Why can’t my church be quiet when I want to pray?

Father Matthew Mitas of Immaculate Conception Parish in Union answered this question last month in the local diocesan newspaper. Many Catholics have voiced such concerns in recent years. It a number of churchs, it seems as if many have forgotten why they are there. One thing I have noticed, however, is that those churches which are less "modern" and which have priests who give sound and faithful homiles seem to be less prone to adopting a disrepectful, "party-like" atmosphere. Of course, there are exceptions, but there seems to be a connection. When the sense of the sacred is lost because of the embracing of a secular or banal architecture, the hiding of the tabernacle, or the removal of things such as statues which help us draw our attention to the holy and sacred, one may be deceived into thinking according to his surroundings.

Anyway, some excerpts of his excellent response are:

...post-Vatican II Catholics don’t pray as much, they don’t pray as often, and they don’t pray as well as did their pre-1962 forebears. Many Catholics don’t know how to pray...if they ever find themselves alone in a church, many don’t know what to do.

First, they simply don’t know how to talk to God (which, after all, is what prayer is), and, second, they have no sense of the sacred. Christ Himself shows us that prayer and the sense of the sacred are inextricably joined.

...the one[indignity] He [Jesus] could not bear was when His Father’s house was profaned. "My house shall be called a house of prayer!"...It was the only time He ever used physical force, driving the miscreants out...

If the Lord was moved to physical force by His revulsion at those who failed to respect His house, how can we tolerate the same outrage in our parish churches? At one time we didn’t. Why do we now?. . .Under no circumstances should we allow the turning of our Father’s house into anything less than what it is: a house of prayer.

What followed from Fr. Mitas' sound and cogent article? It's really hard to determine, but the Review later printed two follow-up "Letters to the Editor" which are below.

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Quiet needed
Editor:

Kudos to Father Matthew Mitas for his Dec. 16 column. I go 30 to 40 minutes before Mass to spend some quiet time with my Lord and to say the rosary.

The loud noise from constant talking in the vestibule is very disturbing and very inconsiderate. I’ve gone to the 4:30 p.m. Mass on Saturday and the 9 a.m. Mass on Sunday, and I might as well be in the middle of a Wal-Mart.

Please, people, wait until after Mass to converse with other parishioners or to use the telephone. The Lord and I will appreciate it very much.

Name withheld by request
Ferguson
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Joyful Mass time
Editor:

I strongly disagree with Father Matthew Mitas in his Dear Father column (Dec. 16 ) in the Review. I think that far too often our churches are uninviting and even somewhat dead.

I am glad to see people talking before Mass. A Mass is supposed to be a celebration with our community. It is not a private affair. It should be a happy occasion.

There are some people who I have sat near for years and I don’t even know their names or anything else about them. I think that we should take time before Mass begins to greet each other. At certain times I think we should greet each other and spend a little time praying with each other in a group.

If a person wishes to pray silently and alone there are many occasions when that is possible. Just visit a church some day during the week.

Raymond Stahl
St. Louis
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What is truly uninviting, at least to me, is an atmosphere of the everyday life. As we step into a church, are we not supposed to be entering that mysterious realm where heaven and earth meet? Where the eternal and infinite coalesces with that which is of time and space? Where our Lord, truly and substantially present beckons us to follow Him and abide in Him?

How many of us, witnessing the cruel torture and death of our Lord, would be engaged in idle chit-chat? How many of us, witnessing our Lord's resurrection from the dead and His Ascension into Heaven, would ignore Him in order to converse with our neighbor instead?

We can see a marked difference between these two letter writers. One concerned with the spiritual aspect of giving to God that respect, attention and adoration due to Him in His house, and another, apparently more concerned with the temporal matters which are better left before or after Holy Mass. After all, can we not keep watch with Him for one hour in sacred silence or in prayer?