Intruding Church Behavior

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Had today off from work and, of course, went to church.
Hardly any parking because of a morning funeral of a firefighter being held upstairs.
I walked past a park bench where two women in their early thirties were talking.

Went in and downstairs to the dark quietness of the lower church.
Only a old lady in the back reading.
I decided to go up to the statue of Mary and smell the blue large flowers in the vases at the base of the stand.
Looked up at the statues face and went to my pew to read “ Power of Silence “

So…the two gals outside on the bench came in and knelt by the Mary statue - praying.
One was the leader, the other was sad and needed prayer, wiped a tear from eyes.
I put the book down - and secretly prayed with them. Beautiful.

Anyways a old lady came in, went to the podium, feet away, made noise,
another older lady came in and they began talking. Couldn’t believe it.
Right in front of them kneeling and sobbing.
 
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Life happens. You know the way of the world, and you “Couldn’t believe it”?

I’ve always viewed my inability to block out the world as my weakness, and not the fault of those making what I perceived as a commotion around me.

Pax et bonum!
 
Go tell them you’re in a place of worship and want your quiet.
 
It was a beautiful thing to see these two women kneeling and praying together -
I was in awe. Imagine. They were side by side. In perfect peace. Like angels.
My impression was that of sacred ground.
I put down my book and easily fell into prayer with them.

But the old lady church helper - walked into their space.
She began puttering around. Went and tapped the podium microphone.
She went into the back room and flipped on the lights. Ambience gone.
She came back out and another old lady walked in and they began talking and chatting…
The church and just us six. The intimacy of prayer was shot…for the women in their 30’s.

It was a touch rude - of the older ladies.
 
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When that happens to me - and it does quite often - I try to imitate St. Therese of Lisieux’s example as she coped with something similar.
From her autobiography - “Story of a Soul”:
For a long time I had to kneel during meditation near a Sister who could not stop fidgeting; if it was not with her Rosary, it was with goodness knows what else. Maybe no one else noticed it; I have a very sensitive ear. But you have no idea how much it annoyed me. I wanted to turn around and glare at the culprit to make her be quiet, but deep in my heart I felt that the best thing to do was to put up with it patiently, for the love of God first of all, and also not to hurt her feelings. So I kept quiet, bathed in perspiration often enough, while my prayer was nothing more than the prayer of suffering! In the end, I tried to find some way of bearing it peacefully and joyfully, at least in my inmost heart; then I even tried to like this wretched little noise.

It was impossible not to hear it, so I turned my whole attention to listening really closely to it, as if it were a magnificent concert, and spent the rest of the time offering it to Jesus. It was certainly not the prayer of quiet!
http://www.olmc-mission.org/storyofasoul.pdf (p.71-72)
Click to expand...
 
"I am the sacristan at our local parish. It gets more difficult every year, but, since my husband died a few years back this has really been my way to say thank you to the Church and to our priests.

Anyway, one of my duties is to set up the Chapel for daily Mass. We unlock the Chapel early in the morning, and do not usually have Mass there but today there was a funeral in the upper Church.

Today when I arrived there were two women kneeling at the front of the Chapel, one of them is crying. I waited just as long as I could, turned on the mic and thought that might signal them. People are going to begin arriving for Mass and I did not want them to feel uncomfortable as more people came into the Chapel. Father XYZ would be there soon to hear Confessions before Mass, and I could see some people reading books as they prayed, so, I turned on the lights to help them read AND to keep them from tripping or falling in the dark Chapel.

Seems someone took offense at my being there, perhaps I need to stop being the sacristan."

There are at least two sides to every encounter. Err on the side of charity.
 
The world doesn’t revolve around you and your need for silence and “ambiance”, nor should you expect it to. You’re going to have to learn to deal with the fact that other people exist, have things to do, and some of those things make noise. The lady you described wasn’t throwing a party. She was getting the chapel ready for Mass.
 
The two women kneeling and praying -
it was for something serious - I truly sensed that -
One gal , placed her hand on the others forehead -
They were both truly before God - sweet and beautiful -

But her comes this older lady…a helper…
She didn’t even pause…walked on over as if they weren’t even there -
Like the energizer rabbit with the bass drum -
Like Martha - zooming all about - while sister Mary was by Jesus -
Then Martha has the nerve to complain to Jesus !
What else is new.
 
I stay after daily Mass every day to pray. This happens to me a lot. Some of the women caring for the church are more respectful about it. Some less. They come in pairs, and there’s one pair who actually yells all the way down the church to each other – that is, when they’re not standing on the altar next to each other communicating at roughly the same volume. Grrrrrr.

But I remind myself:
  • the church is a public space, not a private one.
  • the altar guild has a job to do.
  • I get to be Mary because of the Marthas, not in spite of them.
And I pray gratitude:
  • Thank you for being Martha.
  • Thank you for making this space comfortable for everyone.
  • Thank you for taking care of Jesus’ home.
  • Thank you for letting me kneel here in the middle of your working time, even though the work is made harder when you’re trying not to disturb me.
The beauty of the praying women was not disturbed when the working women entered. Yes, that sort of thing can be aggravating, but it is our response that determines whether or not it functions as a disruption. If we simply fold it into our current awareness of God, it becomes just that much more to share with him. Even in the most profound moments, those moments when time dilates so that each second contains eternity, even then life continues apace all around us. And that is also beautiful.

You may have noticed from the story you reference that Mary did not complain when Martha interrupted. So if we’re going to be Marys, let’s be Marys!
 
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