I have blogged before about the almost cultish nature of some of the Catholic families around here. Right now I am so frustrated I can cry. Quite frankly, if a strange man knocked on my door and said “Hey, if you wanna move now, I got a truck ready, but you gotta go now!” I’d say “Yippee, let’s go!”
There is a family (11 kids-about half range from age 21 to teens) that lives 5 minutes, if that, away from us, but do not associtae with us because my mantillas are too distracting and her sons might be looking at me. We are the cause of much scandal. They attend our TLM parish sometimes, sometimes they go to one 1.5 hours in the other direction. There is another family at our Church in which the woman was divorced (the story is her husband left her with 9 kids when she converted to Catholicism) and now she is remarried. Her children are almost all teenagers now. The wife of the first family took it upon herself to confront the husband of the second family that he should not have married his wife because she is not Holy and the children are bad blah, blah, blah. The first woman’s daughter is also writing notes to other teenage girl’s mothers saying that their daughters dress like sluts at Church (which the do not, they dress modestly, just not as extreme Puritans) and these girls should not be attending Church.
My family has been the receiving end of some of this gossip as well, but oddly it is never to my face like this. Even when we tried to confront someone, they had nothing to say, but of course turned around and told other people again, what is wrong with us.
Is this nonsense common in parish life? This is so unCatholic, in my opinion. People should be able to go to Church to worship without this sort of heartache. Did I miss the part when Jesus said our job was to go out and tell people not to get married or come to Church because they do not adhere to strange Puritan ideas not outlined in any Church teaching? But I think this is the story of this diocese. No leadership, no formation, so we make it up as we go along.
I went to the Easter Vigil Mass at my parents’ Novus Ordo parish, and my feelings were I should have been shot before thinking yet one more time “oh maybe it won’t be so bad.” Do I have to go into how they turned the readings into a concert? Changed around the words to make them musical so they could be performed. Then the priest gave his homily about how this was the best Easter Vigil Mass ever, even compared to what they do in Rome, and we should appreciate the music ministry for their talent and creativity.
I am getting tired. There are things going on at home that are just really hard, and I go to Church to find solace in the Lord. I resent getting pushed around and finding out I caused some scandal this week because of some obscure point of my clothing after I already fretted over finding the most modest items in my wardrobe as to not cause scandal. Not one person will have a theological discussion with me, yet they all can tell I am a heretic because my necklace was too pretty or my top button was un buttoned.
But in regards to the the first story, I think these attitudes going unchecked can be very dangerous to our faith. Not that I can do much besides whine about it here to get it off my chest, and then pray very hard on it, but these things, besides being hurtful and annoying, scare me quite frankly.This type of thinking always seems to get a following. I also know the whole bit that the Church militant is not perfect because of Original Sin, and people will be people, all that stuff. But I am far from perfect, but I would not do this to people, and I think many normal people would not consider doing this.
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I belong to a whopping big parish. At last count I think it was almost 10,000 families with almost 30,000 parishoners. We don’t really have the rumor-mongering because so few of us has a chance to really get to know the other people at Mass.
A friend of ours goes to a small parish downtown. She’s said that there’s lots of what you describe in this post. They seem to spend a great deal of time talking about what this or that person is wearing and who’s doing what to whom.
Maybe it’s more a function of parish size than anything else. People generally hold in contempt things they know better. The bigger parish seems to diffuse some of this sort of stuff even when you get to know people better.
just an idea.
This parish is very small (52 families total). I am not sure if there a parish such as you describe in the Albany Diocese.
Come to our very orthodox “Novus Ordo” parish 🙂 Small — not 52 families, but new and small enough to have only one priest and a priest-in-residence in a diocese with good vocations — and while I’m not part of any inner circle of parishioners, I know we don’t have that “they are going to gossip about us the minute we’re out of earshot” feeling when we attend or have occasion to talk to some of them. (Speaking as someone who’s virtually certain never to look too tempting at church, but has trouble finding good clothes that fit properly, has to run to the ladies’ room mid-Mass on a regular basis, has a child who makes noise and usually has to be taken out, etc.)
Sounds like your basic Pharisees. That type has been around forever. Chin up. As I remind my family, “Fortunately, when we reach the pearly gates, we’ll stand before Christ and not the biddies at church.” (Or whoever else is bugging me.)
I think that I might be tempted to quote scripture at them – the bit about the plank in one’s own eye being more important than the splinter in some one else’s.
I also have to keep reminding myself that the church is a hospital for sinners, not a museum for saints.
As the pew lady said, it isn’t about us – it’s about HIM!
I go to a fairly large parish, with only one priest (mission diocese in very Northern Canada.) We had a group of ladies in our Church who were very pre-Vat in their attitude about the Mass and proper comportment and dress at Church. (Some wore mantillas and shawls).
Sometimes I loved these ladies, because they wouldn’t put up with AmChurch nonsense. But there were other times they wanted to make me scream, because of gossip and other Pharisee nonsense.
I remember one time when they all walked out before Communion because the priest allowed our local branch of the Cdn. Catholic Society for Development and Peace show a slide show after a quick homily. What a scandal afterwards! Now, I don’t think Mass is a place for slide shows and skits, either, but the Lord was present in the tabernacle, and was about to be present on the alter, and they turned their back on Him! There was nothing invalid about that Mass, no matter how annoying the homily.
Another instance that comes to mind is one of the ladies complaining that youth surround the alter in the youth Mass for the consecration. She gossiped about that one for weeks, saying how scandalized she was. I put a stop to that one by pointing out the Pope insists on doing the same thing at every single World Youth Day Mass, and two of my friends had had this honour bestowed upon them, and they both say they have a much fuller understanding of the True Presence now. At first, she asked me if the WYD kids were surrounding the alter “because of lack of space.” I then pointed out these youth behind the alter are hand-picked months in advance, from every province, territory, and country represented. She turned green.
My hubby nicknamed these ladies the “scary Marys” because of their severe interest in Marian apparitions and the end times.
The North is a transient place. Most of these ladies have moved away. I still love them for some of the things they taught me (like love for our Blessed Mother and her Rosary, and how to say the rosary), but that tendency to judge and tear down publicly drove me nuts.
Hang in there, Pansy!
I thought the Pew Lady’s blog was very appropos to some of my thoughts. Had I read her blog before I had written mine, I would have saved the trouble, linked and said “yeah, what she said?”lol
Pansy, that’s awful. 🙁 My parish, which is a relatively small one, thankfully doesn’t do much of the gossip thing. I’m really thankful for it.
Hey Pansy,
Yes, TLM parishes are weird! For the year and a half now that I’ve been attending the TLM I’ve noticed the types of whackos your post is about, and some of the angry trads Mark Shea posts about (although I don’t think they’re the majority), but also a lot of holy, generally happy trads. My boyfriend, who has been going to the TLM in Rochester for several more years than I have has noticed the same thing, it attracts a lot of weirdos. I say don’t worry about it! We’re not Puritans, we’re Catholics! You’re clearly doing all you could be expected to do to make sure you and your family is dressed appropriately for Mass, and if some nutjob is giving you a hard time about it, laugh it off, say a prayer for her that she may realize she’s being a heretic Puritan, and then go back to what you were doing before. 🙂
Alicia’s got it right about the Church being a hospital for sinners, not a museum for saints! Let the nutty lady worry about her own soul, not your mantillas!
well, I doubt we have a big gossip problem in our parish since half the parish dribbles in right before the Gospel and leaves immediately after Communion — that wouldn’t leave much time for checking out the other parishioners and discussing them out in the parking lot.
That first lady sounds like a garden variety nut who just happens to be focusing her nuttiness on church matters. If she weren’t in your TLM parish she would be admonishing her neighbors for driving in front of her house too often, or putting tinfoil on the windows or something.
y’all need to come to the weebit parish the summa mamas attend. we have less than two hundred families and very limited gossip because the radtrads who are drawn to us (the anglican use seems to attract the angry trads for some reason) don’t stay long once they realize we won’t listen to such vanity and ugliness.
Colossians 2:16-19
So let no one judge you in food or in drink, or regarding a festival or a new moon or sabbaths, which are a shadow of things to come, but the substance is of Christ. Let no one cheat you of your reward, taking delight in false humility and worship of angels, intruding into those things which he has seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind, and not holding fast to the Head, from whom all the body, nourished and knit together by joints and ligaments, grows with the increase that is from God.
People who resort to such tactics, are just seriously miserable people. If she were a lukewarm Catholic, she’d stil behave in the same manner, although perhaps it would be directed at someone else. I just think that people like that seem to be drawn to extremes though. It’s like they can’t handle moderation in anything. Humph.
There’s little that depresses me more than gossip. I just will not stand for it. I used to fall into that trap, and it just makes you feel wretched. Now I just withdraw when things seem to head in that direction. I say continue to go to the tlm regardless, and pray for this woman’s soul. Pray for her children, who are probably greatly effected by this attitude of hers as well. I’ve been in a similar situation before, and continuing to be kind (quite a feat under the circumstances), really helped me to exorcise myself of the bad feelings a particular person inspired in me, and helped me to set a good example, and perhaps made an impression on the person doing the gossiping (I hope). My old psych professor once told me to “act as if,” and eventually, you will be so. i.e. act happy, kind, whatever, and you will eventually be happy, kind, or whatever. It just takes a (whole lotta) conscious effort to be kind to such people.
Gotta concur with Smockmomma. Part of why my wife and I were so uncomfortable with the TLM community was that attitude. I saw it from the fatherhood end of things. I watched a 7 year old lose his faith because his father was more concerned about the position the boys hands were in, rather than the fact the lad was praying at all. If that’s how they deal with their children, I thought, how ever will they deal with us.
I could go on with similar anecdotes. Suffice to say I found the atmosphere angry and poisonous, despite the heroic efforts of two FSSP chaplains to defuse it. Seems to be an integral part of what one wag called “Protestantism with Rosary beads”.
We’re quite happy with the little parish we’re in now, which we recently discovered is also the Summa Mamas’ parish.
That’s part of why I don’t have much desire to go to the TLM. But if our parish started having it, that’d be great. I’m not sure it would end up being our regular Mass. But as much as I can respect people saying that it helps them worship better, or that the abuses in the non-indult parishes (correct terminology?) in their area are too bad, I do worry about what it would be like in a completely self-selected parish designed specifically to avoid the new Mass, if that makes any sense. Not at all that everyone there must be a prideful crackpot, but that I can imagine a number of such people clustering there.
I was on a mailing list once which was for women who didn’t use any form of “birth control” including NFP — not to get into that discussion, but I remember reading there a woman’s description of “persecution” she had to go through to get the Eucharist one time, being merely enduring the new, English Mass, not done to her liking, although I don’t recall there being any outrageous liturgical abuse described — but the fact that she and those responding to her considered it “persecution” of the TLM-preferring attendee rather than a less than ideally reverent Mass said a lot to me…
Pansy, I’m so pleased that you’re coming to visit the DC area! The first thing I’m going to do when I lay eyes on you is gasp and point to make you feel right at home!
(Big hug to Pansy, too).
All I can suggest is what Therese did when forced to wait upon Ancient Sister Sourpuss: she gave her her very sweetest smile. even though she thought she might strangle the old bat!
And God blessed that effort, and the old bat came eventually to love Therese and to SWEETEN UP HERSELF!
Just wanted to say sorry that you are having these experiences. Also, as an aside, I blv these sort of things can happen at any parish, although in some places it seems to thrive a bit more. In our large parish (we actually live within 5 minutes walk of over 5 churches) that we normally attend, there are a few “cranky” older ladies. Last summer, one of them came up and told my wife to come to church with more clothes on. I should mention that it was over 100 degrees out, and my wife had a long dress on. It was sleevless, but the “straps” were about 5 inches wide! For the first part of the Mass, that woman´s “attack” only caused us to think about her, rather than Christ. Now, I tend to just ignore the crankies, and continue on with life. Although I am about to tell after Mass one of them to stop telling my children to be quiet (they are quiet), because she´s making more noise than they are, what with her loud “Shhs,” etc. And yes, if the children are loud we deal with that, but honestly, they are respectful. I´ve decided it´s just some old crank who doesn´t like children, and doesn´t think they should be in Mass.
I think the irony is that such people are primarily going to be found where other people are sincerely striving for holiness. Pharisees are attracted only to those on the path to God. So hang in there, Pansy. You must be doing something right. 🙂
Remember when Jesus said, “Wherever two or more are gathered in my Name there shall be nitpicking.”? That’s not actually what He said, but He shoulda said it.
Relax, pray for them, and try to ignore it as best you can. God can see your heart.
This is called “Being too concerned with human respect.” Try not to worry about these folks. Old Josemaria Escriva reportedly said to God, “Lord, if You don’t need me to have a good name, why do I need to have a good name?”
God bless you. You have a book by St. Josemaria on your reading list — have you had a chance to look at it?
This is called “Being too concerned with human respect.” Try not to worry about these folks. Old Josemaria Escriva reportedly said to God, “Lord, if You don’t need me to have a good name, why do I need to have a good name?”
While this is true, my issue is not so much this crazy lady because there are always crazy people, that this stuff goes on and is more common than not in this diocese. It is the lack of formation and leadership you see here, and this is one of the ways this filters down to a personal level.
The Bishop instituted this Indult. He told the pastor that he had to do the Indult and afterwards anytime you mention the TLM to anyone outside of the parish you hear the same exact words “oh, there are some strange people there. The Bishop is keeping an eye on that parish.” But he’s not.He’s not leading his flock in any capacity in this diocese. All he is doing of late is spending his time in his investigation and defense, and if that is all he is capable of then he should resign.
Again, maybe I am too concerned with human respect, but I am lonely. I am having a lot of issues at home where I wish I had a priest to talk to and a spiritual director, but there are none. My brother needs to be confirmed, but they make it nearly impossible to receive this sacrament in this diocese because everything is run by feminists who make it about what is PC to them as opposed to what really works. Then they tell you you do not need to be confirmed anyway. I wish I had some Catholic friends but I am either too extreme or too wordly with my top button unbuttoned and not rejoicing that everyone is going to hell.
Again, my point is not a pity party. But if this diocese were a person, it would be a person who cannot get up from bed because of fever and chills who would look green from sickness and who is fading away due to lack of nourishment.It has been this way for a very long time.It is the Mystical Body of Christ, and the lack of true Catholicism has goen beyond simply holding your nose wbile they play another silly folk music selection and hold hands at the Lord’s Prayer. It is invading all aspects of a Catholic life here, and this to me is just one more example of what happens when the hiearchy does not lead their flock and allow them to make it up as they go along. What happens when parents raise children like that?
What is a TLM Parish, please? I presume its traditionalist but is there something else?
Whoa……that is a difficult and depressing situation. Will pray that it doesn’t get you too down.
(From the perspective of my parish, I wish there were more women with just a top button un-buttoned. I see a lot of buff babes who feel that their good condition warrants 4 or 5 unbuttoned buttons. And skirts up to who knows where. And some of these gals are Extraordinary Ministers of the Eucharist standing around the altar which puts their legs at eye level for guys kneeling, especially in the area behind the altar…..Oh, well, don’t even get me started…..)
If I may be allowed the luxury of qouting Monty Python; “RUN AWAY!!!RUN AWAY!!”.
People like that (wether they know it or not) are here for one purpose, and that is to drag you down to their level.Now, they may have the very best of intentions, but as we all know, the road to hell is paved with good intentions!I’d just smile, say hello and leave them alone. Let them say what they want, you know the truth, God knows the Truth,does anyone else really matter?!?
From what I can tell from your blog and talking to you via e-mail, you seem like a normal person, so why waste your time on these knuckleheads? The way I see it, we all have enough problems in the world without having to worry about why so & so thinks were not as catholic as their family. Who are you there for anyway, for God or for them? Write em off, move on and talk to the nice couple that sit quietly to the left side of the pews. Theyre probably more interesting anyway.
Sherry,
TLM= Traditional Latin Mass
Pansy attends the “old” or “Tridentine” Mass celebrated according to the 1962 missal in the Diocese of Albany (in union with Rome, under the Ecclesia Dei indult). I attend one in Rochester.