Return to Communion

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Phemie

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Deo gratia! Yesterday Fr. was in the confessional for the first time since this whole covid-19 thing started so I was able to finally go to confession. And this morning I was finally able to receive Communion. It felt good and a return to normal, although nothing about these days is normal.

In our parish we have to call to register on Tuesday to attend Mass on Sunday. Based on the number who register they design a seating plan and when we arrive we are told to go to our designated section, sitting in the first vacant pew. Every second row of pews is roped off in order to maintain social distancing.

Because up to now we’ve been limited to a maximum of 50 people, I’ve not tried to go every week in order to allow others to go. But, yesterday, in talking to the person who does the registration I found out that fewer than 50 people had registered for this morning’s Mass so I was able to attend and finally receive Communion.

Next week the attendance can be 100, provided that number is no more that 50% of capacity and still allows us to maintain social distancing. But based on this morning’s logistics we won’t be able to accommodate near that number because of the number of single individuals who attend. We can put one person at each end of the larger pews and still maintain distancing but they have to consent to sharing.
 
I must say, reading your and others’ posts on this, it’s eye opening how different the situation is in every diocese, and even how much it varies from parish to parish. You guys haven’t had confession since March? I can’t even imagine. 😞

I thought California was strict, and our Covid numbers are high, but we never stopped having confession, even when public Masses were not allowed. The confessional itself is scary though. We have confession in the classrooms so it’s not in a confined space.

We too have to register for Sunday Mass (every third Sunday to make it fair), but we’ve had two daily Masses since June 8, so there is plenty of opportunity to get to Mass.

I’m happy for you that you are able to receive the sacraments again but sad that it took this long.
 
Agree–it is sobering to see what some people have endured. We’ve never been without confession, although its format changed. And we’ve been able to attend Mass for a couple months now. Things are “slowly” getting back to normal as they’ve added more Masses due to demand and, of course, they rope off every couple pews so the church holds less. I have to say that a few months of live-streaming Mass made me appreciate attending Mass so much more!
 
We can get a couple hundred people in our Sunday Mass, and I worry about that many people in one place. So I go to a weekday Mass, where we have between 25 and 45 people. Every other pew is in play. We can sit where we want in the middle sections, the place being huge for so few people. We have Sat. morning Reconciliation outside in an open tent. And we have had a couple of parking lot Masses on Sundays, so I did attend those. Really looking forward to things getting back to normal.
 
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Here in our diocese they’re fine with multiple unrelated people in the same pew as long as we sit 6 feet apart. Most of the Masses are so uncrowded that we can easily have people on each end of the pew and no one in the middle. Our pews are pretty long though.

I hope you get things less complicated where you are soon.
I’m glad you were able to return to Confession and Holy Communion.
 
At my parish, every other pew is roped off, but it doesn’t look like six feet to me between people. Maybe somebody measured it?
 
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We have been encouraged to list friends we are willing to sit with when we register for Mass. that is working well for us.
 
We have had one Mass per Sunday since June 28. Father would like to add a Saturday evening Mass but without volunteers for cleaning after Mass it’s simply not going to happen.

Twice now I’ve been a reader. After Mass it’s the reader’s duty to clean the ambo, the Lectionary, and the binder used for the Prayers of the Faithful. Father reads the Gospel from the chair so we don’t share the same space and he cleans his space afterwards. No altar servers. Today we had music for the first time, an opening hymn, a Communion hymn, a hymn after Communion, and a recessional. All by one musician/singer, no congregational participation permitted by order of Public Health.

Starting next Sunday this is the mandate:
New guidelines received from our Public Health Office require non-medical masks to be worn in all public indoor places, including houses of worship beginning Monday, August 24th.

This Public Health Order is waived for:

– Children under the age of 5
– People with physical or mental health conditions
– During “services provided” ( i.e. receiving Holy Communion)
– Showing identification
– When deemed unsuitable under Occupational Health and Safety Regulations
– In seated areas, provided physical distancing of 2 meters is being practiced.

Beginning next Monday, Aug 24th, everyone will be expected to comply with this order. Non-medical masks over “mouth and nose” must be worn while entering and moving around the church. These can be removed when seated as long as the 2 meter physical distancing rule is practiced. The mask must be worn going up for communion, but removed at the time of communion.
Click to expand...
 
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That’s not bad. Really you don’t need a mask for the majority of the Mass. Around here they are theoretically required all the time though many don’t wear them and it’s not enforced.
 
Everybody at Mass around here wears a mask and has been doing so for months. I’ve seen the priests enforcing it.

I wouldn’t be comfortable sitting in a closed room full of 100 maskless people for an hour, especially if they were speaking the Mass responses. Not to mention that some people are going to need to cough, clear their throat, or sneeze.
 
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Where I go to the Holy Mass, to the Augustinian fathers, the Masses are 1 pre-holiday + 5 festive.

In this way everything is solved with the simple spacing, aided by adhesives and other tricks.

I know very well that it is a privileged situation, but thank God, because I would not stand a regulation like West Point.

In movies I like West Point, mind you 😉 but not in my personal life.

I pray that the whole world will soon be freed from this nightmare.
 
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