Mass

Now that a 15-month suspension of the obligation to attend Sunday Mass has ended, as of July 1, pastors, parish staff and parishioners are weighing the costs and benefits of continuing to livestream their daily or weekly Masses.

“Before every Mass or after, parish leaders should be enriching their people’s understanding of what it is they celebrate. If we want to teach about the Real Presence, we need also teach about the Mass.”

The obligation to attend Mass on Sundays and holy days of obligation in the Diocese of St. Cloud will be reinstated on the weekend of July 3-4, Bishop Donald Kettler said in a letter to pastors June 3.

In his letter to pastors, Bishop Kettler also addressed a change in protocols for adoration chapels, and he included a reminder about the importance of wearing masks.

As the coronavirus pandemic continues to limit the ways worshippers can safely gather, the diocese, parishes and area religious communities are doing what they can to make Christmas Mass accessible to all.

From now until the end of the year, in-person parish gatherings outside of worship services must be suspended and shifted to online meetings or conducted at home.

With the global pandemic practically shutting everything down for months, the sacramental wine and altar bread business has suffered like other businesses in the country.

Perhaps, after weeks of uncertainty and nearly unhealthy doses of hopelessness, church is precisely the place we can bring those feelings — anxiety, fear and nervousness — and lay it down at the altar.