Everything in life has its history. It begins one way and evolves. The parish, as we know it in the United States is also a product of evolution. I’m not taking side on this cry room question. I see both sides of the coin. But history has a way of helping us understand things better.
Prior to the existence of parishes as we know them, there were monastery churches and cathedrals. Monastery churches were mainly for the benefit of the monks. Since most monasteries were very large, they needed churches to accommodate the monks for mass. There was usually an open space in the rear for the peasants who worked on the monastery farms. Remember that monasteries were not just religious houses; they were feudal estates. Parents and children stood at the rear of the church during mass. There were no benches or chairs. Only the religious had a seating. My guess is that if a child became uncomfortable or wrestles, it was easy for the mother to step outside, since they were already at the rear of the church.
The other option was the cathedral. If you have ever seen a European or Latin American cathedral, they were more elaborate and architecturally artistic than the monastery churches. However, they had seating only 1/3 of the way from the sanctuary back. Almost two thirds of the cathedral was open space where knights could attend mass on their horses and the peasants could stand. Only the aristocracy sat. The aristocracy did not carry their infants around with them. They had nannies to care for them. These infants stayed home. The peasants carried their infants with them. However, at the cathedral church, they stood in the rear. When the infant became wrestles or uncomfortable, the mother could step outside. Eventually, vestibules were added in places where they had severe winters. You didn’t have to take a crying child outside into the cold.
Many diocesan priests and some abbots erected small chapels for the outlying areas. They depended on the cathedral or the local monastery. These chapels were the predecessors to our modern parish church. They were usually very small and remote. Only peasants attended mass there, since the aristocracy lived in the city during the winter months, in order to remain close to the royal court and they retired to their countryseats in the summer. However, the wealthy usually had a chapel on their property. A priest would be sent from the local religious house to celebrate mass there. The master and mistress of the house would attend mass, without their infants who were at the manor with the nanny. The servants and the tenant farmers would also attend. They too were at the rear of the chapel with their infants in tow. However, the chapels were small enough to allow a quick escape.
While they did not have cry rooms, as we can see, there were escape routes for parents with distressed children. It was not that the children were unwelcome. Parents would escape, because the child was genuinely distressed about something that had to be addressed. I should add here that it was very common for peasants to breastfeed their babies, even during mass. This reduced some of the crying.
These small chapels eventually became small parishes. As cities grew larger, small chapels crept up in different neighborhoods. These eventually became today’s parishes. As parishes grew they also evolved. The monks were no longer present. They remained in the monasteries. Secular priests, attached to a diocese, attended these parishes. With the migration of Catholics to the Americas, there came Franciscans, Jesuits and Dominicans. They built chapels that eventually grew into diocesan parishes.
The American phenomenon changed the face of the Catholic parish. There was no longer segregation between the aristocracy and the peasantry. Protestants introduced the concept of the pew into their churches and American Catholics adopted it and exported it too. We no longer had the open space in the rear of the church where a mother could attend mass with her infant, while remaining close to the door to make a quick escape, if necessary. In addition, the early American Catholic was predominantly poor. We now had infants embedded in the body of the congregation where there is not always a quick escape route to attend to the needs of a crying child.
I’m not saying that the cry room is a good idea or a bad idea. I’m saying that we have to understand why no on ever thought of it. It would never have occurred to anyone prior to the development of the modern American parish, because the spatial organization of the larger churches was different and small chapels were . . . small. Mothers didn’t feel trapped with a crying child.
I do believe that the parish is a place for the family and children are part of the family. They must never be excluded. I also understand the discomfort of a parent who has a distressed child and feels trapped in a pew with 10 people sitting on either side.
I did see a rather interesting arrangement at a church that I visited in Bogota, Columba. They designated pews near the exits reserved for the disabled, seniors and parents with infants. They don’t have to use them. They are reserved for their use. The distance between the one pew and the other in front of it is about three feet, just a little wider than a bulkhead seat on an airplane. You can get in and out without having to climb over people. It also allows for quick evacuation in case of fires or other emergencies. I have to take my hat off to the Jesuits who built the church. It’s a concept that I have never seen in the USA. It does not require a lot of space. If I recall, there were four such pews, one near each exit. Two were in the rear and the other two were in the front and sides.
That’s just my two cents on this subject.
Fraternally,
Br. JR, OSF
