Sermon on Silence at Mass

Dear Friends and Family,

I attempted to record this past Sunday's sermon, on the importance of silence at Mass, and how this silence helps children.

I and have posted it online here: https://philomena.sermon.net/mca/main/main/20986351. The volume is rather low, but hopefully you can correct that on your computers.

Here are my notes from the sermon: (DISCLAIMER: THESE ARE NOTES, NOT A PERFECTLY WRITTEN SERMON!)

“…the disciples fell on their faces and were exceedingly afraid.” At the Transfiguration, the apostles fall prostrate on their faces before God. Our souls should do the same, at each and every Mass. Our souls should fall prostrate before God in His sacred mysteries. For while we cannot physically fall prostrate on our faces during Mass—though the sisters in fact do so, following a Carmelite tradition—the way we act at Mass should reflect this attitude of prostration: of adoration, of love, of reverence, in the presence of God.

            How can we help children to embrace this attitude? This the top priority during my time as chaplain for the Latin Mass in San Antonio, Texas: how can everything at the Mass be organized to be—to use modern language—as “child friendly” as possible? How can the Mass help children to grow closer to Jesus, to grow in adoration, to grow in holiness? And in that situation it was a question of how to do this with a large congregation composed of large families, with many active boys, and, for most of the families, with no prior experience of the Latin Mass. Because, given the many attacks on the souls of children today, given how difficult it is for parents of young families to raise holy children, I felt that everyone who attended the Mass, and every aspect of how the Mass was done, should help form the children. And it quickly became evident that one essential part of how the Mass needed to be lived, if it was going to truly benefit the children, was silence.

            The souls of children need many things: regular Confession, spiritual counsel, the family rosary; children need to be encouraged and helped to embrace virtue in their daily lives at home, to make regular sacrifices for God; they need help discovering the wonderful treasures of traditional Catholic children’s literature: both stories of saints and fiction.

            At Mass, the church’s architecture should help them by being beautiful and sacred [here at Lanherne, the building also has prayers of over 200 years of sisters and of St. Cuthbert Mayne], the music should be sacred, especially the Gregorian chant; the gestures of the altar boys should be sharp and reverent, helping any child at Mass to pray, and of course helping the altar boys themselves to pray. The vestments of the priest, the cassocks, the clothing of those who come to Mass, in short, everything at the Mass should be a sign for the children that there is something incredibly holy and sacred taking place, a unique treasure that is worth work and sacrifice.

             

            Furthermore, to help the children learn to pray, silence in the church is particularly necessary. It is not easy for anyone—young or old—to give their full attention to what you cannot see, feel, or touch: to the Holy Sacrifice of Calvary and to the Real Presence—Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity—of Jesus Christ. That is why, at Mass, we need all the help we can get: the help of the architecture, of music, of reverent gestures of the priest and altar boys at the altar, and of silence. Silence helps us to turn our attention from what we usually hear, from the people we usually pay attention to, to the One Who cannot be heard or seen. And if silence is helpful for anyone at Mass, it is particularly helpful for children, who often have a harder time than adults maintaining their focus and attention on what cannot be seen.

            There are many other tools that help teach children to understand and to pray the Mass. For example, I just ordered some books, full of pictures and explanations, which will be available for the children. But an essential tool is silence. Even at a very young age, before they can read, or even follow well the pictures in a book, it helps awaken their souls to the great mystery that takes place in the Mass, and disposes them to adoration, love, and respect for God, who becomes present on the altar.

            There are two key practical points to fostering silence at the Mass in a congregation that is blessed with many children. Both are challenging. But when implemented, both bear good fruit for the children. The first is the disciplining of children who are old enough to understand that they are doing something wrong by making noise. At what age do children begin to understand this? It differs a bit for each child, and you yourselves will best know that age for each of your children, but it is often quite young. Once a child can understand that they should not be making noise, then we need to help them learn to be quiet by using discipline: that is, by applying simple, concrete consequences.

            “Discipline” has a bad name today, but it is very loving to discipline children. Even though they may want to be good, they are weak and often don’t do what they might truly want to do, or what is truly good for them—and it’s not just children who experience this! So, a key part of education is applying concrete consequences when a child disobeys, so that the child learns to choose to do what is good. In disciplining you are giving your children a wonderful gift—the gift of learning to break free from selfishness, the gift of the freedom to obey God, to do His will, which is the only thing that leads to true happiness. Keys to effective discipline are choosing something concrete and immediate (as immediate as possible after an offense), and the willingness to repeat the discipline, if necessary, many times. Just what is a “good consequence”? That will depend on the child. Some of you have shared that a “time out” of having to sit in the car is quite effective. For other children it will be different. Each of you as parents will know best what fits your children.

            The second practical point concerns children who are too young to understand that they should not make noise. A 6 month old, for example, obviously can’t understand that they ought to be quiet in church. So the key sacrifice here is a willingness to take such children out when necessary. When is that necessary? Please always feel free to ask, if you are not sure, at a given Mass, if a child should have been taken out or not. In general, the occasional whimpering of a 6 month old is not disruptive. However a 6 month-old who is truly crying, or an older child who is crying or making noise (but who can’t yet understand), would normally be disruptive. But rather than trying to give a set of rules, I think the best thing is that you feel free to ask, and little by little it will become clearer. Also, since several of you have asked me to take the initiative of telling you, if there was too much noise, I will try to do so. One challenge though, is that I sometimes don’t notice the noise as much, or don’t remember after Mass, because of the priestly prayers at the altar.

            Taking little children out can be a hard sacrifice for the parent, or grandparent, or uncle or aunt, who does so. You can feel that you’re missing out on graces you badly need from the Mass, or are missing the sermon (though some people might prefer to miss my sermons!). However, God will bless you abundantly for this sacrifice. Not only will your other children benefit from the quiet church, but you will benefit from the very sacrifice of stepping out.

            When we make a Holy Hour, and that hour is a peaceful time where we are able to focus on the Lord, and our mind is not distracted, that is a wonderful blessing from God. However, when we make a Holy Hour and we feel sick, or have a bad headache, and the entire hour is very difficult and filled with distractions, but we nonetheless choose to offer the hour to the Lord, this type of Holy Hour can in fact bring many more graces and blessings than the peaceful one. Why? Because you are doing something which is more difficult for you, which takes more sacrifice, and which is more humbling because it does not feel like you were doing anything spiritual during that hour. In a similar way, a parent who regularly spends parts of the Mass outside the main church with a little one, will receive particular blessings and graces from God for that sacrifice.

            I am convinced that God wants the celebration of the Mass here to be one that offers children the best opportunity possible to learn to pray, to grow in holiness, and to one day become saints. Silence is, I believe, an essential part of providing that opportunity. But more importantly than what I believe is how the Mass was lived by families for centuries—every sort of family: rich or poor, sinful or holy. Today, this policy of silence is common at Latin Masses throughout the world, and so I feel confident that it is one that we can and should embrace here.

It will likely be particularly challenging for you at the beginning. Just as, when someone joins a cross country team, it might at first be difficult to run even one mile, but after 3 months they find it easy to run 6, so also you will likely find that this is hard to implement at first, but becomes lighter with time. One particular challenge of establishing silence at the Mass is that if only one person is making noise in a church, then the silence is gone for everyone. And so I would ask you all to please try to implement these two points with your own children, and to be patient with the children of others. May God reward you for these efforts, and may He grant, through the prayers of the Blessed Virgin Mary, that this Mass might become more and more a Mass that helps children, and that helps each of us, to follow the only path that leads to Heaven: the path of the Cross. Though not easy, the way of the Cross is the only path that grants us some share of true peace and joy on this earth—a peace and joy which Jesus can grant, even in the midst of suffering. May He grant us that grace.