"renting" out a priest and church

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Hello all, I’m a member of a small young adult group and we’re looking to have monthly group masses and short seminars on matters of faith and morals. We aren’t attached to the local Church or the Diocese, so we don’t have unlimited or easy access to a church. Has anyone ever done something like this? We have a priest friend who would be willing to offer mass according to the roman missal of 1962, and we have a church where we would love to have private masses held (it is central in the diocese and easy access for anyone anywhere), but I just don’t know how you do it.

So in essence these are my questions:
  1. How do you go about renting a church out? Can anyone do it or do you have to be a parishioner? Does the priest offering mass have to be in residence at the parrish?
  2. Do you pay the priest if he preaches? How much do you give him for his trouble?
  3. Our charism is geared towards the promotion of the Latin mass and we would like to invite our novous ordo friends to witness high masses and big feasts, do you have to be offically connected to the diocese to advertise in local churches?
Thanks for any and all help!
 
Orate said:
Hello all, I’m a member of a small young adult group and we’re looking to have monthly group masses and short seminars on matters of faith and morals. We aren’t attached to the local Church or the Diocese, so we don’t have unlimited or easy access to a church. Has anyone ever done something like this? We have a priest friend who would be willing to offer mass according to the roman missal of 1962, and we have a church where we would love to have private masses held (it is central in the diocese and easy access for anyone anywhere), but I just don’t know how you do it.

So in essence these are my questions:
  1. How do you go about renting a church out? Can anyone do it or do you have to be a parishioner? Does the priest offering mass have to be in residence at the parrish?
  2. Do you pay the priest if he preaches? How much do you give him for his trouble?
  3. Our charism is geared towards the promotion of the Latin mass and we would like to invite our novous ordo friends to witness high masses and big feasts, do you have to be offically connected to the diocese to advertise in local churches?
Thanks for any and all help!
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  1. Ask your 1962 Missal-saying priest about this. But, I think all you’d have to do is ask the Parish Pastor, and he should give you the OK.
  2. Ask the priest? If he’s willing to say Mass, I doubt he’s looking for a stipend. You can always take him out to dinner afterwards (or cook him food).
  3. Noice! Ask the bishop and your priest. I think for “large scale” (newspapers, etc) you need the bishop’s permission, but Facebook and word-of-mouth - no.
Good luck!
 
Why are you not working with a pastor (preferably the pastor of the parish that you wish to use) and with the bishop of the diocese to start with?

Do you actually think that God will bless your efforts if you’re not acting under the bishop’s omophorion (protection and support)?
 
We’re very small and are just begining to “branch out”. Until now we had no need to think of any of this, it was just myself and five other guys having bible study in my basement and meeting regularly for latin mass and adoration. We’ve been blessed and people are begining to ask what we do and how often and where we do it. (Note: I’m not an angry trad trying to avoid my bishop)

I live at the edge of the diocese (which is large) and a young adult group from the other end has been wanting to join us for adoration and dinner meetings. That’s why we were looking to host mass at a different parrish, it’s central and beautiful. I would absolutly love to have the support of the bishop, but being a basement prayer group, I have no clue how you even ask for his approval. And there is a side problem, in my diocese you can’t have in home meetings, for fear of liability, so we would loose the at home bible study. If you know how to do these things, then please let me know! Again, any help and advice is welcome!
 
As a previous poster has mentioned, talk to your local pastor and let him know what you’ve been doing. Ask him for advice and listen to what he has to say. Continue to pray and remain open to the Holy Spirit.
 
Orate said:
We’re very small and are just begining to “branch out”. Until now we had no need to think of any of this, it was just myself and five other guys having bible study in my basement and meeting regularly for latin mass and adoration. We’ve been blessed and people are begining to ask what we do and how often and where we do it. (Note: I’m not an angry trad trying to avoid my bishop)

I live at the edge of the diocese (which is large) and a young adult group from the other end has been wanting to join us for adoration and dinner meetings. That’s why we were looking to host mass at a different parrish, it’s central and beautiful. I would absolutly love to have the support of the bishop, but being a basement prayer group, I have no clue how you even ask for his approval. And there is a side problem, in my diocese you can’t have in home meetings, for fear of liability, so we would loose the at home bible study. If you know how to do these things, then please let me know! Again, any help and advice is welcome!
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Who was saying your Latin Mass? Your priest friend? Is he not connected with the diocese? Why not?

I don’t get this. Maybe older Catholics do, but I don’t.
 
And there is a side problem, in my diocese you can’t have in home meetings, for fear of liability, so we would loose the at home bible study.
**That you’re doing something that goes against the diocesan rules is a great problem in itself.

I’m not a moral theologian, so I don’t know if it’s a matter for confession.

It might be well to get your parish to sponsor your Bible study asap and suspend them until that can be arranged.**
 
bpbasilphx said:
And there is a side problem, in my diocese you can’t have in home meetings, for fear of liability, so we would loose the at home bible study.
**That you’re doing something that goes against the diocesan rules is a great problem in itself.

I’m not a moral theologian, so I don’t know if it’s a matter for confession.

It might be well to get your parish to sponsor your Bible study asap and suspend them until that can be arranged.**
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I’m sure he means an organized, Church sanctioned, group can’t meet in homes.

A few friends having bible study is never sinful or problematic.

You seem to be coming down very hard on this fellow; any reason?

I can’t detect that they’ve done anything wrong.

God Bless
 
I have to say that the fact Catholics are getting together at the grass roots level for spiritual purposes is admirable. These people need and deserve to be encouraged.

Let us hope that the local ordinary sees it that way and there is no delay in the approvals.

My only suggestion at this point would be to contact the FSSP directly and inform them that this group intends to contact the bishop, and ask for their support and prayers.

Michael
 
Is your priest friend a diocesan priest in the diocese with which you reside? Does he already know the pastor of the parish you would like to use as your central location for meetings? That could be helpful. Either way, I would recommend that both you and your priest friend meet with the pastor of the parish. You want to be gracious and humble because you really need that pastor’s support if you hope to use his church.

It really shouldn’t be a problem. It wouldn’t be a bad idea to contact your bishop (or at least someone in the diocesan office) to let them know what’s going on. I don’t see a problem in putting this step off until after you have met and had Mass a few times at this centrally-located parish. That way the bishop will know it isn’t just some idea this small group of guys came up with that probably won’t pan out. You’ll have more information to share about what exactly your group is doing. The pastor of the parish and your priest-friend should know better as to when and how to do this.

The benefit in working with your diocesan office is that you can key into any structures they have in place which will help your group to grow. Young Adult ministry is a vastly underdeveloped area. Most diocesan offices should jump at the chance that you want to pull together such a group. There have been many failed attempts on the part of diocesan offices to initiate such groups, simply because these things tend to work better when they come from the young adults themselves.

I’m not sure why you’d have to stop your home Bible study. 🤷 Is their a diocesan rule against a group of guys having a Bible study at home? If there is some policy about parish groups meeting at homes, simply keep it separate from whatever official group is born out of your efforts at this other parish. Or am I missing something?
 
God bless you for the lovely plans you have! You should ask your current pastor his advice for how to approach the diocese. You will definately need permission from the pastor of the church that you want to use for Mass and your priest friend will need permission from the bishop to celebrate Mass in his docese (unless your friend is already a priest of the diocese). You should also check out your diocese website–there may already be a young adult program that you can feed into, or add your program to the list of offerings. Once you have things set up, you can do all the word of mouth advertising you want. If you want to go bigger than that–ie newspapers, etc–you should clear it with the diocese.
 
Cat said:
Who was saying your Latin Mass? Your priest friend? Is he not connected with the diocese? Why not?

I don’t get this. Maybe older Catholics do, but I don’t.
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He’s a religious, he lives at his abbey, I don’t think he is under the bishop, its his abbot who sends him out to my parish to say the mass. I’ve been his server for a couple of years and he’s shown personal interest in our group (mainly because we’re all his altar servers). He’s mentioned more than a few times about helping us out, I’m just trying to figure out the logistics of how that works.
 
bpbasilphx said:
And there is a side problem, in my diocese you can’t have in home meetings, for fear of liability, so we would loose the at home bible study.
**That you’re doing something that goes against the diocesan rules is a great problem in itself.

I’m not a moral theologian, so I don’t know if it’s a matter for confession.

It might be well to get your parish to sponsor your Bible study asap and suspend them until that can be arranged.**
Click to expand...
Are you kidding me? no you’re not a moral theologian, and you have absolutly no business judguing the moral culpability of my friends hanging out and studying the bible and meeting for adoration and Sunday mass. I didn’t know the diocese must approve of Catholics meeting and praying. So now my mother’s prayer group is a matter of moral judgement too? She’s not officially connected to the diocese, they just meet for coffee and rosary every wednesday. Remind me and I’ll tell her to go to confession for disobediance.
 
Joe_5859 said:
I’m not sure why you’d have to stop your home Bible study. 🤷 Is their a diocesan rule against a group of guys having a Bible study at home? If there is some policy about parish groups meeting at homes, simply keep it separate from whatever official group is born out of your efforts at this other parish. Or am I missing something?
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Not missing anything, I’m just thinking that because anyone who would want to come over would also be in the “sponsored group”. Thus it would look like the group itself was holding official meetings in my home. Anyone who is an official group connected and acting out of the diocese, cannot hold meetings in a private home for insurance liability. I’ve just ALWAYS invited anyone who joined us for mass or adoration to come over, my mom bakes us stuff and if its late enough (dinner time) she’ll make up a big dinner for us all, it’s really nice, and you can’t do that in the church hall.

But I guess you could just say we all met after the meeting officially ended and meet up at my house for a separate event? (even though it really isn’t)
 
I think some people are a bit confused about what I’m doing. I want to thank everyone who does and has shown words of encouragement!

I’m just a guy who has his altar server friends and some other guys and gals who join us regularly for Sunday mass (at a real parish) and adoration over to his house for bible study and discussion and dinner.

We think wer’re doing something pretty cool, because most young adults who go to our Latin mass come alone and leave right after. They don’t get a sense of community. My friends and I just think it would be a great idea to spread out and get more people, young adults from other parts of the diocese involved. We just want to share the beauty of the Latin mass with other young adults who haven’t had the opprotunity to experience it. The best place to do that isn’t at our parish, it’s too far out of the way, what would be a 30-45 minute drive for most can be made into 10-15 minutes by moving to a different location.

Of course I know you need the permission of the pastor! I’ve met him a few times and think he would let us (I hope) I just want to know if I have to pay the church for using the facilities (none of us are parishioners at his parish) it’s just us guys and we’re all college students and poor.

All I wanted to know was weather or not anyone has ever had a private mass held in a parish and if they did what the rules were about doing that. I’m not doing anything wrong, I’m not trying to look for trouble. If my bishop would personally sponsor us I would jump twenty feet with joy! The point is this: I just came looking for advice as to how you start a non-parish specific young adult group. How that works and who you have to go to for sponsorship.

I’m sorry if I came off as hostile and renegade, I’m really not.
 
Orate said:
But I guess you could just say we all met after the meeting officially ended and meet up at my house for a separate event? (even though it really isn’t)
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Bingo. 👍

I guess we’ve all been giving you more advice than you really need. :o

The short answer is, there shouldn’t be a problem or cost involved. As long as you have the pastor’s okay and the priest saying Mass has been granted faculties in your diocese, there should be no problem.
 
Our “Una Voce” chapter just asked the priest at the church we wanted to use. He agreed to set aside a time for us on Sunday when we could have the Mass. Now we just need a priest that can say it! I guess we’re in the opposite situation as you. The pastor at the church didn’t ask for money, but I’m sure we could give a little.

I say just ask. The worst thing that can happen is to get a no.
 
Orate said:
Are you kidding me? no you’re not a moral theologian, and you have absolutly no business judguing the moral culpability of my friends hanging out and studying the bible and meeting for adoration and Sunday mass. I didn’t know the diocese must approve of Catholics meeting and praying. So now my mother’s prayer group is a matter of moral judgement too? She’s not officially connected to the diocese, they just meet for coffee and rosary every wednesday. Remind me and I’ll tell her to go to confession for disobediance.
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Your own words which out and out say that you’re afraid the Bishop would not approve of what you’re doing if he knew and you’d “loose” your home Bible study shows that you at least suspect you’re not following the diocesan regulations.
 
bpbasilphx said:
Your own words which out and out say that you’re afraid the Bishop would not approve of what you’re doing if he knew and you’d “loose” your home Bible study shows that you at least suspect you’re not following the diocesan regulations.
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There just is no problem with small groups meeting in a home in any diocese I have heard of. Once such a group is officially sponsored, then the group must meet certain criteria laid down by the diocese for sponsored groups, because at that point the diocese becomes responsible for any liability. People meet in small un-sponsored groups all the time in places like their work place, a separate room in a restaurant, etc. The only way the bible study group could possibly be lost is if both it and the Mass are sponsored. Their is no reason to let everyone and his grandmother meet in the bible study. Keep it small with the same guys and any others who want a study group can form one and do the same.

Having belonged to several bible study prayer groups over the years I think it helps to keep your pastor informally informed as to whats going on and to be open to his advice and guidance. Its not like you are antagonists as some of the posters here seem to be trying to make out. You can have it all. Go for it.👍🙂
 
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