By DEXTER DUGGAN
PHOENIX — Catholics able to return to attending limited public Masses as dioceses start to reopen from the COVID-19 pandemic will feel the sensation of three-dimensionality again, being surrounded by the atmosphere of the worship hall instead of watching a flat-screen livestream.
The celebrant’s face in the sanctuary may be 70 or more feet distant, rather than the close-up image they recently may have become used to thanks to cameras. To compare with a secular activity, a fan in football-stadium seating isn’t right down in the huddle.
Even while many Americans were under lockdown orders or somewhat less restricted during pandemic uncertainties, they still could watch the celebration of the Mass even miles away. But now in some areas they were emerging from home, to head for church.
Some distance from the altar was always the way it had been before. Anyone who thought he’d get a front-row pew for Christmas or Easter by walking in the door five minutes before Mass was to start must have been from a very small parish.
People may have wondered if some Catholics had become so accustomed to watching Mass from their couches since mid-March that they’d be reluctant to get in their car or hit the sidewalk to renew their personal presence before the Divine Presence.
A ceremonies coordinator at a Phoenix church told The Wanderer on May 11 that even before limited public Mass began that day, people were coming to the church property to receive the Eucharist when distribution of that sacrament was renewed.
“People want the Mass, that was evident when they lined up outside of a closed church waiting to receive the Blessed Sacrament after a livestreamed Mass,” said Chris Quintenz, the liturgical and funeral coordinator at St. Thomas the Apostle Parish.
A woman in California’s San Diego Diocese, under tougher restrictions, told The Wanderer on May 18: “As the public Mass closure in San Diego drags on, more than once I’ve wished that the faithful could still receive Communion. Spiritual Communions are just not the same as receiving the Lord, Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity.
“Catholics in our parish have outdoor Confessions, held in a grassy garden lawn beside the church building. With proper ‘social distancing,’ of course,” she said. “Why not a similar reverent Communion service outdoors? I want my Lord back. God knows that if abortion clinics are still allowed to do their killing during COVID, we need Jesus more than ever.”
On May 19, the most recent news on pandemic restrictions at the San Diego diocesan website, as of May 4, said, in part: “In compliance with the governor’s executive order asking all Californians to ‘shelter in place,’ all parishes and school campuses of the diocese in San Diego and Imperial counties will remain closed until further notice.
“As a diocese, we strongly support these recommendations and defer to the opinion of health experts. This is not a challenge to our Catholic beliefs. On the contrary, we respect the science and want no part of putting the health of our fellow parishioners or their families at risk,” the San Diego notice said.
Quintenz, the Phoenix church’s ceremonies coordinator, subsequently told The Wanderer on May 18 that people were glad to be able to attend Mass in person again.
“People are so happy to be back! They are thanking the bishop, the pastor, the deacons, even the staff for this opportunity to publicly worship again,” he said.
“It’s all thanks to God, that is where all accolades need to be directed. Once we started distributing Communion again, we had one parishioner break out in tears of joy when she was able to receive,” Quintenz said.
Quintenz said that because St. Thomas the Apostle resumed limited public Mass on Monday, May 11, the staff was able to gauge how to proceed. “We kind of stuck our toe in the water by offering the daily Mass during the week before the Sunday Masses came around, so some of our responses evolved during the week.”
Phoenix Bishop Thomas Olmsted said at his diocesan website that due to a flattening of the curve of COVID-19 cases, “I am pleased to share that on May 11, I permitted our pastors to begin celebrating the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass publicly in our churches. I hope this will provide a great sense of comfort for the many Catholics who have been longing to attend Mass to receive Jesus in the Eucharist.
“I want to emphasize that Catholics in the Diocese of Phoenix remain dispensed from their Sunday obligation to attend Mass during this pandemic,” Olmsted said. “We need to remain cautious and vigilant during this public-health crisis, and I know that many are hesitant of returning too soon. I urge those of you who cannot join us in person to continue to watch a livestream of the Mass and make a Spiritual Communion.”
He said he developed a parish reopening plan with pastors, “but it will not be a process that happens overnight. Rather, it will occur over the course of time, and will vary from parish to parish, based on a variety of circumstances that are unique to each community.”
The California Catholic Daily news site posted on May 18 that San Francisco Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone said public liturgies might resume in two weeks if the Bay Area continued successfully to manage the pandemic.
The report said that Cordileone said “government leaders do not understand the steps churches can take to protect congregants. ‘When they think of a worship service, they think of something like a megachurch, 1,000-2,000 people jammed in a crowded area,’ he said. ‘They don’t think that we can have distance in our churches, or that we can have outdoor services’.”
The Catholic news site said archdiocesan and diocesan public Masses resuming in May included Oklahoma, Baltimore, Louisville, St. Louis, Richmond, Portland, Ore., Denver, St. Petersburg, and Austin.
Quintenz, the St. Thomas the Apostle liturgies coordinator, told The Wanderer that due to social distancing, 160 people were being allowed to register in advance to attend a weekend Mass in a church that has a capacity of 1,150 people.
“We also have an overflow room in the hall where we have a projection screen of the Mass in real time and where we will bring Communion to you,” Quintenz said.
He said that inside the church, two of the four weekend Masses have about 140 people, and the other two 160, while the daily morning Mass has 60 to 70 people attending.
The parish also distributes the Eucharist to those who come to the church after Mass is over. Quintenz said that about 20 people show up after both the 9 a.m. and 11 a.m. Sunday Masses, and “maybe half a dozen” after daily Mass.
Fr. Robert Bolding, the president-rector of Phoenix St. Mary’s High School, also assists at St. Thomas the Apostle with Mass and Confession. He normally celebrates the 11 a.m. ad orientem Sunday Mass, and concluded this observance on May 17 by telling the small congregation, “It really is a great joy. It’s a beautiful thing to see you.”
He thanked the people for “your patient endurance of this kind of difficult and confusing and frustrating situation.”
Bolding, who has a full black beard, donned a pandemic mask before stepping down from the altar to distribute Communion. The Wanderer asked Quintenz whether there are problems for the priest with the mask. “I have not heard him complain one bit. Knowing Fr. Bolding, he would point out it is a minor nuisance compared to what our Lord endured,” Quintenz said.
This parish also has offered afternoon outdoors Confessions for weeks on its parish school basketball court, with priests sitting widely apart for penitents.
Asked if outdoors Confessions would continue as the hot Phoenix summer arrives, when highs from June through August might exceed 110 degrees, Quintenz said, “No plans to change the way we are doing them now. We have a total of four portable evaporative coolers and plenty of shade!”
As a person who has received this sacrament in the open air, I think it’s a nicer method than being in “the box.”
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