Denver Newsroom, May 8, 2020 / 02:59 am (CNA).- On Sunday, March 15, Nebraskans in the Diocese of Lincoln still had a choice of whether or not they wanted to attend Mass and risk possible exposure to coronavirus.
By the next day, they didn’t. Public Masses in the diocese were canceled, as they soon were throughout the country due to the pandemic.
Now that curves of infection are “flattening” and hospitals have had a chance to ramp up their capacity and supplies, many dioceses, including Lincoln, are slowly reopening Masses to the public. What exactly that will look like varies a lot depending on each parish’s unique spaces and limitations.
Archbishop George Lucas, currently serving as acting bishop of Lincoln, has followed guidelines from Governor Pete Ricketts in issuing some general guidance for re-starting public Masses. Ultimately, however, he left the decision to reopen up to each individual parish.
One place that has been offering public Masses as of Monday, May 4, is St. Wenceslaus parish in Wahoo, Nebraska, a town of 4,500 people located in the Diocese of Lincoln.
Fr. Joseph Faulkner, the pastor of St. Wenceslaus in Wahoo, said he decided to reopen public Masses at his parish after meeting virtually with the other priests in his area. The Masses, of course, will look quite different than normal – with limited capacity, social distancing, and precautions like no holy water, no hymnals, and no sign of peace.
And in many ways, Faulkner said he is encouraging his parishioners to act like it’s the weekend of March 14-15 again.
“From the get-go, we’re telling people – you need to make a decision. I even put in my message (to parishioners), think back to – it’s March 14th and you’re trying to make a decision. Whatever decision you made then is probably still the right decision. If you need to be extra careful for yourself, for your family, for your parents, for your coworkers, for your patients you see in the nursing home, stay away,” he said.
Parishes in the cities of Lincoln and Omaha decided to wait to reopen, Faulkner said. Lincoln has a re-opening date of May 11 for non-essential businesses, and the size of Omaha parishes made re-opening at this point very difficult. Although Wahoo sees a lot of traffic from Lincoln and Omaha and other surrounding towns, Faulkner said he thought he could use appropriate precautions to make reopening safe at his parish.
“St. Wenceslaus specifically is lucky. We’ve got a nice big basement, so that gets you another 30%-40% seating room. We’ve got three priests, which is really lucky. So from five weekend Masses, we’re going up to eight, so we can do more to spread our people out.”
Faulkner said he has even offered to other parishes with just one priest that he can send someone to help them out if they are offering extra Masses for social distancing and are feeling burned out.
For attendance and seating, Faulkner said he is blocking off every other pew and is going to stagger families in order to maintain six feet of distance. Instead of having people call or sign up online, Faulkner said he is hoping that the extra Mass times, the use of the basement space, as well as the people who choose to stay home, will be enough to maintain an appropriately staggered congregation.
Faulkner said he has been grateful to have public weekday Masses before the weekend to work out some of the kinks of the new restrictions. For example, he’s still working on his communion line protocol, he said. He tried a method using the side aisles and then the center aisle at his first Mass on May 4th, and “it was horrible. So I’m going to fix that tomorrow.”
Masks during communion have also been tricky.
“It’s really hard to say Mass with a mask on, and then I have to make my Communion, I have to receive,” Faulkner said. The priests were donated some N95 masks, which Faulkner tried to use on Monday, but the straps made it hard to quickly receive communion and readjust the mask without touching his face or his glasses, he said, so he’s hoping to find a different kind of mask by the weekend.
From his parishioners, Faulkner said he has seen a variety of attitudes toward the closing, and now re-opening, of public Masses.
“There’s really three camps,” he said. “There’s the, yes, amen, be safe, meditate-on-the-saints-who-didn’t-have-the-Eucharist-for-years group.”
“Then there’s definitely the middle group, which is like, I don’t want to take any risks, but I want the first available ‘okay’ to go to Mass,” he said.
“And then there’s the, ‘I’m 85. If I die because I went to Mass, thank God’ crowd. Literally the people who are most cavalier are the older ones,” Faulkner said.
A bishop’s perspective: Oklahoma
Archbishop Paul Coakley, the bishop of Oklahoma City, told CNA that Catholic parishes throughout the state will start celebrating public Masses again on May 18th, with their first public weekend Masses on May 23-24, the Feast of the Ascension.
In a May 7 letter to Oklahoma Catholics posted on the archdiocese’s website, Coakley recognized that while the past two months without Mass have been a painful time for many, God never abandoned his people.
“The gift of the Holy Spirit assures us of God’s continued presence in our lives. No matter the circumstance, he is with us. Perhaps the greatest sacrifice for the lay faithful these past few months has been fasting from Christ’s body, blood, soul and divinity given to us in his real presence in the Eucharist. We pray that in this time of Eucharistic fasting, God has graced you with a profound hunger for this communion with Jesus and the members of his Body, the Church,” he stated.
The timing of reopening public Masses was chosen just before the feasts of the Ascension and Pentecost “to remind us of God’s faithfulness and to prepare to celebrate the birth of our beloved Church on Pentecost,” he added.
The decision was reached through consultations with Bishop David Konderla of Tulsa, priest councils in the state, and medical experts, “including a prominent infectious disease specialist,” Coakley said.
“It won’t be business as usual,” he said. “We will be celebrating public Mass and people will be able to come and they will be able to receive Holy communion, but the churches won’t be full. In fact, we’re limiting it to 33% of the occupancy capacity,” he noted.
“We’ve been very cautious watching the numbers and putting in place pretty strict guidelines to ensure that we were able to maintain social distances and practice the appropriate kind of hygiene,” he added.
A five page document released by the state’s Catholic dioceses details the exact guidelines, such as including 6-foot social distancing between pews, the recommendation that all attendees wear masks, and the recommendation that priests have plenty of hand sanitizer readily available throughout the church.
Coakley said the document offers guidelines for pastors while still giving them the flexibility to implement the recommendations and requirements in the way that works best for their unique parishes.
“If the church fills beyond capacity, we’re asking them to consider using other space in the parish, perhaps the parish hall, to be able to put overflow crowds and continuing to social distance properly, parking lots, things of that sort,” he said. “We’re going to have to rely upon the creativity of our pastors and they have been demonstrating a great deal of creativity up to now, so I’m sure they’ll continue to do so.”
Coakley said he is asking priests to also continue offering livestream Masses for people who will choose not to come to the public Masses at this time. He noted in his May 7 message that the dispensation from the Sunday obligation still stands for all Oklahoma Catholics at this time.
“We are dealing with an invisible threat to people’s lives, a virus that our brightest doctors and scientists are still figuring out. The ever-present temptation in our American culture is to want solutions immediately and to act quickly, because we want what we want, and we want it now. As a Church, we must proceed more deliberatively,” he said.
Coakley told CNA that while he understands Catholics’ fear, anger and frustration during these past two months of suspended Masses, he also encouraged them to think of their time away as a way of serving others.
“We’re really living through a health crisis, a time of severe challenges, and it’s impacting us in so many ways economically, and in terms of social isolation, loneliness, the liturgy also. But I think we need to think beyond individual rights and consider also our responsibilities toward one another, especially the responsibility to love and serve one another, to be mindful of one another’s needs.”
Wichita, Kansas
On May 3, Bishop Carl Kemme of the Diocese of Wichita announced plans to reopen public Masses starting on Wednesday, May 6, following recommendations of the county’s local public health authorities.
Phase one of the guidelines will last until May 20, and they stipulate that parishes may hold Masses at no more than 33% capacity. Churches will use only one entrance, so that the number of people coming may be properly counted and seated, and six foot spacing should be clearly marked so that people can maintain social distance.
Mass attendees are encouraged to wear masks, and priests are required to wear them while distributing communion. Parishes are also encouraged to keep hand sanitizer available at entrances, and parishioners are “strongly encouraged” to receive communion in the hand.
Fr. Clay Kimbro is the parochial vicar at St. Anne’s parish in Wichita. Kimbro said he and the other priests of the diocese have been having weekly virtual talks with the bishop about when to re-open Masses and what that might look like, and so priests were able to give feedback as to what guidelines they thought would work well.
At St. Anne’s, which has 1,200 families, Kimbro and his leadership team have been meeting and working on logistical things, like roping off every other pew so that Mass attendees can maintain proper distancing.
He said he has also had extra meetings with his ushers, who on the weekends will “seat everyone so that they can make sure that the distance is maintained. That’s a lot more responsibility than our ushers are normally given.”
Kimbro said the parish is not having parishioners sign up for Masses online. Instead, if more people show up than the allowed 33%, the overflow congregation will be directed to the school’s auditorium, where a second priest – either Kimbro or his pastor – will celebrate a concurrent Mass, also with social distancing protocols in place.
“We were a little leery of (adding Mass times), because when you add Mass times, it’s hard to take them back,” Kimbro said. “Also, it’s hard to turn people away. They come to the door at 10 a.m. for Mass, and we say, ‘Come back at 1:00 p.m.’ Well, it’s a lot easier to say, ‘Go over to the auditorium.’”
Kimbro said the parish is working on decorating the auditorium to make it an appropriate place to have Mass, and they are also putting down tape lines to direct traffic and to mark distances.
“There’s a lot of work in planning, and it can be a little overwhelming, but we’re overall just really excited to see people again,” he said.
St. Anne’s parishioners have been “all over the map” in terms of their eagerness to return to Mass at this time, Kimbro said. Some have been signing up to read at Mass, or to usher or distribute communion, because they miss Mass so much and they want to be involved.
Others are a bit more anxious, Kimbro said, and he has encouraged those people to attend weekday Masses, where there are likely to be fewer people.
He also added that the Sunday obligation continues to be dispensed for everyone, as Bishop Kemme made clear in his May 3 announcement.
“I do want to emphasize that the current pandemic is far from over. Medical experts tell us that this health crisis remains a very serious threat to the lives of many people,” Kemme stated.
“Because of this, I want to urge all those in the high risk population and others who so choose to continue to use the general dispensation I am giving from the obligation to attend the Sunday celebration of the Mass, which continues indefinitely during this crisis. Please do not put yourself or others at risk by attending the Masses once they resume. This is my urgent appeal to all in our Catholic Community: use extraordinary caution and good judgment in determining if you should attend Mass. No mortal sin is committed if you decide that you and your family should not attend.”
Kimbro said that he is looking forward to having parishioners come back to Mass, even though it might not be the triumphant return that some may have envisioned just yet, with everyone packing in the pews like normal.
“I think everybody was hoping it would kind of be like this post-9/11 experience, where churches are packed and everybody recognizes that need (for God), but we’re tempering that, and it’s kind of like everything in this virus, right? Our expectations versus our reality – having to live in the reality of the moment and what we’re given and just go with that,” he said.
“But then I looked at the Gospel for this Sunday that we’re back, and the first line is: ‘Do not let your hearts be troubled.’ So that’s perfect.”
[…]
It would be wise for the Bishops to avoid endorsing politicians. Politicians lie. Neither party deserves an endorsement.
“Neither party offers a platform”. Sigh. Really? If the church bent over backwards any further to avoid being critical of leftist democrats it would split in half. The most clearly dangerous ideas attacking religion and freedom for individuals in general come from the left. One need only view the history of religious suppression in other nations as they followed the path to socialism and then communism. Its true that neither party is specifically Catholic as this is a secular society, not a religious one. Yet the very reason for this article is the recent loosening of laws saying churches had no right to speak out pro or con regarding politicians whose interests conflicted with any church. Lets notice that this loosening came during a republican administration. Its CERTAIN it would not have happened in a democrat one. Ditto the revised Roe v Wade decision.
Maybe it would be smart of the church higher ups to point out to their congregations which party is the more freedom and religion friendly. But then again so many church higher ups mistake socialism for Christianity. No matter. Some of us, at least, actually CAN see reality when it is right in front of us.
@LJ, great comments!
If facts mattered, there’d be no Democrats … And many fewer clergy.
My friend, don’t forget what the far right Nazis did to religion. Let not history repeat itself.
More NDS…Nazi Derangement Syndrome.
Br. Jaques, try harder.
An ignorant statement. The Nazis were socialists. Socialism is a left wing ideology, not a right wing ideology.
they were tyrants – like building all those concrete bunkers with slave labor
Didn’t we help some of them to S America?
It’s best to stick to principles that never change, rather than to politicians and parties that will betray your trust.
Dear, dear bishops at the USCCB: The People of God have superceded your failed leadership. They’ve taken matters of politics into their own hands. They hardly pay attention to you, if you haven’t noticed.
Vox Populi, Vox Dei, eh?
No, you surely don’t mean that, because — whatever your politics — your side does not always win, and you would not want to say that it was God’s will for your side to lose.
Maybe Vox DiogenesRedux, Vox Dei was what you had in mind?
No. Vox populi, vox Dei is not what DioRe wrote. Neither did DioRe purport, suggest, insinuate, or otherwise imply that he speaks for anyone other than himself.
The ‘People of God’ is ‘defined’ in Gaudium et Spes. Highly recommended reading.
Your statement is parallel to the claim by the Beatles that they were “more popular than Jesus”. The claim was made before I was born, but I never much doubted it. So much the worse for popular opinion! Popular opinion 2000 years ago was, “Crucify Him!” It’s not much different today.
Disappointed by this, with hope that local bishops will see through the progressive perspective of the USCCB. Why wouldn’t we want priests citing defiance of Catholic social doctrine by calling out those candidates who promote abortion, euthanasia, homosexual relations and so on.
Stephen: Did Jesus, St. Peter (our first Pope) or St. Paul say one word against the evil Roman Empire that eventually brutally killed them?
“Church will not endorse candidates…”
Send that memo to Tobin and Cupich and McElroy and Stowe. I am sure that will be news for them
@jpfhayes, AMEN!
A memo to Burk and Strickland might also be in order. Just saying! 🤔
Dormez-vous, Frere Jaques?
Retired members of the hierarchy and those who hold no governing post in a US diocese are not considered active members of the USCCB. Cdl. Burke and Bp. Strickland need no memo. You, however, do.
Good one!
While the USCCB’s reaffirmation of its stance not to endorse political candidates is consistent with canon law and Church tradition, it highlights a deeper pastoral failure: the widespread malformation of Catholic consciences. Many Catholics, influenced by a narrow reading of pro-life teaching, are not truly pro-life in the holistic sense but merely pro-birth or anti-abortion. This reductionist view neglects the Church’s full vision of a consistent ethic of life—from conception to natural death—that includes care for the poor, the marginalized, migrants, the elderly, the environment, and all victims of injustice. In failing to seriously teach and apply Catholic Social Teaching, especially in election seasons, the USCCB has left voters unequipped to exercise informed prudential judgment—the moral reasoning that weighs not only a candidate’s position on abortion, but the full range of life issues. True conscience formation demands helping Catholics discern which candidate or party best reflects the widest range of life-affirming principles, not just anti-abortion rhetoric. Without this, many Catholics vote based on a single issue, often ignoring policies that harm life after birth. If the Church refuses to endorse, it must all the more boldly educate and form—lest Catholics vote in ways that contradict the Gospel’s call to protect all human life and dignity.
Right, Deacon Dom. The Democrats’ murdering of more than a million children a year for the past fifty-two years is offset by the Republicans’ canceling of the school lunch program.
I got it.
So the experiment is complete. It’s undeniably true, there is no issue so evil or insane that it will convince Catholics not to vote for Democrats.
Murdering babies, allowing terrorists to enter across our open borders, legalizing drugs, sexualizing children, promoting sodomy, denying the existence of women — nothing on this list has impacted Catholics’ insistence on voting for Democrats.
You’re known as ‘Deacon Dom’ hereabouts. But, I have to say, you sound more like a bishop.
And — trust me — that’s not a compliment.
brineyman, well said. My guess he’s bucking for a promotion in the ranks. Who knows, maybe even Pope Francis II.
No one is really expecting the Catholic Church to endorse one political candidate or another. Why, the Church hierarchy has a difficult enough time speaking in one voice about Church Teaching let alone weighing in on the merits of political points of view.
I think the IRS ruling simply was addressing something about allowing political candidates EAQUAL ACCESS to Church membership on Church property to propose their ideas. This is something the protestant churches have been doing for a hundred years but the Catholic Church unwilling so as not to jeopardize their sacrosanct tax-exempt status. Once again, the USCCB seems quite adept at obfuscation.
An most unexpected exhibition of wisdom.
Perhaps more of a rice bowl issue that funds initiatives dear to their progressive hearts. The traditional Church enjoy few if any similar revenue streams. One would think that the Church should have a funding stream, strictly charitable donations from within the Church and reject all federal and state revenue with their terms and conditions which is politics at the grass root level.
To understand the USCCB politics, follow the money.
AFCz: You speak more common sense than most of us are acquainted with these days. Thanks.
The USCCB may have made its best decision ever. Otherwise, the divisions among them will dethrone what little credibility and authority they still retain. I’m praying for a saint to emerge from among them……waiting…waiting…waiting…
meiron: A saint among them will appear only when they show a willingness to die for the Faith. When was the last American bishop martyred?
Deacon,
I didn’t know of any off the top, so I asked AI. It replied with Oscar Romero. Discounting that as a technical error, I kept reading, and discovered this fellow named Francis Xavier Ford.
He was a Maryknoll missionary, a bishop, imprisoned and martyred in China in 1952.
meiron, yes, he was American but martyred by the ChiComs. That said, in 250 years we’ve never had an American bishop martyred in America. We did have a Bishop from NY who was imprisoned for his ProLife activities. I guess they didn’t think to kill him in prison.
This is welcome news!
(“Church will not endorse political candidates despite IRS shift.”)
Thank you bishops!
May St. Thomas More intercede for the Catholic Church – political candidates and non-candidates – Catholics one and all.
I am saddened and ashamed to read some of the ultra-snarky, uncharitable and judgmental comments from some of my fellow Catholics who apparently think their “version” of Catholicism is the one and only true version of the faith. Those who take offense at the statement, “Today in the United States, neither political party offers a platform that would serve as a foundation for a true home for faithful Catholics,” show their reluctance to discern the truth about current USA politics. Certainly there were and are Democratic policies that bear much criticism, but to deny that the current MAGA administration is undertaking a variety of cruel and unjust programs that cause much pain and suffering is to look away from the truth. As I see it, the collective wisdom of our US Bishops far supersedes the holier-than-thou musings of some of those snarky commentators on this site.
per Catholic.org: (this priest spoke against tyrants) …….Parishioners offered to escort Father Jerzy by car back to Warsaw, but he was used to being followed and it was late. He and his bodyguard would go alone. The secret police overtook them on a deserted road about a half hour from the town. They held the bodyguard at gunpoint. The captain dragged Father by the cassock to the Fiat. “What are you doing, Gentleman? How can you treat someone like this?”
In a cold fury, the kidnappers beat him with fists and clubs, smashing his skull and face. Unconscious, he was bound, gagged and thrown into the trunk. As they headed for a lonely stretch of woods, the bodyguard hurled himself from the Fiat in a desperate attempt to escape. He made it to a nearby workers hostel and quickly raised the alarm. When they reached the hospital emergency ward, another squad of secret police and a state prosecutor were waiting to take him away. But for the authorities it was too late. The bodyguard had already alerted the Church.
The secret police Fiat sped on with Father Jerzy in the trunk The captain’s men were arguing now, and downing quick shots of vodka. The kidnappers were so terrified that they would be identified that they wanted to leave the priest in the woods. “No,” said another angrily, “the priest must die.”
With the bodyguard’s escape, news of the abduction had swept across Poland. Shock and outrage were nationwide. The parish church overflowed with thousands of people. Every night, larger crowds came to the Masses, praying for Father’s deliverance. Massive security forces surrounded the Warsaw steelworks, where the men were praying at work. Throughout Poland, there were mass meetings in factories and spontaneous prayers in schools. The national crisis mounted. Other churchmen denounced the kidnapping, but Cardinal Glemp refused to comment. The Holy Father declared himself “deeply shaken,” condemning the shameful act and demanding Father Jerzy’s immediate release.
After ten days of waiting, the nation’s patience ran raw. Authorities dispatched large security forces and imposed emergency measures in cities and towns. The last Sunday of October, a record 50,000 people engulfed the parish church at a cold, outdoor Mass for the Homeland. They listened to a tape of Father Jerzy’s last sermon. They hoped and prayed to see him again.
When smiling security officers pulled the battered corpse of Father Jerzy from a reservoir on the river Vistula, about eighty miles from Warsaw, it was tortured beyond recognition. A sack of rocks hung from his legs. His body had been trussed from neck to feet with a nylon rope so that if he resisted he would strangle himself. Several gags had worked free and lay across his clerical collar and cassock, soaked with the priest’s vomit and blood.
Officially, Father spent less than two hours with his kidnappers, but his torture was much too extensive and systematic to have in inflicted in that brief time. Family members present at the autopsy described a body covered head to foot with deep, bloody wounds and marks of torture. His face was deformed. His eyes and forehead had been beated until black. His jaws, nose, mouth were smashed. His face was deformed, and both hands were broken and cut, as if the priest had been shielding it from blows. His fingers and toes dark red and brown from the repeated clubbing. Part of his scalp and large strips of skin on his legs had been torn off.
The autopsy showed a brain concussion and damaged spinal cord. His muscles had been pounded again and again until limp. Internal injuries from the beatings had left blood in his lungs. One of the doctors that performed the post-mortem reported that in all his medical practice he had never seen anyone mutilated internally. The kidneys and intestines were reduced to pulp, as in others cases of prolonged police torture in Poland. When his mouth was opened, the teeth were found completely smashed. In place of his tongue, there was only mush.
A group of priests tried to identify the body, but could not recognize their friend. Identification was finally made by Father’s brother from a birthmark on the side of his chest. Making the full autopsy report public was deemed too explosive by regime and Church officials, who continue to suppress it. Church and independent sources familiar with the report have said it details an even more horrifying picture suffered by the defenseless priest.
“The worst has happened,” declared Lech Walesa, Solidarity’s leader. In Rome, the Holy Father reacted with shock, following the news late into the night. At the parish church in Warsaw, a priest made several attempts to get the mourning population to say the Our Father. When he reached “Forgive us as we forgive those who trespass against us” the congregation refused to pray with him. It took several more attempts before the people would utter that line, and when they did, they prayed it with great force.
Just as was feared, when the state trial was held for the perpetrators, only the mid-level criminals were sentenced. Those who masterminded the plot got off scott-free. Because they were afraid that Father Jerzey’s final resting place would become a shrine, the state officials pressured his parents to bury him in their distant village. The faithful demanded a huge funeral and that he be buried in the parish cemetery. It was the pleading of Father’s mother that he be buried at the parish church in Warsaw.
Father’s mother had continued to wear a red shawl as long as she believed her son was alive. Now, for the funeral, she wore her black shawl. On the day of the funeral ten thousand steelworkers in hard hats marched past secret police headquarters, chanting “We forgive,” “Greetings from the underground,” and “No freedom without Solidarity.” Half a million people filled the streets leading up to the parish church. Scattered throughout were the forbidden Solidarity banners of factories, schools and offices from every corner of Poland. One read “A strike at the heart of the nation,” another proclaimed, “But they can’t kill the soul.”
Father Jerzy knew that his death would have immense power. “Living I could not achieve it,” he once said when the danger rose. The parish church, Saint Stanislaw’s has become a national shrine. As of the writing of this piece by James Fox in 1985, and unending river of pilgrims flow past Father’s grave. Great mounds of flowers are put there. Even communists visited the grave. A thousand-man volunteer force guards the church yard in teams around the clock.
The murder of the holy, defenseless priest emboldened the populace and encourage many conversions and vocations. All the while the regime continued to defame the priest.
Today, Poland, as the rest of the former Iron Curtain countries of Europe, is a free country and a proud ally of our own country. The enemies of Christ rule Europe no more.
***Author’s note: It was by chance that I was looking for reading material when I happened upon this Reader’s Digest of May, 1985. I could not sleep thinking that Father Jerzy’s story must be made widely known. The title of the original article was “Do you hear the Bells, Father Jerzy?” The author of the piece is John Fox.
Father Jerzy, may you rest in peace.
More nonsense from our spineless American bishops. OF COURSE they will continue to endorse political candidates, in the same manner as they have been doing for the past 50 years at least. They will continue to glad-hand, chuckle, laugh, and pose for photographs with every scandalous “catholic” politician on the left. They will continue to excuse every pro-death, anti-family and anti-religious vote and policy of the “catholic” Democrats. They will continue to scold every Catholic Republican politician for imaginary offenses against Catholic teaching. The political positions of the Catholic bishops of America will continue to be crystal clear and unmistakable. They will ALWAYS have the backs of their Democrat Party financiers.