As we continue our Lenten journey together, our Holy Trinity family is finding new ways to adapt our ministry and outreach so that people can continue to participate, as much as possible in parish life. We can be thankful to God that unlike this same period on the liturgical calendar last year, we are not actively being encouraged to stay away from our Parish church, from the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, or from a proper Catholic devotional life. Just as I wrote in this space some months ago, we are not yet back to normal, and all you have to do to understand that is look around on any given Sunday or other day.
We are striving as a community to make things as normal as possible, however. I was heartened a couple of weeks ago when my turn in the rotation came to lead the Stations of the Cross, and I was assisted by Deacon Jim. The women's group from Holy Ghost in Knoxville was sponsoring a silent retreat hosted here at Holy Trinity. Not only did so many ladies come from parishes all over the diocese (I recognized a few of them!), but they added to our own home crowd and the church looked as close to normal as I've seen it in a while. May many others come to devotions and Holy Mass at church in the weeks to come.
Despite the fact that Catholic people in East Tennessee and elsewhere are attempting to return to some semblance of a regular spiritual life (as evidenced by our Parish mission this past week at Holy Trinity, for example), both we and Catholics in other parts of the country remain under restrictions due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Families have to keep socially distanced within the church, at least six feet apart. Masks have to be worn in the nave of the church and the clergy must wear masks when distributing Holy Communion. A few bishops around the country have been bold and brave enough to restore the Holy Precept to attend Mass on Sundays and Holy Days of Obligation within their dioceses. However, those bishops who have done so have added a number of caveats and exceptions to their decrees. Most dioceses, including the Diocese of Knoxville, have not restored the Sunday obligation largely because of the very restrictions under which we must labor, understanding that these restrictions make it impossible for some people to attend Mass every single week, while others are already homebound or find themselves to be highly at risk, and many are recovering from the disease themselves.
There is no substitute in the Church's liturgical and spiritual life for the real and physical attendance of an individual or a family at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, or any other act of public devotion or worship. Nothing that the Church can do, or that our Parish could possibly do, will ever change that, and so we continue to encourage anyone who can attend the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass on Sundays and Holy Days of Obligation, even if under restriction, to do so for the sake of themselves, their families, and their souls. However, we recognize that some people will not be able to join us each week because of the present situation. As a result, we have responded to the request of Bishop Stika for each Parish in the diocese to make live streamed Sunday Mass available to parishioners.
Deacon Jim Prosak has very graciously set up a YouTube page for Holy Trinity Parish at https://youtube.com/channel/UCY_BPZLO6JGDlK8ijLrn3hw. If the link seems a bit long to remember, just do a YouTube search for "Holy Trinity Jefferson City" and our page will come right up. As you'll see if you visit our YouTube page, we already have some Masses and the recent parish mission archived there. If any parishioners happen to have a Google Chromecast or Roku device, you can even stream the Mass right on a digital television.
For now, the Sunday 10:00 a.m. Mass has been selected as the regular weekly Mass which will be live streamed. In addition, Holy Days and special events, such as Parish missions, will also be live streamed. In addition to being found on the above mentioned Parish YouTube page, each live stream event can be found on a special page on our Parish website: https://htjctn.org/masses-online
It is our prayer that most parishioners are able to return to the sacramental life of the Church, and that if you've been away, you'll return and we'll see you soon. Our live stream is another way that we can help bring the prayer of the Church to everyone, and that both those who are able to be with us and those who can't (through no fault of their own) will be blessed by this new ministry to bring our local church even into our digital life.
Note: This is the unedited version my column in the parish bulletin for the week of March 4th. The bulletin is up on the Holy Trinity Parish website.
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