News sources late last night were reporting Gov. Baker's reopening plan would include places of worship at 40% capacity, giving churches the same reasonable accommodations as secular businesses. Sources are saying places of worship will be able to open as of today.
The Massachusetts Municipal Association published a Mandatory Safety Standards for Places of Worship Checklist without any of the draconian obstacles the Archdiocese of Boston has been claiming their 'close work' with Governor Baker would impose upon the return of Catholic Sacraments.
The recommendations of Fr. Hehir's "pandemic team" at the state level has unraveled.
As of last night, sources from the Archdiocese of Boston told me that Cardinal O'Malley was still planning to to implement all of Fr. Hehir's recommendations, which includes indefinite parish closures, a list of people who will be banned from the reception of Sacraments and soliciting volunteer worshipers to conduct medical physicals with temperature taking.
I'll be working on this with internal hierarchy of the Church this morning and will keep you updated.
Update - 11:30
New Boston Post's coverage of yesterday's prayer gathering has was published this morning.
The respectful and prayerful statements of the attendees are powerful.
In response to the prayer vigil, yesterday, Cardinal O'Malley released the below statement through his spokesperson. I underline the pertinent sentences.
One of the great challenges in responding to this deadly and highly contagious pandemic is the disruption to our everyday way of life. Our lives have changed in profound ways. While this is a difficult time for everyone, including the Church, we are confident that we will emerge from this crisis stronger as a community of faith. We have a responsibility to do our part to keep people safe and to help mitigate the spread of the disease, which is why the Archdiocese is committed to working in collaboration with public health and local officials. We very much want to resume public Mass and gatherings as soon as it is safe to do so. The Archdiocese currently has a team of priests, deacons and the laity working with parishes to devise a phased-in plan for resumption of public Masses as soon as it is determined safe. In the weeks since public Mass was suspended parishioners have turned to CatholicTV and local parish live streaming to participate in the Mass, marriage preparation and other programs that are offered to the faithful.
Archdiocesan officials were certainly not expecting Governor Baker to announced 'it is safe to open churches today at 40% capacity.
They were, in fact, expecting him to announce 'a strict list of vulnerable persons' which would then be used to license their internal 'restricted persons' list to continue to ban classifications of healthy people from the Sacraments (see below) and announce the implementation of an agreement made with public health and local officials to solicit untrained volunteers at the parish who would conduct health assessments, take temperatures, diagnose Catholics wishing to receive Sacraments and report findings of illegal health assessments to Massachusetts health officials.
A complete list of Governor Baker's mandatory compliance for places of worship has been released.
We are awaiting an update from Cardinal O'Malley regarding the identification of 'health and local officials' and the plan to which they refer. I have sent some internal memos to Church hierarchy which I will publish after release and review of Cardinal O'Malley's plan, along with plans of other diocese in Massachusetts.
May 18th is significant in our current lives because Governor Baker is going to make a speech which hopefully will begin the process to ease back restrictions. The Archdiocese of Boston has been working as closely as possible with the Governor and his staff to figure out when and how we reopen our Churches. This is hopeful news to all of us, but I caution everyone not to think that we will be anywhere near back to normal. The Governor has already announced that there will be four stages: 1. Start, 2. Caution, 3. Vigilance, and 4. New Normal. The best we can hope for from the Governor’s speech this Monday is that he will initiate the first phase called “Start”. As of this writing, we do not know if Churches are changed in any way in the first phase, or do we have to wait for the “Caution” stage.
When we do come back it will be gradual. It will involve a limited number of people allowed in for the Mass. There will be strict rules before you enter, and once inside the church as to where one can sit. There may be a sign up to get in. Don’t worry that won’t last forever and we will gradually get back to a “new normal.” While the gradual reentering occurs, we will continue to stream our Masses, and your Sunday Obligation will be modified to fit. It is quite possible that the Governor defines “vulnerable persons” strictly and those in this category will not be allowed in the Church until a later phase. So, the word is patience.
Please note that whenever you do go back, there will be no missalettes, no collection baskets, or anything that people reuse. It will be awhile before any of these things come back. Therefore, we are actively figuring out ways to make these Masses reverent and as normal as possible, utilizing our screens and new camera.
We hope you are well, and that you let us know if we can be of service to you.
Blessings on you and your families,
Bishop Mark
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