Our local Catholic church doesn't want us there. I can't understand why

[BlueMediterranean]

Hi everyone,

I wanted to share an issue my partner and I have been facing at our local Catholic church and get your thoughts on it. We moved to a new city about a year and a half ago and bought a house here. The schools in the area are somewhat average, and the best one by far is a Catholic school. Being Catholics ourselves, we thought we wouldn't have any issues.

Initially, we didn't attend church because I was heavily pregnant, and after that, I experienced postpartum depression, which made it difficult for me to feel comfortable leaving the house with my baby. However, my partner started going to the evening mass on Sundays instead of the morning one. We officially registered with the church when we moved here.

After about 6-7 months, I joined him at the evening mass. From the very beginning, we found it strange that the priest never greeted anyone. As soon as he finished his sermon, he would disappear. Everyone would leave, and there was no socializing whatsoever.

One day, we went to talk to him about baptizing our baby, but he told us that he didn't know us well enough and asked us to continue attending the mass. We found this odd but decided to keep going. A few months later, we asked again, and he gave us the same response. In fact, he didn't remember us and thought we wanted to register as new members.

That's when we started to worry. If the priest never greets anyone and leaves immediately after the sermon, how can he get to know anyone? We could attend mass for years, and he wouldn't even know our names.

We had to rearrange some personal commitments to attend the Sunday morning mass to see if things were different, but he still doesn't greet anyone. We persisted in asking about the baptism and were given the contact information of a church volunteer who organizes the baptism course. Unfortunately, our emails to this person have gone unanswered, and when we asked in person, they claimed not to have received them.

I am truly baffled by all of this. Why does the church ignore us in this manner? I am now worried about how we'll obtain the necessary paperwork to register our daughter at the Catholic school if they won't even baptize her.

There must be a reason behind all of this, but I honestly can't comprehend it. I have considered volunteering, but both my partner and I work full-time jobs, which makes it challenging.

If anyone has any insights or suggestions, please share them. We would greatly appreciate it.

Thank you.

This^
Plus the OP does not seem to know about the Order of Mass, has not come back to explain which country she lives in AND has posted a copy of this post on the Philosophy thread. Why?

Absolute nonsense.

Racism?! Do me a favour. The Church WELCOMES immigrants. Over half the practising Catholics in any Parish I've ever attended Mass in are people from other ethnic groups. Our current and former Priest are immigrants (one Irish, one Nigerian). Of it wasn't for immigrants there'd be hardly any Priests. In my lifetime I've known Priests from the following countries: Ireland, India, Nigeria, Poland, Malta, Italy, Uganda and England.

It is not the church showing a judgemental attitude.

FYI, I was unmarried and attending church with (now DH) and DD for 2 years, no one made us unwelcome. But they did see that we were there every week and not just doing it for a school place.

Including the negative birth rate in countries like Italy.
My daughter was one of 15 only children in her Italian primary school class. I was the only one in the UK!

It's interesting how the customs vary from place to place and are quite different in Ireland and the US.
The OP has unfortunately not said where she is, so it's hard to give specific advice, although I actually don't think she's in Ireland as you don't need to be Catholic to attend a Catholic school here. They don't give any preference to Catholics for school entry to a Catholic school either ( this is because the majority of schools are Catholic so selection on this basis would discrimate and be unfair). So I imagine OP is in the UK or elsewhere.

If you’re a regular church goer you know most of the parishioners and I can assure you there’s an awful lot of unmarried couples with kids, singles with kids, divorced people, everyone practices birth control and as they walk the aisle to take communion even some you pass the odd person that’s sleeping with another married parishioner.
The community is no different to life outside.
Non of these things mean you can’t be a practicing Catholic it just means you end up going to confession a lot more…..or at least in the eyes of the church you should be.

I know lots of Italian Catholics who aren't married and live together. Some are divorced.

I do agree there's a fair bit of shark jumping from the OP (and others) regarding how they think (wrongly) the church thinks. And does.

To be fair I’m a bit of a goldfish and probably couldn’t recite the order of the mass despite being a catholic and convent educated. I go into automatic in church. I still struggle with the change in the words and revert back to the older versions of the creed etc.

Being a Christian (CofE) I am honestly shocked by some of these responses.

The experiences in the Catholic Church are so far away from my church experiences and I’ve been attending most of my life in various churches.

I’ve always been taught that Being a Christian means flowing Christ but also being more like Christ. In our church it’s extremely important to be non judgements, accepting of everybody and most of all speak the word of Jesus through word and deed.

The numbers of christians in the UK is at an all time low - If anyone wants to come into church for whatever reason- get their baby baptised, just curious, come once a year, come to make friends, or even come for the school place, they are welcomed with open arms.

New or infrequent people are given even more fuss that regulars.

The Vicar always stands at the door after the service to greet parishioners - it’s their job to find out how they are and be available for any questions / concerns!
Honestly shocked and saddened at these Catholic experiences on here.

*spread not speak!

I think some of these thoughts , ideas are not from practicing Catholics though.
Catholics are not judgemental. It really is very accepting, even if technically the ‘laws’ of the church aren’t in some cases.
If you are an involved parishioner also, like most Christian’s and indeed religions, it is a very supportive environment

I agree with this. And it's always the same on any thread mentioning Catholicism in the UK.
Either in the UK Catholicism didn't update after V2 in the 60s (which I don't believe) or, people spout the prejudices non Catholics have about Catholics.

And, as above. I'm not Catholic.

In our church it’s extremely important to be non judgements, accepting of everybody and most of all speak the word of Jesus through word and deed. Surely you understand that being a Catholic Christian means following the teaching of the church not just being in the building? People come together to support each other to follow the church’s teaching. Just like in any situation some will do that through encouragement and some through finding fault. Catholics are on the whole not damning and shunning in my experience.

Some are more traditional than others and officially, NFP is the only form of limiting family size allowed by the Catholic Church. The majority just don't follow that.

In England Catholic schools can be quite popular and have quite stringent admissions criteria. Eg. A local state secondary prioritises based on baptism and also how frequently Mass has been attended and for how long. Has to be confirmed by a priest. Another prioritises based on how early the baptism took place as well.

That doesn't mean that those families using birth control are living in harmony with church teachings. NFP is allowed if you have reason to limit family size. I'm not saying I agree but I do know what the teachings are.

Possibly some racism in the mix too, if English isn’t your first language.

Please don't bring racism on the part of the Church into this. The current shortage of priests has meant that we have welcomed several foreign priests - Polish, Indian and Nigerian in the city where I live. The only racism that I am aware of had been experienced by the Nigerian priest whilst travelling on a bus.

Hypocrisy is rife in many religions. You're meant to be genuinely sorry when you go to confession. I can't say I knew unmarried couples in the church but did know divorced people and single parent families. I knew one family whose parents had divorced and remarried, but they'd been through the formal annulment process to be able to remarry.

I'm a regular Mass attending Catholic and I think it sounds like you've picked a duff church and congregation.

As a Catholic you are meant to encourage people to become Catholics, we welcome anyone. If anything at my church new people are likely to be put off as everyone is so friendly it's overkill sometimes. Plus our congregation is aging so we're delighted to have new members especially young family's, no one would care if you weren't married.

The priest regularly leaves either straight away or after his homily because he has 2 other Masses to attend due to a shortage of priests but if he is free he does come for a coffee after Mass.

I would suggest you change churches to be honest if it's that bad. I would also write to the Bishop because I don't think what you are experiencing is normal for a Catholic church.

The whole thing is a nightmare

As of August last year the PAV clarified which birth control is acceptable to the Church. Pope Francis confirmed it a few days later. It is very open to interpretation (which is exactly why it was worded in such a way) "Natural" without clarifying what is meant by that.
As a word, it has as much literal significance as "non chemical" and "toxic"
All a bit Schrödinger's birth control tbh.

Yes. The perception of Catholic schools being ‘better’ and people attending for schools has had a major deforming effect on English Catholicism, in my experience of it, alongside the specific local histories of Catholicism in its relationship to the C of E, recusancy etc, and as ‘immigrant’ religion (Catholics of the Jacob Rees-Mogg variety define themselves against (I quote) ‘bog Catholics’). I also think some parishes are extremely conservative compared to, say, Irish Catholicism— especially as some are now importing priests from traditionally more socially/theologically conservative parts of the world. Lesbian friends who are devoutly Catholic, weekly churchgoers and v involved in their parish, and who baptised their daughter (completely unproblematically — a priest in their parish also blessed their marriage), have now stopped attending as their London parish now has its priests from west Africa, and has become far more conservative.

Natural family planning is allowed. No barrier can be put in the way of conception. So no condoms, no pill, no coil, no withdrawal method. The only acceptable NFP is temperature tracking. I think the Church is clear on that.

Yes that was rather my point. Most Catholics practice birth control. They are aware they are not supposed to but do anyway (just like the multitude of other sins we commit and still are Catholics), which is why it would be odd for a parishioner to harangue a woman about it.

@BerriesPineCones that may be the case in central london but isn’t happening everywhere in the uk.

Racism is part of life but not necessarily in church where it is an international institution not uk based. Our “leader” the Pope is South American, based in Rome and most of our population are not from the uk.

The priest must be used to all those family moving locally when they have a baby and suddenly becoming church goers because their ultimate goal is for their child to go to THE school.

This is exactly the scenario in my local town where their is one excellent secondary school which catholic and all the others are very poor. We knew the priest and he told us how funny it had become to see those family who tried so hard and didn't see that he could tell that their interest was all about the school. They then amazingly had zillion excuses why they couldn't attend any longer afterwards. The only difference is that he didn't care so much.

It sounds like that Priest does care and wants to see that you are truly commited to the faith and church rather than to a place at the school.

I haven't heard that announcement, so that's interesting. Thanks. I'll look that up. My own time was NFP via the reading of body symptoms to determine the fertile period.