Your Sunday Sermon notes – 4th Sunday after Pentecost (13th Ordinary) 2020

Was there a good point made in the sermon you heard at the Mass for your Sunday, either live or on the internet? Let us know what it was.

Also, are you churches opening up?  What was attendance like?

For my part…

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9 Comments

  1. Clinton R. says:

    Hello, Father. I assisted at our NO Mass. Attendance is capped at 100. We were well spaced apart. Mass usually seats about 800. The priest reflected on today’s Gospel and how we are to not put either father nor mother nor anything before our faith in Christ and His Church. He went on to cite the faith of the martyrs of the Church like St. Thomas More and Jose Sanchez Rio, who was killed for his refusal to deny Christ. Father went on to conclude in his homily our need to be prepared to suffer for being Catholic.

  2. Lurker 59 says:

    Moderate sized parish with attendance capped at 25% of building occupancy. You have to sign-up on the web (name of each individual, address, phone number, email address) and have a ticket to get in. Even with events going on in the parish this weekend (so higher draw than previous) attendance was less than that cap by aprox 15%-18%, depending on the Mass.

  3. Alex says:

    FSSP ATL
    Well attended since reopening – currently in gymnasium for extra spacing.

    Fr. Smith focused on the epistle’s message of present suffering being incomparable to future glory. First that our earthly life does indeed involve suffering, and enduring this suffering often seems dull, but is worth it. Second that when we choose sin, we choose it for a perceived good in some aspect. He pointed out that if man chooses to commit a sin once, he will often persist in the same type of sin his whole life, because the perceived good only increases. How foolish, he said, is the man who thinks he will sin today and resist and repent tomorrow.

  4. exNOAAman says:

    My closest EF is at an historic but small church which will not be able to fit the usual crowd with mandated distancing . Next Sunday will be the first go of it there. However, one of the many priests who presides there, in rotation, is pastor of a much larger NO church , (seats 800). So, he’s added 2 masses, one of them EF. Coincidentally, this place is where I made my first holy communion in the 1960s, so I felt compelled to attend, and found it uplifting.
    .
    But here’s the kicker…under the excuse of Covid-19 safety, this mostly NO parish has resurrected the old (and lengthy) communion rail so everyone can receive in the most sanitary manner : on the tongue, while kneeling. Parish website has a well written document explaining that this is preferable. I was impressed with this strategy. After reading so much about bad bishops, (and yes we have one), trying to ban traditional communion, this parish has taken action. The rail had previously been carpeted over, according to the document.

  5. Sue in soCal says:

    Our young associate pastor made the point that it is not how much you give but the spirit in which you give. Mass attendance has dropped. We are a small mission church. Our maximum capacity for COVID-1984 is 25 with social distancing and masks. (I have taken to wearing long scarves wrapped around my head and face as a small protest – going Shiite- Catholic, so to speak. Instead of a jihad, a crusade.)We need to sign up for Mass because of our limited capacity. We had 24 the first Mass we were open and about 15 each Mass since. Our bishop absolutely does not allow EF Masses but I would love to see what attendance for those Masses would be if he did.

  6. Liz says:

    It felt pretty normal except we usually have two masses and right now there are three and one is live-streamed in addition to people being there which actually must mean our church is more crowded than before. Also, I desperately miss holy water in the fonts. I carry holy water in my purse and give the kids each a little as we enter and exit but I still miss it a lot. At one n.o. church it still has tape on every other pew although we are allowed to go to 75%c capacity I think. We still go to confession and adoration at our local n.o. church (the Blessed Sacrament is reposed) but Father wants us wearing masks for mass so we haven’t been there for mass since March. I realize that our state (Nebraska) has been different than most.

  7. Tristan says:

    The pastor told a vocations story, of a young man discerning the priesthood who felt a connection to this week’s gospel (in the NO).
    Also this weekend there were a couple dozen First Communions, which were being sorted out amongst each of the Masses.
    We seat ~ 100 (about one third capacity?) with priority if signed up. The early Mass is under capacity, and I think a few no-shows, while the noon/Spanish Mass is full.

  8. Lusp says:

    Diocesan parish with EO form Mass. No limit on people, we just have to use every other pew. EO form Mass has been at capacity since reopening two months ago. Our fantastic sermon was about how the worst slavery is slavery to sin and that this is what we should really be focusing on, not the slavery of the past.

  9. HyacinthClare says:

    Father told us last week at the packed-full 7:30 a.m. mass to please go to the 12:30 or the 2:00 pm ones, which were more lightly attended. We went to 2:00 and it was probably 90% full. We are FSSP and our priests provided mass (via TV at first, then very limited attendance) and confession (outside) every day without fail ever since this started. The two priests are celebrating mass five times every Sunday so everybody can get in. We have had literally dozens of new registrations in our parish the last three and a half months. Some of them may have been “lurkers,” because when there were limits on head-counts at mass, you couldn’t sign up unless you were registered, but that ended a month ago and the registrations continue. Somebody ought to study us…

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