Parishioners are welcomed back to
church for Mass in Tralee, Co. Kerry There was “absolute delight” as people returned to Mass this week, after stark figures revealed that one in four pre-pandemic regular church-goers said that the pandemic-imposed Mass ban has harmed their mental health.
A quarter of those polled said the inability to gather for Mass had affected their sense of wellbeing while 61% of respondents said their mental health wasn’t harmed, with another 14% saying they weren’t sure.
The research was carried out by Amarach on behalf of the Iona Institute.
Speaking to The Irish Catholic about the return to public worship, Bishop Paul Dempsey of Achonry said it was “lovely” to be able to celebrate Mass with people physically present for the first time this year.
“Even from the celebrant’s point of view, over the last few months celebrating Mass in an empty church, an empty cathedral, was an eerie experience,” Bishop Dempsey said.
The bishop said that to have people physically present while celebrating the Eucharist was “very special”.
“I think for a lot of people it was almost emotional to have that gathering together,” he said.
This was echoed by Fr Edmund O’Rahelly of Ballina, Co. Tipperary, who said that priests “were never trained” to celebrate the Eucharist as they have been over the past five months.
Their opening Mass saw mainly regular attendees, with 95% of the 30 in attendance regulars.
“I met people before they went into Mass and they were very excited about the fact that our churches were open again,” he said, continuing “they felt very put out that we were fully closed for so long”.
“It was soul-destroying saying Mass inside in the church on one’s own. I mean, we were never trained to do that,” he said.
“The whole idea of the celebration of the Eucharist is that it’s a community – a community action more than anything, and here we were doing it just to supply a need so that people would have it on the parish radio. Ok, some people got great solace from that, but I don’t think it was a great way to be celebrating the Eucharist personally.”
Fr John Bracken of Dundrum, Co. Dublin told of a “good turnout”, with just over 70 people in attendance, separated into pods.
“What was lovely which surprised me, was the noise, the sound of people responding,” Fr Bracken told.
“You just forgot, because you haven’t had people in there in so long.”