Everyday Catholicism

Jul 15, 2009 11:53

All right, in my story, the main character is a lapsed Catholic trying to get back into it in his new hometown. It's in a West Virginia, USA town, relatively small population, and as I don't have much of a Catholic background, I was hoping for some details: What are the typical hours for a Catholic Church, like, access-wise? Are there typical hours ( Read more... )

usa: west virginia, ~religion: christianity: catholicism

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dustthouart July 16 2009, 07:23:16 UTC
Oh boy. It's INCREDIBLY varied from place to place. Is the "small West Virginia town" you have in mind an actual place? Google that sucker. Find the parish website. There should be confessions and mass times listed, and if the parish has a welcoming committee, that might be there too. Of course, some parishes have not yet really entered the internet age, lol, so you might also consider calling the diocese. AFAIK the entirety of West Virginia is a single diocese, the Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston. Here is the diocese's evangelization website; it probably has good information on the diocese's welcoming initiatives.

I'm a Catholic convert and I've traveled a fair bit within North America and Asia, and at individual parishes I've seen everything from confession 15 minutes before every Mass (Toronto, ON) to half hour daily confession plus longer blocks of confession time on Saturday (Pittsburgh, PA) to confession three times a week in hour blocks (Taipei, Taiwan) to a truly pathetic IMHO single hour on Saturday for two parishes ( ( ... )

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part the second dustthouart July 16 2009, 07:23:38 UTC
Re: acceptance... Catholics tend to flee after Mass as if they are escaping a burning building, especially after daily Mass. Socializing within the sanctuary is, in any good Church (LOL my sticklerness is showing), considered disrespectful to the presence of Christ within the reserved Eucharist and to the people trying to pray. This leaves the lobby, and in my experience socializing there is mostly limited to saying hello to friends. The priest usually stands near the door and shakes hands with people as they leave ("Lovely sermon, father" "Why thank you, have a blessed day") and if you are new he may comment on it in a friendly fashion or he may not. Some parishes have coffee and baked goods after one of the Sunday morning masses. But, in general, no, you won't get the same kind of "New person! Let me help you and love you and call you George!" that I got from many evangelical places when I was church shopping, lol ( ... )

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Re: part the second dustthouart July 16 2009, 07:26:30 UTC
Erm, and I just realized that I'm assuming that your character is relatively young. Sorry about that. No matter what his age, I think he's likely to get encouragement, not a cold shoulder, from any internal group. But attending Mass in and of itself is pretty anonymous, which I kind of appreciate.

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Re: part the second shadefell July 16 2009, 12:23:03 UTC
OH MY GOD, I am RC and my husband is Eastern Orthodox and they HANG AROUND AFTER SERVICES. It blows my mind! Seriously! I had no idea how hidebound I was. So much is similar about their services (even thought they are in a different language) that the little differences like that really threw me. Your description of fleeing is very, very apt.

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Re: part the second dustthouart July 16 2009, 13:36:41 UTC
Yeah, and you had a good point down there about the "WHAR IZ MAH BREAKFAST" effect, lol, I've had that feeling myself after Mass. Even with the discipline relaxed to an hour, most people don't eat breakfast before Sunday morning Mass because there's just no time. And at a daily Mass:
Early Morning Mass: I gotta go to work!
Noon Mass: I gotta go back to work!
Evening Mass: I gotta go home!

Although if you go to a parish that takes its time on Mass, you could practically be eating Doritos on your way up the steps to the front door and still take Communion, with the one hour fast.

My spiritual director recommended that I spend 15 minutes in prayer after Mass, and when I leave at the end of the 15 minutes, the place is usually deserted. Perhaps two or three other pious stick-in-the-mud types like myself, lol. Even the priest is gone!

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Re: part the second shadefell July 16 2009, 14:20:50 UTC
Our services were almost always 45 minutes long and the car ride to church took at least 15 minutes, so we often grabbed toast on our way out the door. But that's, you know, not a real breakfast.

And even when we go to the almost-entirely-families-with-teenagers-or-teenagers-alone-fulfilling-confirmation-requirements 11:00 Mass, we still never had time for breakfast before Mass.

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Re: part the second artekka July 17 2009, 18:35:34 UTC
"New person! Let me help you and love you and call you George!"

lol nice

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argosy July 16 2009, 07:30:13 UTC
Your icon took me a minute, but hee!

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dustthouart July 16 2009, 09:01:27 UTC
Haha, ty.

This post has actually got me musing on my own Appalachian ancestors, good Ulster Scots Presbyterians all, and wondering how they would feel to see their little Papist descendant advising someone on Romanism in their adopted homeland. For shame. XD

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