Priests doing Communion are more like bouncers
Clergy bid for meaningful sacrament but families want a big day out
PRIESTS celebrating the sacrament of Holy Communion sometimes feel like they have to act like bouncers, one candid member of the clergy believes.
Portlaoise-based Father Paddy Byrne spoke out in support of his colleague, Father Tom Little of Co. Carlow, who tried to scrap the traditional Holy Communion big day out set on a specific date. Instead, he invited parents to bring their children to the sacrament for the first time on any Sunday in May or June.
He said this would make it more about the sacrament than a day out but had to backtrack this week after a petition of nearly 300 was given to him by parents of three local national schools. Father Byrne, who is a curate in Portlaoise and author of a book about the changing face of Irish Catholicism, said parents arrive late into the church for the ceremony like ‘they are walking into Langton’s pub in Kilkenny or the Seven Oaks bar in Carlow’.
And many are using the day as an excuse for a ‘p*** up’ he added. ‘They have no respect’ and sometimes he feels ‘more like a bouncer in church instead of a priest’.
He said: ‘If First Holy Communion is a child’s day, that’s wonderful. But so many parents treat it as a p*** up. I don’t mean that to sound vulgar but it’s quite vulgar what we see, children arriving in Hummers and so on.
‘And then some parents find it intolerable to keep off social media for the duration of the Mass, so by the time the sacrament comes they’re on Facebook or whatever.
‘I’m not judging but I think the day is sometimes more about nostalgia than a faith-based ceremony. We have about 300 children a year making First Holy Communion and we’re lucky if we get 5% back as regular Massgoers. Usually, the next time we see them is for Confirmation, then for their wedding, and then probably their death,’ he said.
Interestingly, the organiser of the petition, Anne Lennon, concurred. ‘I agree with what Father Paddy says about some parents but that’s not me,’ she told the Irish Mail on Sunday. Earlier this week, Fr Little said his original proposal was made in an effort to get parents to bring their children to Mass regularly.
He said that the children could celebrate the sacrament with their classmates at a ‘regular Sunday Mass’ and this might encourage children and their families to attend Mass on a regular basis, rather than ‘a once-off’.
‘I regret the confusion caused. I would have preferred if parents would have seen this as a work in progress rather than a social media frenzy,’ he added.
‘Parents arrive late as if they’re at Langtons pub’