Mass for all Dear parishioners, a number of you have been asking about the weekend Mass schedule for our parishes. I have made the decision, at least for now, that the current weekend Mass schedule will remain the same. Allow me to explain the rationale. There are several key principles which ought to form our thought on when and how many Masses we should celebrate in our parish on Sunday (or the Sat. evening vigil Mass).
Sunday Mass is the liturgical climax of the whole week because it is the celebration of the Resurrection of the Lord. Thus, Sunday Mass is a solemnity, meaning that it ought to be celebrated with great beauty, reverence, and with full, active, and conscious participation of all present.
When the Sunday Mass (or Sat. evening vigil Mass) cannot be richly celebrated due to low attendance (not enough liturgical ministers, no music, etc.) it is, generally speaking, better to have fewer Masses so as to have fuller congregations, thus making it more possible to enhance the liturgical celebration of the Holy Mass.
A priest in this Archdiocese is granted as an exception the permission to celebrate up to three Sunday Masses and two weekday masses. Although it is permissible, this is not necessarily the ideal since the more Masses a priest celebrates, the less likely he is able to celebrate the Mass with due attention and reverence because of the onset of fatigue. Moreover, if a priest, for example, needs to celebrate two Sat. evening vigil Masses, this could prevent him from celebrating other important Masses on a Saturday such as funerals and weddings.
In general, in addition to the reasons mentioned above, having a Mass with a fuller congregation is to be preferred over having a poorly attended Mass because of the greater sense of community which is experienced and more naturally formed by such a congregation.
When deciding on the time to celebrate a weekend Mass, the good of the whole community must be taken into consideration. The whole community includes even neighboring parishes as decisions made at one parish can adversely or positively affect a neighboring parish. This is especially the case with a clustered parish.
Having stated those key principles, let me now explain the rationale for the current Mass schedule.
We still are only averaging about 70% of attendance compared to what it was pre-Covid 19. This, in my judgment, clearly reduces the pastoral necessity of as many Masses being celebrated before the pandemic started. Therefore, while we have returned to having two Masses on Sunday at their normal times (8:30 am and 10:30 am), it does not seem reasonable (pastorally necessary) to have two Saturday evening vigil Masses at this time. I decided back when we reintroduced the Saturday evening Mass that having the Mass begin at 5:00 pm made the most sense. I did not want to give preference to either the 4:00 pm Cleveland Mass time or to the 6:00 pm Marysburg Mass time. Therefore, 5:00 pm was the natural compromise. Similarly, I knew that parishioners wanted Mass celebrated in their own parish, so that explains the decision to alternate the 5 pm Saturday evening vigil Mass between the two parishes. I know that the current Mass schedule has caused frustration for some of you. I apologize for that, but I do believe the current Mass schedule is the most reasonable, even if not the most preferred, given the relatively low number of people attending Mass these days. I ask for your patience and charity as we continue to navigate this time of the pandemic. I also thank you for trying to understand the difficulty of meeting everyone’s pastoral needs in this unusual time. Whether and how our Mass schedule will change in the future will significantly, though not only, depend upon Mass attendance trends. Let us remember that the most important thing is that we can publicly celebrate the Mass together. When we consider where we were a little more than a year ago, we have much to be grateful for. Let us hold each other in prayer!