With Canceled Masses, Pope and Priests Get Creative in Reaching Their Parishes

By Christine Persichette, Melissa Butz and Elise Anne Allen

As many of the restrictions imposed early on by Italy to fight the COVID-19 coronavirus begin to be adopted elsewhere, the number of Catholics unable to get to Mass, or at least strongly discouraged from leaving the house to do so, is growing.

One novel attempt to fill that void is what might be called Pope Francis’s impromptu “virtual parish.”

Since March 9, after the Italy’s national lockdown was imposed, the Holy Father has been livestreaming his daily Mass at the Santa Marta residence in the Vatican, which previously had always been celebrated in private, with a synopsis published by the Vatican media services. In addition, the pontiff’s weekend Masses are also being livestreamed; previously, his weekend liturgies were only publicized if they were open to the general public.

As of March 16, the papal Mass was attracting a live audience of about 6,000 people, the size of a large parish. Most were watching on Facebook and mostly in the Italian original, which is unsurprising given the 7:00 a.m. start time in Rome, which right now works out to 2:00 a.m. on the East Coast of the U.S.

There were, however, a hearty band of more than 900 English-speakers following the live translation provided by the Vatican on Facebook and Youtube.

Joining Pope Francis each morning is a small cast of regulars, made up of members of his own household. In effect, the pontiff is trapped at home with his own family just like everyone else in Italy, where the total number of infections as of Monday evening was 24,747. The total number of deaths due to the virus was 1,809, and the number of people cured was 2,335.

The Holy Father’s household includes three priests, two layman and a small cluster of nuns from the Vincentian Daughters of Charity, who have run the Santa Marta guesthouse since the late 1800s, when it was still operating as a hospice in the original building which used to exist on the site.

Each morning during Mass one of the nuns does the first reading.

When he celebrates Mass, Pope Francis is also flanked by two laymen: Sandro Mariotti and Peirgiorgio Zanetti, two “papal butlers.”

Mariotti was hired after the exit of Paolo Gabriele, who worked under Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI and was convicted for leaking confidential letters to the press, causing 2012’s “Vatileaks” scandal.

Zanetti has known Pope Francis since he was known as Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio, often assisting him when he visited Rome while Archbishop of Buenos Aires. He was a member of the Vatican’s police force before stepping into his current role.

Marotti and Zanetti are often seen collecting letters and gifts during the pontiff’s private and public audiences, and distributing rosaries and medals to his guests. The two men also take care of the pontiff’s clothing and prepare his bags when he travels abroad.

Sitting in the chairs lined up inside the chapel alongside the sisters are Pope Francis’s secretaries, Uruguayan Father Gonzalo Aemilius and Egyptian Monsignor Yoannis Lahzi Gaid.

Before Pope Francis’s election, Fr. Aemilius had caught Bergoglio’s attention for his work with youth living on the streets in Montevideo. He took over for the pontiff’s former secretary, Monsignor Fabián Pedacchio Leaniz, who in 2019 returned to his full-time job at the Congregation for Bishops.

Msgr. Gaid is a Coptic Catholic priest who was named second secretary to Pope Francis in 2014, making him the first Eastern rite priest to hold the position.

Both Msgr. Gaid and Fr. Aemilius concelebrate the Mass with Pope Francis, however, instead of standing with him at the altar, they recite their portions of the Eucharistic Prayer from their seats, keeping the appropriate distance required under the coronavirus restrictions.

Also at Pope Francis’s side during his daily Mass is Monsignor Assuntino Scotti, an Italian priest who also belongs to the Vincentian spiritual family. He is the person who oversees requests to participate in the pontiff’s daily Mass and is the priest reads the Gospel during Pope Francis’s livestreamed Masses.

Normally the chapel on a given day would be filled with additional priests and around 25 guests who got the green light from Msgr. Scotti, however, it is now notably empty.

As the coronavirus increasingly prevents swaths of Catholics around the world from attending Mass, parishes throughout Rome and Italy generally have also launched their own virtual liturgies, with many opting to livestream Masses at the usual times for parishioners who want to tune in via Youtube or Facebook.

In one Roman neighborhood a priest celebrated Mass on top of a roof, so Catholics in the area would be able to follow from their buildings and make an act of spiritual communion – a prayer recited in the event that a person is unable to physically receive the Eucharist, for whatever reason.

And as similar restrictions are increasing throughout the United States and other parts of the world, the congregation of the pontiff’s “virtual parish” will continue to grow, and other local one’s will also rise up to feed the spiritual hunger during the ongoing crisis.

In the Brooklyn Diocese, some 21,000 people have viewed a Facebook Live post from Father Christopher O’Connor. The pastor of Blessed Virgin Mary Help of Christians in Woodside led a procession of the Blessed Sacrament through the streets of Queens Monday morning, bringing the Church to the people.

“I ask that you do not walk with us so we don’t have big crowds,” he said during the livestream. “It will just be the sisters and myself singing. Come outside the house if you want, or just look from your window.”

Father O’Connor is also celebrating Masses live on Facebook.

And he’s not alone. A video on Facebook from Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary Church in Jamaica is also using social media to keep its parishioners involved and praying during this uncertain time. Clergy have been celebrating Masses in Spanish and English, as well as praying the holy rosary, live on social media.

Coronavirus Concerns Close New York Schools: Next Steps for the Brooklyn Diocese

Currents News Staff

The coronavirus pandemic has closed all schools in New York City, leaving families with many questions. The decision to close diocesan schools was made even before the decision to close the city’s public schools

While the schools will be closed, distance learning programs have been developed so classes can be taken online at home.

Joining Currents News to help Catholic parents better understand what’s happening now and what the future could be like is the Superintendent of Schools for the Brooklyn Diocese, Dr. Thomas Chadzutko.

Coronavirus Precautions Prompt Major Life Changes in the U.S.

Currents News Staff

First some good news: an experimental trial for the coronavirus vaccine is in its earliest stages.

“This is one of the fastest vaccine development launches in history,” said President Trump. “Not even close.”

A study from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases will attempt to confirm the vaccine works and is safe.

“There will be three separate doses: 25 milligrams, 100 milligrams and 250 milligrams and the individuals will be followed for one year,” said Dr. Anthony Fauci, Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases at the National Institutes of Health.

As that research moves onward, people are adjusting to a “new normal.”

“You have to think of this in a wartime worldview,” said New York Mayor Bill de Blasio. “You have to think of this as something where you’re going to see a massive mobilization to save lives, to help people through their suffering with this disease.”

Officials are stressing the importance of avoiding groups and practicing social distancing.

“What we are asking for everyone to do is to remain at home for all, but the most essential outings for your safety and the safety of those around you,” said Mayor London Breed of San Francisco.

Many restaurants, including Starbucks, Chick-Fil-A and McDonald’s are now only serving take-out or delivery orders

California, Pennsylvania, New York City and other areas have ordered bars to close their doors.

Some businesses, like Regal Cinemas and Nordstrom are shutting down for the time being.

As of Tuesday night, there were more than 182,000 confirmed cases and 71,000 coronavirus-related deaths worldwide, according to Johns Hopkins University.

Holy Week, Pope Francis and the Church on Coronavirus Lockdown

By John L. Allen Jr. and Currents News Staff

ROME – Catholics are affected by the coronavirus in the same ways as everyone else, but since the Church is “sui generis,” it’s also having some unique implications for ecclesiastical life. In some cases well-established patterns are being reawakened, and in others the scare is creating unprecedented ironies.

Here’s a brief traipse through the Catholic ripples of the pandemic as they stand now, as seen from Rome.

How About Holy Week?

On Saturday evenin, the Prefecture of the Papal Household, which generally handles the logistics of public papal events, posted a note on its web page about Holy Week. It read:

“The Prefecture of the Papal Household is concerned to communicate that, because of the current international health emergency, all of the liturgical celebrations of Holy Week will take place without the physical presence of the faithful.”

At 11:30 p.m., Vatican News, an official news site of the Vatican, posted the note on its Facebook page, and from there it was off to the races in terms of news agencies around the world picking it up.

Among many reporters who cover the Vatican, it was a matter of consternation that such seemingly major news was broken not in an official communique but rather on the site of a Vatican office generally consulted only by people looking for tickets to see the Holy Father. The way it was handled sowed doubt about how official the news actually was.

(As a footnote, I’m forever edified by colleagues here who still manage to get upset about such meltdowns. God help me, but long ago I resigned myself to much lower expectations.)

Early Sunday afternoon we finally got an official statement, and, frankly, it raised at least as many questions as it answered. Here’s what Vatican spokesman Matteo Bruni said:

“Relative to the liturgical celebrations of Holy Week, I can specify that they’re all confirmed. Given the actual situation, modalities of implementation and participation are being studied which respect the security measures imposed for avoiding the spread of the coronavirus. Those modalities will be communicated as soon as they’re defined, in line with the evolution of the epidemiological situation.”

So, what does that mean? Is the idea that there still could be a public presence if things get better by Holy Week? Or, as many Vatican-watchers seem to think, does the word “participation” in the statement refer mostly to the possibility of cardinals, bishops and priests concelebrating with the pontiff, rather than opening things up to ordinary believers?

Bruni didn’t say, and so we don’t really know. Trying to evaluate what might happen brings us to ripple number two …

The Pope’s Team Pushes Back

Italy is in the middle of a nationwide lockdown, with all restaurants, bars, pubs, coffee shops, and most businesses closed – only supermarkets, pharmacies, and a handful of other “essential” services remain open. Last Thursday, the Diocese of Rome announced that all churches in town would be closed in keeping with those security measures.

The next morning, however, Pope Francis began his daily Mass by proclaiming that “not all drastic measures are good,” and insisting that the “holy faithful people of God” must not be left alone. Just a couple of hours later, after Cardinal Angelo De Donatis, the Vicar of Rome, spoke with Francis, he reversed himself and announced that parish churches can stay open, trusting the “mature consciences” of the faithful to decide whether to go.

That same day, a lengthy WhatsApp message by Father Yoannis Lahzi Gaid, a Coptic Catholic who serves as a personal secretary to Pope Francis, was sent to priest friends of his in Rome. Since it’s unlikely a papal secretary would broadcast a message that undercuts his boss’s view of things, most pastors assumed it reflected the pope’s thinking.

In essence, it was a “cri de coeur” for priests not to abandon their posts.

“I think of the people who will certainly abandon the Church, when this nightmare is over, because the Church abandoned them,” Gaid wrote, adding, “May it never be said: ‘I won’t go to a church that didn’t come to me when I was in need’.”

For sure, that’s not an uncontroversial position. Critics object that encouraging priests to defy the lockdown not only risks their own lives but puts other people in danger. Others, however, insist that if the Church believes what it says about the Eucharist, if it believes that people need spiritual care just as much as medicine and security, then priests ought to be out there on the front lines just like doctors and cops.

Also on Sunday, Pope Francis left the Vatican by car to visit the Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore to pray before the celebrated image of “Maria Salus Populi Romani,” meaning “Mary, Health of the Roman People,” to whom Romans have always turned in times of trouble. Francis then went to a street known as a famed shopping center, where he walked briefly on foot to the church of San Marcello al Corso, home to a miraculous crucifix which, in 1522, was taken by procession to Roman neighborhoods struck by plague.

All of that, of course, was not strictly speaking in keeping with government injunctions to stay at home, expressed in the Italian hashtag campaign #iorestoacasa, “I’m staying at home.” (By the way, the Italian church has launched its own social media version, #iopregoacasa, “I’m praying at home.”)

Perhaps all this, in the end, is why the Vatican is being a bit coy about Holy Week. It may be trying to balance legitimate public health concerns with the concern that people will remember who stood by their side when the chips were down.

A Catacombs Sunday

At the personal level, Italy’s lockdown is creating a bizarre reality in which Catholics who want to get to Mass find themselves in a sort of catacombs situation unseen on the peninsula since the era of Roman persecutions of the early Church.

As of Saturday evening in Rome, my wife and I had resigned ourselves to not being able to attend Mass the next morning, and therefore we were planning to watch the livestreamed papal Mass at 7:00 a.m. as the next best thing. However, we spoke to another couple here in town who told us about a parish near them where the pastor had quietly told people he’d be saying Mass Sunday morning for anyone who wanted to come.

We decided to go, and then engaged in a brief brainstorming session on the following point: If police ask us what we’re doing out of the house, what are we going to say?

Under restrictions imposed by the Italian government, there are only a handful of legitimate reasons for moving around town. They include work, a health issue backed up by a note from a doctor, and “routine necessities” such as going to the grocery story or pharmacy. Notably, going to church is not on the list.

For the record, our plan was to say we were visiting a friend who couldn’t get out and needed us to prepare a meal. In all honesty, being caught wasn’t that big a worry, since the very worst that might have happened was a fine which, thanks be to God, we probably could afford.

Yet in one of the world’s most pervasively Catholic societies, in the pontiff’s own backyard where Catholic prayer and worship has always been at the heart of responding to any perceived crisis, the fact you even have to think about such things … well, it’s unprecedented, a little bit unnerving, and just downright weird.

Currents News full broadcast for Monday, 3/16/20

On the newscast: School like they’ve never experienced before. Catholic students are off and running as administrators try to keep them safe; A new set of closures in this “new” New York. Social life coming to a halt; Pope Francis blesses an eerily empty Saint Peter’s Square as the Vatican preps us for a Holy Week… streamed online; Plus… the last public masses in the Diocese of Brooklyn. No one is quite sure when parishioners will be together again.

Watch weeknights at 7:00 pm EST on NET-TV in the New York City area on Spectrum, Optimum, and Fios. Subscribe to our YouTube channel to receive notifications about new content.

Catholic High School Ahead of Coronavirus Concerns With Jumpstart on Distance-Learning

By Tim Harfmann

The only sounds you’ll hear at Cathedral Prep School and Seminary is that of maintenance men disinfecting the building.

The Elmhurst Catholic high school may be closed this week as a precaution, but there’s no time lost: students have been learning online every day.

“We can try to give them as much of a normal experience as possible,” explained Cathedral Prep’s rector-president, Father James Kuroly, who said they’ve had this emergency plan in place since September 2019.

Nearly 160 students are studying from home.

“It’s through Google Classroom. They’re able to respond to the question, as well as respond to one another,” said Fr. Kuroly.

Teachers also use email and other methods to have constant communication.

“The teacher is not in front of you,” he added, “but the teacher is providing the resources, the information, so that learning is able to take place.”

Although teachers and students don’t meet face-to-face online, Fr. Kurloy can FaceTime members of Cathedral Prep’s administration.

The school’s principal, Richie Diaz, said the all-boys Catholic high school has been ahead of the curve when it comes to distance learning.

Seniors have been taking an online class all year.

“The fact that we’ve been doing some level of this throughout the whole year makes me confident that the students are comfortable with the technology and also that, to be quite honest, they’re humble enough to know this is not an ideal situation and that they’re going to work with us,” Diaz said.

Distance learning is made possible thanks in part to DeSales Media Group, the parent company of Currents News, which provides technology for learning.

“We’re able to work with one of our great partners, Cathedral Prep, in making sure that young people are able to continue to go to school, even as the rest of the city and even our public schools are not able to,” said Monsignor Kieran Harrington, Vicar for Communications in the Brooklyn Diocese.

Pope Makes Mini-Pilgrimage Outside Vatican to Pray for End of Pandemic

By Cindy Wooden and Currents News Staff

ROME (CNS) — With Italy on lockdown and Rome streets almost deserted, Pope Francis left the Vatican March 15 in a mini-pilgrimage to an icon and to a crucifix associated with miraculous interventions to save the city and its people.

The icon is “Salus Populi Romani” (health of the Roman people) in the Basilica of St. Mary Major and the crucifix, which Romans call the “Miraculous Crucifix,” is housed in the Church of St. Marcellus on Via del Corso, a usually crowded street of shops leading to the central Piazza Venezia.

Shortly after 4 p.m., the Vatican said, Pope Francis was driven, with a small police escort, to the Basilica of St. Mary Major. Joined by Polish Cardinal Stanislaw Rylko, archpriest of the basilica, he entered the Pauline Chapel where the “Salus Populi Romani” icon looks down from high above the altar.

The pontiff laid a bouquet of yellow and white flowers on the altar and sat in prayer in front of the chapel’s famous icon of Mary and the child Jesus.

Pope Francis prays before the icon often, including before and after every trip he makes abroad. In the late 1500s, St. Francis Borgia, the third superior general of the Jesuit order, started giving a copy of the icon to every Jesuit going out on mission. According to Cardinal Rylko, Jesuit Father Matteo Ricci carried his to China and gave it to the emperor.

But, long before that, the image was connected to the faith of the Roman people in times of dire health emergencies. According to legend, late in the sixth century Pope Gregory I had the icon carried through the streets of Rome in prayer that the Black Plague would end, and in 1837, Pope Gregory XVI prayed before the image for an end to a devastating cholera outbreak.

Leading the recitation of the rosary in 2013 at St. Mary Major, Pope Francis said, “Mary is a mother, and a mother worries above all about the health of her children; she knows how to care for them always with great and tender love. Our Lady guards our health.”

The crucifix at the church of St. Marcellus is a fifteenth-century wooden crucifix that survived a fire in 1519 that burned to the ground the original church on the site. The morning after the fire, while the ruins were still smoldering, people found the crucifix intact. Some Catholics began gathering every Friday evening to pray together, eventually forming the Confraternity of the Most Holy Crucifix.

In 1522, in the midst of the great plague in Rome, the faithful carried the crucifix in procession throughout the city for 16 days. According to an article on the website of TV2000, the Italian bishops’ television station, devotion to the crucifix led the city’s people to defy “the authorities, who for fear that the contagion would spread further, had banned all gatherings of people.”

The situation was similar when Pope Francis stopping his car on the Via del Corso, made a point of walking to the church “as in pilgrimage,” said Matteo Bruni, director of the Vatican press office.

“With his prayer, the Holy Father invoked the end of the pandemic striking Italy and the world, imploring healing for the many people who are sick, remembering the many victims and asking that their family and friends find consolation and comfort,” Bruni said.

The pontiff, he added, also prayed as he did that morning at Mass, for health care workers, doctors, nurses and all those who are still working in Italy so that necessary services are guaranteed even amid the lockdown.

Officials Urge Social Distancing Amid U.S. Coronavirus Cases

Currents News Staff

You may have to make adjustments to your social calendar: the ongoing coronavirus crisis is causing closings and cancellations as it still poses a serious threat to the United States.

“As I’ve said many times, and I’ll repeat it, the worst is just ahead for us,” said Dr. Anthony Fauci, Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases at the National Institutes of Health.

That’s why there’s a push for social distancing.

Schools in more than 30 states have shut their doors.

“We’ve informed the superintendents, while we’ve closed schools for three weeks, that the odds are this is going to go on a lot longer,” explained Governor Mike DeWine of Ohio.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends canceling or postponing events that have 50 or more people for the next eight weeks.

Large gatherings are banned in some states, including California and New York.

While bars and restaurants in some states are closing early, Illinois is shutting them down completely to dine-in customers until the end of the month.

“I tried earlier this week to appeal to everyone’s good judgment to stay home to avoid bars, not to congregate in crowds,” said the state’s governor, J.B. Pritzker. “It’s unfortunate that most people didn’t take that seriously.”

President Trump says more testing will be available soon, and that Americans shouldn’t raid grocery store shelves.

“You don’t have to buy so much, take it easy, just relax,” Trump said.

Relax and stay away from large crowds, for the time being.

“It is how we respond to that challenge that’s going to determine what the ultimate end point is going to be,” said Fauci.

Public Masses Suspended: Coronavirus Crisis Hits Brooklyn Diocese

By Tim Harfmann

March 15 marked the last Sunday with public Masses.

Bishop Nicholas DiMarzio suspended weekday and weekend Masses in Brooklyn and Queens until further notice.

“That’s actually very disheartening because this is something that I look forward to every Sunday,” said Maria-Elena Zegna, a parishioner at Holy Family Church. “This is undescribable.”

Bishop DiMarzio also lifted the obligation for Catholics to attend Sunday Mass.

At Holy Family Church in Fresh Meadows, Queens, nearly 70 parishioners worshiped at the March 15 noon Mass, which is about half the normal attendance.

The Catholics were blessed with the relic of Saint Rosalie, who is credited with interceding for the citizens of Palermo, Italy in 1624. Many of them were dying from the black plague.

“The bishop at that time took the relic of St. Rosalie and, in procession, went around the entire diocese and blessed all the people. That plague quickly dissipated,” said Father Sean Suckiel, pastor of the Queens church.

He said with the coronavirus crisis growing in New York and around the country, now is a good time to turn to St. Rosalie once again.

“Just to bring hope and healing to uncertainty for our people. There’s a high level of anxiety and a fear of uncertainty about what’s going to happen next,” he added.

Students at the parish’s Catholic academy can’t go to school right now, but they know what they can do.

“You can still go home and pray to God and worship Him, like you do at Mass,” said sixth grader Erin Villacrucis.

“What we do know is that hope doesn’t disappoint, that God is with us, and He’s going to sustain us,” added Father Suckiel.

So that Catholics can pray to the Lord for strength, Father Suckiel is keeping Holy Family open every day.

Currents News full broadcast for Fri, 3/13/20

On the newscast: President Trump declares a national emergency – freeing up 50 billion federal dollars to fight the coronavirus; Bishop Nicholas DiMarzio says to stem the spread of the virus, you don’t have to go to mass until further notice; In our exclusive report from Nashville, we shine a light on the youngest volunteers helping tornado victims; And today marks the 7th anniversary of the election of Pope Francis.

Watch weeknights at 7:00 pm EST on NET-TV in the New York City area on Spectrum, Optimum, and Fios. Subscribe to our YouTube channel to receive notifications about new content.