My Mass Pet Peeves

Chris and I go to Mass every week, like good Catholics. ;)  We dress nice, sit and kneel and stand as required, and stay through the entire Mass.  Going to Mass is important to us and our faith.  I don't mean it to sound like we are going as part of an obligation.  It is expected of us, but we go because we like Mass and to help us deepen and renew our faith every week.

Now, that being said, I find myself getting annoyed at Mass every week for one reason or another.  Here are my pet peeves:

Arriving to Mass after it starts
Okay, I know that on occasion that some people are running a couple minutes late due to an issue that arises.  I can understand that.  What I don't understand are the people who EVERY week are late!!  Being a minute or two late isn't too bad in comparison with the people who show up during the readings or worse....after the Gospel!  If  you are arriving after the Gospel, then what is the point?  They may think they are fulfilling their Sunday obligation, but, they aren't.  If you arrive after the Gospel, you are NOT fulfilling your obligation.  You have to be there, at minimum, for the Gospel.  I get really annoyed though with the late arrivals because to me it sends the message that Mass is not a priority to them.

Leaving Mass early
Not only do people come to Mass late, but they are in a rush to leave before the Mass is finished!  I am a Catho-lic convert.  I went to church at different Protestant and even Mormon churches.  I don't recall ever seeing a flood of people leaving before the service is done.  And those services often last longer than a Catholic Mass, which is only 1 hour typically.

The flood of people leaving starts during communion.  They go up, receive the body and blood, and then rush out the door.  I am left scratching my head.  I don't understand it because they only need to wait another 5-7 minutes until Mass will end at that point.  They just need to wait for the rest of people to take communion and the closing prayer.  That's it.  Yet, they feel as though because they received communion Mass must be over.  I will admit to having left after communion before, but only because I was not feeling well or Ginny wouldn't calm down (and we were at a Church that does not have a cry room).  It is a rare event on my part, but I notice the same people doing it EVERY week at my parish.

Then there are a segment of people at Mass who do stick around for the closing prayer, but once the recessional hymn is played, they feel it is their duty to leave at that moment.  It is improper to leave then.  The priest is still up there.  It is permissible to leave once the priest leaves.  So, instead of waiting 1-2 minutes for this to happen, another huge rush starts as people depart before the priest has even left.  It is quite rude and shows no respect, IMHO.

How people dress for Mass
Okay, this is my last pet peeve for this blog today.  When I was growing up going to a Baptist church and later a Presbyterian church, my mother expected my sister and I to dress nice for church.  In fact, most often we wore either a skirt or dress.  Occasionally, I wore nice dress pants.  Not only did I dress like this to church, but most everyone else did too.

When I converted to Catholicism, I was pleasantly surprised that I could get away with Dockers or the like.  Once I moved to Florida, I started wearing nice capris as well.  Once or twice I wore nice dark jeans (great condition and looked dressier than a casual pair) to a Holy Day Mass.  The reason I dress nice, as does Chris, is that I feel it gives proper respect to the setting I am in.  I'm there to honor God.  For one hour a week, it isn't that hard to put on something nice to do that.  I think clothing reflects the respect we have for others, particularly, God.

What I cannot comprehend is the number of people who wear shorts to Church.  Some shorts are at least long and tasteful, but what baffles me more are the short shorts, denim shorts, and even athletic shorts.  I could understand shorts if our parish didn't have air conditioning, but it does. Even worse than shorts, to me, are those who dress like they just came from the gym. Or...allow their kids to dress like that!  I've seen children in t-shirts with a cartoon character on it and sweat pants at Mass. I can't understand that.  Granted I am a new parent, but we try to dress Ginny in something nice for Mass.  She typically wears a dress now every week.  My intent is that we continue this and she learns to show respect to God through her actions, verbal and nonverbal (yes, to me clothing is a form of nonverbal communication).

I know some will say that God just wants us there and doesn't care what we wear.  In some ways, I agree; however, I think it says something about us in our nonverbals about how WE show God respect--coming to Mass on time, dressing appropriately, and leaving after the priest leaves.  Isn't that just as important as being there?

A Good Baby?

One question I hear from a lot of people upon seeing or meeting Ginny is "Is she a good baby?"  I've got to be honest.  This question baffles me.  I don't understand it in the least.  Because the opposite of good is bad. So if I were to answer "No" that would mean that she was a bad baby, right?  How is it possible for an infant to be bad?

I suppose the question is asking if she is colicky or not.  My preference would be that instead of asking if the baby is good, to ask if the baby is colicky.  To me, even a colicky baby is a good baby.  Babies are inherently good, I believe.  They are just following their instincts and doing what they know best---peeing, pooping, eating, and sleeping.  Unfortunately, they can't yet talk and tell them what is wrong so they often cry to express their needs.  For some, the needs are not being met in some way (or so it seems because the baby is colicky) and the parent can't meet it because they have tried everything they know to calm their baby.

It is my opinion that I have the best baby in the world.  She is adorable, beautiful, sweet as can be, and doesn't often cry for no reason.  She is cranky on occasion and right now she is a little "piggy"--wanting to eat all the time.  But, no matter what, even when she is cranky and crying, she is a good and wonderful baby!

Eat, Poop, Pee, & Sleep

Before you become a parent, you discover that you have a lot of choices to make--from how you plan to birth your baby (with drugs or without, etc) to if you plan on finding out the baby's gender to getting a changing table or not. I know Chris and I weighed our options as we encountered each decision, but for the most part, we knew what we wanted to do long before the decision needed to be made.  We knew that we wanted to be surprised as to the gender and that I would require a c-section.

There are 4 things that a newborn does in their early life that is easy to predict--they eat, poop, pee, & sleep.  Quite simple.  But, each item requires a choice for the parents to make.  Who knew?  

As for sleeping, that seems relatively easy.  Some sort of crib, right?  Well, in addition to that, we made the decision to have Ginny sleep in our room for her first 3 months of life.  She has a nursery with a crib, but until she is older she sleeps in our room.   We have a hand-me-down pack & play given to us by my sister with a bassinet in it.  So, we place her in there.  We try to get her to sleep in it, and usually she will go to sleep in it for at least one stretch of sleep a night.  The rest of the time she ends up sleeping in her little rocker.   (http://www.toysrus.com/product/index.jsp?productId=4230352)  I hope that one day she sleeps in her bed the whole night through.  

Eating is the other decision we had to make.  Bottle feed or breast feed?  To me, that seemed like a no-brainer.  In my mind, the option I always focused on was breastfeeding.  When I was younger, I couldn't imagine ever purposely choosing to bottle feed. Bottle feeding was an option if for some reason you could not breast feed.  Over the years, I've discovered that some women choose to bottle feed.  I've heard some express that they would bottle feed because the idea of breast feeding was gross to them.  Maybe it is because I've always wanted to breast feed, but I've discovered something since having Ginny---there is nothing more natural than breastfeeding.  By that I mean that it felt natural from moment one.  Did it feel a bit odd getting situated and breastfeeding the 1st time?  Sure, but that was because I hadn't done it before.  However, the moment she started feeding nothing felt more natural to me.  So far, I'm having success with breastfeeding.  There were some questions early on because Ginny lost a lot of weight initially and took her time gaining weight.  She continues to gain though and grow and seems to be a happy and alert baby most of the time. 

Finally, the last decision is how will you diaper your child--cloth or disposable.  I never thought of this as a controversial topic.  I was quite surprised when I mentioned that I planned to use cloth diapers on Facebook at the responses I got from a few people.  Many people were quite discouraging of the idea of cloth diapers.  I heard from quite a few that they thought they would do that too, but gave up after 2 weeks and thought I was crazy to try.  The best response I got was from my mom though.  She just asked me why I wanted to use cloth.  I loved that response.  I wish others had asked.  Again, this was a decision I made long before I knew I was pregnant.  I have always planned on using cloth.  For one thing, I figured if my mom could use cloth with myself and my sister, then why couldn't I.  Also, I could not justify the use of disposable diapers on a regular basis in MY head.  My imagination always went to a landfill and just the thousands of disposable diapers I would be adding to the mix that would be there for hundreds of years.  Additionally, I couldn't imagine spending the amount of money that goes into using disposable diapers for 2-3 years.  The cost is, quite frankly, outrageous.  I know many families use disposables, including my sister and my in-laws.  That's perfectly fine.  Again, this was my issue. My problem imagining the waste and cost. 

We embarked on cloth diapering slowly.  I knew that after a c-section that it was likely that I would not be up for doing laundry that first week--much less Chris.  So, we started that first week off with one bag of disposable newborn diapers.  When those diapers were gone, then we started with the cloth.  It really worked for us in that way.  It gave us a chance to just adjust to having a baby at home.  Now, we have the cloth diapers going and it is becoming a routine.  Is it more work?  Yes, it is.  I do wash the diapers every other day.  However, I love the cloth diapers--we are saving money long term and I don't picture these diapers ending up in a landfill (in fact, when we are done with them, hopefully after having another baby, we can resell them and get some money back). The only time we plan on using disposables is when we go on an overnight trip or vacation.  

Lots of choices and this is just the beginning....