No holy water...

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stanncie

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Is it ok for a parish to never have holy water available on the fonts? I love the parish I go to but this is the case there.

I once asked an altar server why there was no holy water and he told me that it was to prevent santeros from taking it. i do live in an area where there are a number of practicing santeros so that could be the case.

In case you don’t know a santero is a person who practices Santeria which is a religion that mixes Catholicism with african religions.

Anyways I have always blessed myself with holy water when entering and leaving a church since infancy so I kind of miss it.

They do have holy water in the church shop which you can get for a dollar. Also the priest will bless water for free if you ask him to of course.

What do you think of this situation?
 
Sounds reasonable to me. There’s holy water available to you, and it’s more difficult for the santeros to get it for nefarious purposes.

Why not tuck a little bottle of it in your purse and use it when you enter the church?

Betsy
 
Is the church only open on Sunday? If it is closed up for the rest of the week, why don’t they put enough holy water out for sunday and remove it when they close up for the week? The santeros won’t have as much to steal or even the opportunity to steal it. IMHO there should ALWAYS be holy water (with the exception of holy thursday and good friday). There are many spiritual benefits to using it and therefore should be available. I guess stealing holy water is nothing, at least they are not stealing the Blessed Sacrament!
 
The church is open everyday at most times since there is adoration every weekday from 9 to 6 at the adjacent chapel.
I have holy water in my house, car, etc. I guess I could carry some in my purse lol. I just thought that the whole thing is strange since like the other poster said, they could just buy it from the shop for a dollar.

Anyways, it’s not a huge deal but i just found it unusual 🤷
 
I don’t think your parish is supposed to sell holy water. Even rosaries etc are to be blessed after being sold, not before.

Catechism of the Catholic Church:
SIMONY: The buying or selling of spiritual things, which have God alone as their owner and master (2121).
 
Cathryn said:
I don’t think your parish is supposed to sell holy water. Even rosaries etc are to be blessed after being sold, not before.
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It’s done this way: the water is free, but the bottle costs a dollar. For brevity, sometimes people simply say “buy holy water” in stead of saying “buy a bottle full of free holy water.”
 
they are technically not selling you the water but the bottle it comes in. Like I said if you bring your own water in a bottle the priest will bless it.
 
Bluegoat said:
Why don’t the santeros just buy it from the shop too?
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Holy water is not sold. They only sell the empty plactic bottles that are marked for holy water. People who buy the bottles use them only for holy water. But one does not even have to buy the bottle marked holy water. They can use any empty bottle that has been thoroughly cleaned to fill with holy water from the church or ask the priest to bless the water for them.
 
FrDavid96 said:
It’s done this way: the water is free, but the bottle costs a dollar. For brevity, sometimes people simply say “buy holy water” in stead of saying “buy a bottle full of free holy water.”
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I have never seen it sold with holy water in the bottles. I have only seen the holy water bottles sold empty. People who buy the bottles fill them with holy water that they get free.
 
One church I attended had sponges in the founts moistened or saturated with holy water. The reason there being evaporation and they had people designated to replace or moisten the sponges each day or before each Mass.
I have always had a problem with some parishes not having holy water in the fonts during Lent. It started as a idea of depicting being in the desert for 40 days with Jesus. One of the Congregations of the Curia ruled in 2000 that the only time there should not be holy water was during the Triduum, however (speaking of obedience) the empty fonts during Lent still persists in some parishes.
God Bless !!!
Norval
 
FrDavid96 said:
It’s done this way: the water is free, but the bottle costs a dollar. For brevity, sometimes people simply say “buy holy water” in stead of saying “buy a bottle full of free holy water.”
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If it is really only the bottle with maybe a cross on it being purchased, the bottle should be empty, and not incidentely containing a sacramental. Sell the empty bottle, and then let the buyer fill it with the free holy water in the church. Holy water isn’t the Body of Christ. It doesn’t have to be protected from the Santeria.
 
Cathryn said:
If it is really only the bottle with maybe a cross on it being purchased, the bottle should be empty, and not incidentely containing a sacramental. Sell the empty bottle, and then let the buyer fill it with the free holy water in the church. Holy water isn’t the Body of Christ. It doesn’t have to be protected from the Santeria.
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The whole issue of how to distribute free holy water in bottles that people purchase is a different topic altogether.

More to the point here though is that holy water is indeed a sacramental and yes, as such, it should be protected and kept out of the hands of those who will use it for sacrilegious purposes. I don’t understand why you would think otherwise? Of course, this doesn’t rise to the same level as someone taking the Eucharist, but that doesn’t mean that we should tolerate or ignore such sacrilege when we know it’s happening.
 
FrDavid96 said:
The whole issue of how to distribute free holy water in bottles that people purchase is a different topic altogether.

More to the point here though is that holy water is indeed a sacramental and yes, as such, it should be protected and kept out of the hands of those who will use it for sacrilegious purposes. I don’t understand why you would think otherwise? Of course, this doesn’t rise to the same level as someone taking the Eucharist, but that doesn’t mean that we should tolerate or ignore such sacrilege when we know it’s happening.
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Not having a holy water dispenser in order to prevent it from being taken by those who would use it for sacrilegious purposes is one thing but to eliminate even a small amount of holy water in the fonts to be used by people blessing themselves as they enter the church seems to be going a little overboard on the protection issue to me.
 
zab said:
Not having a holy water dispenser in order to prevent it from being taken by those who would use it for sacrilegious purposes is one thing but to eliminate even a small amount of holy water in the fonts to be used by people blessing themselves as they enter the church seems to be going a little overboard on the protection issue to me.
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This is my thinking as well. How about just having a little holy water? Should I ask the priest this or just let it be?
 
stanncie said:
This is my thinking as well. How about just having a little holy water? Should I ask the priest this or just let it be?
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It wouldn’t hurt to ask. Also, the parish may be in need of a volunteer to take on the duty of cleaning the fonts on a regular basis and making sure that a small amount of holy water is in the fonts every day.
 
zab said:
Not having a holy water dispenser in order to prevent it from being taken by those who would use it for sacrilegious purposes is one thing but to eliminate even a small amount of holy water in the fonts to be used by people blessing themselves as they enter the church seems to be going a little overboard on the protection issue to me.
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Well, it’s a pastoral decision, one that isn’t criticized by any dicastery, Council, or Pope (as far as I know). I think that we can say that, in our minds, it is going overboard. However we don’t know the entire story (the pastor may know things that he isn’t saying that makes this seemingly extreme measure not so extreme).
I think it’s best just to support the pastor in this decision.
 
bmadamsberry said:
Well, it’s a pastoral decision, one that isn’t criticized by any dicastery, Council, or Pope (as far as I know). I think that we can say that, in our minds, it is going overboard. However we don’t know the entire story (the pastor may know things that he isn’t saying that makes this seemingly extreme measure not so extreme).
I think it’s best just to support the pastor in this decision.
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Well, we don’t exactly know what the pastors decision is because no one on the board asked him yet.
 
zab said:
Well, we don’t exactly know what the pastors decision is because no one on the board asked him yet.
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The OP did ask. And the reason given was to keep it from being used sacriligiously. However, there may also have been other things that we don’t know about, such as the extent to which the sacriligious people were using the Holy Water.
 
I would question the practice of no holy water in the fonts with the Pastor. If it is about the Holy Water being desecrated later, it doesn’t make any sense that all one has to do to get a bottle of it, in this case, is pay $1 for the bottle in the gift shop. It seems easier for someone with ill intent to to pay the dollar and receive a full bottle of holy water, than siphon some out of a little font cup in the Church.

As someone else suggested maybe the real reason is that the holy water fonts require some maintance, such as regular cleaning and filling. I am sacristan at my parish and I know how scuzzy the fonts get after a few hundred people on a Sunday morning dip their fingers in. You might want to offer to do the cleaning and filling. The holy water available in the church is an important part of the continual renewal of our baptismal promises and should be encouraged.
 
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