This is not just any fire and if the pastor is capable at their job, it shouldn’t flare up again. This is not a project that would take hours of preparation and a series of meetings to complete.
So, let me make sure I understand what you’re saying here. You want a pastor who will essentially lay the law down, is that right? Someone who will just waltz up there and say, “Hey, this isn’t the place to be having your conversation. Take it somewhere else.” That’s all well and good. But, such an approach (if in fact such an approach was warranted in this case and I’m by no means convinced that it was), has ramifications. Please see below.
That sounds like more of a dismissive excuse than anything else. What I find that poisons parishes are pastors that ignore problems. That also drives people away, or in this case, question things like the Real Presence.
Absolutely. It is dismissive. Here’s the reality…we get dozens of these types of emails all the time. At least an email has a name attached to it. Usually it’s a note stuck in the mailbox with no name, or dropped in the collection, or something like that. Those go straight to the garbage. The truth of the matter is that my job as a priest is to preach the Gospel, to lead people to Jesus Christ, to help them grow in holiness. To the extent that dealing with things like this leads to that end, I will address it. When it doesn’t (most of the time), I won’t.
Because no matter how tactful I might have been, one or more of those people would have then went to our pastor and sunk a political knife into my back. Also one of the first things my pastor would have said is “mind your own business.” As incredulous as it might seem, I also suspect some or all (except for the sacristan) wouldn’t even realize how unacceptable their behavior is. The old proverb “familiarly breeds contempt” no doubt plays a part in this matter.
This continues my answer from above on your first point. As you rightly note, because you refused to go to them yourself, a pastor going in and “laying down the law,” so to speak, carries with it ramifications. Among them, just off the top of my head, are alienating people in the parish and publicly berating someone in an inappropriate manner. If what you say is true, why should your pastor subject himself to the same treatment? Especially if he’s new and doesn’t have the same level of familiarity with the people? Should he sabotage his ministry right at the outset?
There are a myriad of ways to address something like people talking in the sanctuary. Personally, I subscribe to the adage that more is “caught than taught.” People need to see examples. Want people to stop talking in the sanctuary? Start praying the rosary before or after Mass. Expose the Blessed Sacrament and foster Eucharistic adoration. Things like that. People are led to understand what our faith professes about Christ’s True Presence. And the pastor doesn’t have to say, “Hey! Shut up!” It takes a long time to correct things. Rome wasn’t built in a day, as they say.
