WHo is the cry room for?

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Well, Mass sure is an experience of Community isn’t it?

I am a senior with fairly good hearing,married to an old fellow who doesn’t. Todays Mass was a bit rambunctious - three kids in front of us who were fairly “busy”, and a young one over to the side who screeched every twice in a while. Others chimed in. The PA system was not turned up and/or the lectors did not know how to use it. The wrong week of Lent was posted on the board. It was an experience. Ah, the people of God. Yet -

Parents of screeching baby took her out a few times; mother of kids in front of us was corralling five of them and had some help by a teenage sister,(I admired her for getting them all there). Hubby endured and we finally got to eye-checking with mutual amusement. One of our friends said once that little children praise God in their own way and I think there is some truth in that!.

It became quieter during the consecration - did not last long.

Here’s a thought - offer it up, say a prayer for the little ones (maybe for the elders also) Know that Christ is present and rejoice in our Catholic community.

PS: Father P. I side with those who say get the lit candles our of the chapel. It only takes once for a lifetime of regret. You could just blow them out for the duration of Sunday Mass then relight - or the parent could do so.
 
VeritasLuxMea said:
Am I the only one seeing this part of the post???
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No - others have seen it but it seems to be tangential to the title question.

I agree that it sounds like there are some pretty serious problems at this church - but what can one say except that in answer to the OP’s title question - the Cry room is for crying…🤷

Peace
James
 
Any chance you can get there early, before the seniors, and take over the place?? 😛

Personally, we never liked the cry room. But then there were 2 of us at Mass, so one could take a noisy baby or toddler out.

And, yeah, the priest publicly singling out people at any point is odd.
 
I, and I may be in a minority here!, hate cry chapels.

There is one in a church not too far from me and I sat in it once with my son, never ever again, it was awful, noisy and I felt excluded from the Mass, I moved from the cry chapel into the main church after communion.

In my honest opinion children don’t learn how to behave in church if their normal Mass experience is a cry chapel, it’s important for the children to be part of the parish, not sectioned off to the side.

I took my children to Mass from when they were tiny babies, I sing in the choir and bring them to the choir loft with me, if they were ever upset/naughty etc I would take them out for a couple of mins to calm them down, then take them back in.

A old priest of ours used to always say he loved hearing babies at Mass, even if they were crying, as they were the future of the parish and the church. I agree.

ETA There sounds like there are other issues though within your parish that need to be addressed, specifically the parish priest.
 
tabycat said:
A cry room is a room that parents can take their young children and babies that are ‘acting up’ or crying and the parents can still attand mass. I don’t know if its just an American thing or not. I do not think that all Catholic Churchs have a cry room. :):gopray::heaven:
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JRKH said:
A cry room is a relatively recent addition to Church design. The first one I remember was in the new Church of my childhood parish - built in 1962.
It is a room that is fairly soundproof where a parent can take a crying child so as to minimize disturbance to others.
I guess maybe it is something of an “American thing”…I don’t know if other places have incorporated these into church design.

Peace
James
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Thanks to both of you! In my area the churches are much older so no wonder they don’t have it. But I think it is a good idea. That way, children can be in Christ’s presence, the parents can attend mass even if their children are noisy and other people can worship without being disturbed. 👍
 
VeritasLuxMea said:
Am I the only one seeing this part of the post???
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DeniseNY said:
No, you’re not! There is something far more serious going on in that parish than improper use of the cry room!
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No, I saw that too! :eek:

PrairieDawn, I think your parish has much bigger problems that who should be using the “cry room”.
Have you considered making an appointment with your pastor and discussing these issues with him? I know I would!
 
PrairieDawn said:
Our parish cry room has been taken over by mostly elderly, dour people who make it clear that crying infants are not welcome. I believe this may be because the acoustics in the church proper make it hard to hear for some people, and the speaker system may make it easier for them to hear the Mass in the cry room, but as our parish priest has recently made it clear that unruly (that is, nonsilent) children are not welcome, it has become an issue for the mothers of babies and toddlers.

Complicating the issue is that our parish priest has also begun to single out parishioners whose lives believes he must criticise publicly–these parishioners have also begun attending in the cry room as a sort of “Catholic time out” or room of shame (the ones that haven’t simply stopped attending.

What many of us have begun to do is go every other week, switching off which parent attends. (We take our older children and leave the baby). Our parish priest appears to have noticed this trend, because he has tken to reminding the parish every week that not attending Sunday Mass is a mortal sin. We live in a rural area, so changing to a parish would necessitate a long drive.

What is the right thing to do in this situation?
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I totally read this as the “sgu” room and wondered what you were talking about. Cyrillic has gotten into my head apparently, lol.

But on a more serious note, this sounds absolutely ridiculous. Cry rooms are some of the worse things to have happened to parishes lately.
 
DaveBj said:
. . . They can suck it up and either tolerate the crying children, or go back into the sanctuary where they really belong.
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Surely they don’t actually belong in the sanctuary, or are these elderly priests hanging about the cry room? Perhaps they could just sit in a pew like everybody else. It would seem like a less distracting option than wandering around at the altar.
 
cothrige said:
Surely they don’t actually belong in the sanctuary, or are these elderly priests hanging about the cry room? Perhaps they could just sit in a pew like everybody else. It would seem like a less distracting option than wandering around at the altar.
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Well, you apparently have a Pastor publicly shaming people during Mass, so I wouldn’t rule anything out. :eek:
 
cothrige said:
Surely they don’t actually belong in the sanctuary, or are these elderly priests hanging about the cry room? Perhaps they could just sit in a pew like everybody else. It would seem like a less distracting option than wandering around at the altar.
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Sorry, that was my Protestant upbringing coming thru.

Not the sanctuary. The wherever-it-is-that-the-normal-people-sit.
 
Take the babies out, get them not to cry, then come back in. Cry rooms for me is a little too extreme and foreign as I have never seen one in any of the parish I’ve visited. Speaking of your priest, this is my personal opinion but I think he’s a little insensitive and harsh. Jesus said suffer not the little children to come to me. I agree that while he should perhaps in a homily advises parents to take children out and quiet them during Mass, publicly call these parishioners out and humiliate them because they have children is uncharitable and may send a public message that “in the Catholic Church, children are not welcome” and may have an adverse effect on our belief in the beauty of children.
 
PastorBonus said:
Take the babies out, get them not to cry, then come back in. Cry rooms for me is a little too extreme and foreign as I have never seen one in any of the parish I’ve visited. Speaking of your priest, this is my personal opinion but I think he’s a little insensitive and harsh. Jesus said suffer not the little children to come to me. I agree that while he should perhaps in a homily advises parents to take children out and quiet them during Mass, publicly call these parishioners out and humiliate them because they have children is uncharitable and may send a public message that “in the Catholic Church, children are not welcome” and may have an adverse effect on our belief in the beauty of children.
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One poster in another thread a long time ago referred to the “cry room” as the “baby ghetto”. I’ve never forgotten. It’s funny and sad at the same time.
 
My parish has 2 “cry rooms” one for the children and one for the hearing impared and those who can not walk to the altar for communion. This approach has worked well for our parish. Our church does seat 1,600 and our we have an attendance of 250 for our 11 so really you can get a whole row of chairs to yourself.
 
Ohana said:
Well, Mass sure is an experience of Community isn’t it?

I am a senior with fairly good hearing,married to an old fellow who doesn’t. Todays Mass was a bit rambunctious - three kids in front of us who were fairly “busy”, and a young one over to the side who screeched every twice in a while. Others chimed in. The PA system was not turned up and/or the lectors did not know how to use it. The wrong week of Lent was posted on the board. It was an experience. Ah, the people of God. Yet -

Parents of screeching baby took her out a few times; mother of kids in front of us was corralling five of them and had some help by a teenage sister,(I admired her for getting them all there). Hubby endured and we finally got to eye-checking with mutual amusement. One of our friends said once that little children praise God in their own way and I think there is some truth in that!.

It became quieter during the consecration - did not last long.

Here’s a thought - offer it up, say a prayer for the little ones (maybe for the elders also) Know that Christ is present and rejoice in our Catholic community.
Click to expand...
From one mother of five young, sometimes rambunctious children, thank you!!! From the bottom of my heart, thank you for your tolerance and good attitude.
 
Bob_Aliano said:
We do have a well staffed, barely utilized nursery. I chalk it up to rude parents forcing too young children to attend with no attempt at instructing the children or consideration for those around them.
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I would not leave my young children, who are unused to being apart from their parents, with strangers in even the best staffed nursery. It is my experience that most parents try very hard to be respectful of others and find the balance between staying in church for a few minutes and allowing the child to settle and making a beeline for the door. As another poster said, I sometimes wear out the carpet. It isn’t easy, but we persevere and appreciate the tolerant and sympathetic attitudes of many.
 
Based on what you say, the state of affairs at your parish is rather sad. Your priest does not seem to understand the nature of young children.

However I can’t help but be at least a bit amused at the idea of the name “cry room” being applied to a room full of “elderly people.”
 
grasscutter said:
One poster in another thread a long time ago referred to the “cry room” as the “baby ghetto”. I’ve never forgotten. It’s funny and sad at the same time.
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It is sad. I believe if Jesus is truly present in the Sacrifice, then he would want to see children around 🙂
 
Thank you all for your support and advice. I agree that children need to learn to comport themselves appropriately in church. My daughter is at that awkward age between mobility and understanding (she’s 16 months old). By two or so, they start to respond predictably to correction, but one year olds often just cry, and forget within moments what they were corrected for. It’s not that you can’t train them not to do certain things, it’s that the process of doing so is often slow and unpredictable.

We decided to start leaving her home after a Sunday in which I felt compelled to take her outside in single digit weather without a coat because I hadn’t grabbed it on the way to the cry room. I have worked out an arrangement with in-town relatives such that we can each only miss about one mass per month, rather than every other week, but I wish there were a better way to solve the problem. The church is small, and only has one Sunday Mass (no Saturday). There is no nursery, nor is there really a place to take a crying child “out” that is not outdoors, which would be fine any time but winter up here in the frozen north. We will probably begin using the outdoors solution in April or May, depending on if spring ever comes. We had seriously considered driving forty five minutes to another parish, but we would have had to enroll the older children in CCD there, and while 45 minutes each way is doable on a Sunday, it’s a real problem on a school night.

Our parish has lost a third of its membership in the past year.
 
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