What constitutes attendance at Mass?

[SMHW]

This is meant to be thought provoking question rather than a heated discussion…

Suppose a group of people are on a long trans-oceanic flight. …one of those 11 hours deals. And lets further suppose that the timing and direction of the flight are such that it starts on a Saturday and ends late Sunday/early Monday. Lets further suppose the pilot, co-pilot, and navigator are Catholic. Many passengers and all of the flight attendants are Catholic. And there happens to be a Catholic priest on board.

Because there is no opportunity to attend Mass before or after the flight the priest decides to say one Mass on board the plane. (We will assume the priest has whatever permission necessary to do so.)

Now here is the question… Can the passengers and crew be said to have attended Mass? Have they met their Sunday obligation?

Obviously at least one member of the flight crew must stay in the cockpit at any given time. The flight attendants must be available to attend to the needs of passengers Many of the passengers will not be follow the action of the Mass; they are most likely to be in totally different compartments. Those who are not interested in attending Mass would still have to be able to have access to whatever services and forms of entertainment would be available at that time.

 

[adrift]

I would assume that the Mass could be “piped” into the cockpit so that they would be able to hear?

I attended a Mass at world youth day. We were very far back in a 2 million crowd. We had to view it on a screen yet we received communion and attended mass. I have seen Church’s which have closed circute tv and those in another room are considered as attending mass. I guess I would say that everyone on board that was intending to go to mass did.

 

[tgauchsin]

The question reminds me of something I heard in my youth:

Suppose that you didn’t make your Easter duty…and it’s Pentecost Sunday…the last day…and you’re on a ship at sea…and the chaplain goes into a coma…but you wanted to receive. And then it’s Monday, too late…but then you cross the International Date Line!
–George Carlin

 

[Pfaffenhoffen]

The question reminds me of something I heard in my youth:

and that reminds me of my ethics class in Junior when the priest said that there was a baby dying in the mountains surrounded by snow (what was the baby doing there still puzzles me) and there was no water to baptize him, what would we, 13/14 years old would do (How we got there with the baby is still a mystery).

I do not remember our solutions I only remember the problem which, for strict standads I still have not solved.

 

[Pug]

It seems that you are asking if someone who is working can be attending mass at the same time. Like if a bodyguard were guarding his boss during mass or a janitor cleaning up puke in the narthax or a politician answering text messages about some huge disaster.

You are asking two different things. Attendance at mass and meeting the obligation. Some Catholics/people don’t have the obligation that day, so by default they “met” it. And if they did have it and somehow whatever happened “counts” as attendance, then in this case again we have the obligation “met”.

 

[Joe_Kelley]

and that reminds me of my ethics class in Junior when the priest said that there was a baby dying in the mountains surrounded by snow (what was the baby doing there still puzzles me) and there was no water to baptize him, what would we, 13/14 years old would do (How we got there with the baby is still a mystery).

I do not remember our solutions I only remember the problem which, for strict standads I still have not solved.

Take a handful of snow, warm it and squeeze it in your hand, drip the water on the baby’s head while saying the proper words. A couple of drops will suffice. I have read of someone baptizing a premature baby with a couple of drops of sterile water from an eyedropper.

 

[Joe_Kelley]

If the church is full to overflowing, as ours sometimes is, you have attended mass if you got as close as you could in the overflow crowd. It would seem to me that the pilot has gotten as close as he can. [maybe I should have been a Jesuit to reason like that. ]

 

[ConstantineTG]

This is meant to be thought provoking question rather than a heated discussion…

Suppose a group of people are on a long trans-oceanic flight. …one of those 11 hours deals. And lets further suppose that the timing and direction of the flight are such that it starts on a Saturday and ends late Sunday/early Monday. Lets further suppose the pilot, co-pilot, and navigator are Catholic. Many passengers and all of the flight attendants are Catholic. And there happens to be a Catholic priest on board.

Because there is no opportunity to attend Mass before or after the flight the priest decides to say one Mass on board the plane. (We will assume the priest has whatever permission necessary to do so.)

Now here is the question… Can the passengers and crew be said to have attended Mass? Have they met their Sunday obligation?

Obviously at least one member of the flight crew must stay in the cockpit at any given time. The flight attendants must be available to attend to the needs of passengers Many of the passengers will not be follow the action of the Mass; they are most likely to be in totally different compartments. Those who are not interested in attending Mass would still have to be able to have access to whatever services and forms of entertainment would be available at that time.

In the Philippines its quite normal for churches to overflow and many of the people are on the driveway and parking area of the church. Many of these churches have speakers installed on the outside for people to hear the Mass from where they are.

You don’t have to be in the physical location. And if you think about it the plane is one vessel. Given that the pilot has an important thing to do (with modern planes they’re not really flying the plane, but still you wouldn’t want the cockpit to be abandoned) then he can listen in to the Mass, or even be dispensed all together of his obligation because someone has to be there in the cockpit.

Or you can go all Hollywood and look for a non-Catholic in the plane, put him in the pilot’s seat, and if anything goes wrong the control tower will talk him through it an everything will be okay

 

[Phemie]

Or you can go all Hollywood and look for a non-Catholic in the plane, put him in the pilot’s seat, and if anything goes wrong the control tower will talk him through it an everything will be okay

I like the way you think.

 

[ProVobis]

Now here is the question… Can the passengers and crew be said to have attended Mass? Have they met their Sunday obligation?

Yes and yes. The priest intended that it be met for every Catholic there, whether he’s in the bathroom, sitting in first class, or in the cockpit. Or even listening to music on his headphones or sleeping, for that matter.