly become a disaster in less than a season.
Loud-living-dogma said:
Carpet in church is bad for acoustics. Of course it’s nearly universal in churches built after the 1960s. Bad acoustics, bad sound systems, bad music.
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Completely disagree. What you say may be true if the “sacred music” is a rock-and-roll type band, but as someone who has been singing in a Gregorian Schola for 15+ years, Gregorian will never ever make a comeback if you carpet churches. I’ve sung in hard-surfaced churches, in churches with lots of carpeting (mostly in the sanctuary), and in a former chapel converted into a concert venue, where acoustic panels were placed on the ceiling to do the job of a carpet in deadening sound. Gregorian chant (if you can hear it at all) sounds awful in those circumstances.

The propers in particular have lots of subtleties that will get completely soaked up by the carpet, and to make ourselves heard, the cantors have to really strain our voices, which distorts the chant and makes it more likely that we go off-key. Remember that chant was “designed” around the acoustics of hard-surfaced great stone churches of the medieval era, and that’s where it sounds best.

When I built the small oratory in my study, I had it partitioned off from the rest of the room with a large frosted glass panel, and while the study itself is carpeted, the oratory has granite floor tiles. I can sing the Offices without having to strain my voice, whereas in a carpeted environment I do have to strain my voice as the sound gets lost.
 
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Irishmom2 said:
We have marble too. I don’t think it particularly enhances my mass going experience, do you Katie?
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This was not addressed to me, but I hope you do not mind if I answer. The materials used for church construction, taken as a whole most certainly affects people’s mass going experience. Sure, any one of them can be a little off and it may not have much of an effect, but overall, beyond a doubt it does. Take a church that has all carpet flooring, wood altar and ambos, all drywall walls, dropped ceilings, and it will have the look and feel of a modern assembly hall, not a church.

From the USCCB’s document “Built of Living Stone”:
The Choice of Building Materials: A church building is a lasting expression of a faith community’s life. Because the church building is destined to endure, parishes and the professionals who assist them should ensure that the components of the building, especially the building materials, are sturdy and substantial enough to stand the test of time.
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This is a point that both modern and traditional church architects stress. Materials are very important. Carpet is simply not suited to a Catholic Church.
 
I was in no way advocating carpet. But my experience is that tile, slate, wood are no less conducive to a good mass experience. Yes, economically, go with what will last so as not to have to replace it. But beyond that, you are talking about aesthetics, and mass can be wonderful in a grass hut with a dirt floor, so that is something else. And I don’t want to take this thread further off topic.
 
Reminds me of a story…walked into church late for the rosary…
missed it by one decade…so I decided to read in the pew…while the rosary was recited…
well…there I was…reading…when I mistakenly gently touched the kneeler - with my foot…
I was sitting cross legged…the upright kneeler fell !!
Could’t believe it.
Strange things have happened to me…but this…wow…

It was like a damn firecracker went off in the church.
The old lady, up front, kneeling, with the rosary, reciting, shot me a look -
it made my blood freeze - her look -
I put on my most innocent expression - and shrugged my shoulders…

It was a small wood peg - that came out of the side - figures - sigh
 
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