Touching on an incident where a priest hearing confessions was pepper-sprayed, a recent article from OSV News looked at how clergy and layfolk might balance security with welcome and worship.
It is an uncomfortable subject. While staffers at weekend Mass in one North Carolina parish include armed off-duty police officers, many Catholics may balk at such measures being taken within an assembly come together to worship the Prince of Peace.
It seems a shocking notion at first but sadly the “St Michael the Defender Ministry,” which is approved in the Diocese of Raleigh and is used in around 80 parishes, also seems prudent. Parishioners are drilled in situational awareness — something all of us should practice, no matter where we are — and in emergency evacuation, among other things.
It is good to be aware of what is going on around us. Particularly in an age where folks wander through public places with their eyes glued to smartphones, it’s important to become more aware of where we are and who is nearby for a moment.
Of course, being more aware can sometimes mean looking a little bit foolish to others, but that may be worth the risk.
One afternoon a few years ago, I managed to make the final hour of adoration, which would conclude with Benediction. I recognized many of the “regulars” there — the older couple who had never missed; the woman with seven children; a young man discerning a vocation. Seated toward the back of the church, I heard steps come from behind me and then a man passed by my peripheral vision — a new face I did not know.
He was dressed in a hoodie and carrying one of those insulated picnic bags, along with a canvas bag holding something long and weighty, suggesting metal.
Seeing new faces was not too unusual — the parish has a busy soup kitchen operating at that hour, and all sorts of people will stop into Benediction for a few minutes, so the man shouldn’t have piqued my attention.
But the canvas bag, and his odd behavior did. Without acknowledging the sanctuary at all he simply found a pew, sat and then looked around at the people praying. He was fidgety, unable to get quiet. Finally, he stood, moved to the choir area and began to sing the “Panis Angelicus” in a clear, strong voice.
At that point I became concerned.
Everyone else did what most people do when a stranger is behaving oddly — they turned from his gaze and tuned him out.
None of them, however, had seen the man enter, as I had; they’d not seen that long, heavy-looking canvas bag.
My imagination began to percolate. Here was bizarre behavior, exhibited by a stranger carrying something that — it seemed to me — could be a rifle. Who knew what the insulated bag was for? He was in a church, close to the area where a priest or deacon would soon be raising a monstrance in blessing. I could not help picturing St. Óscar Romero, slain at the altar in 1980, as I wondered whether this man might finish his hymn and then unleash hell upon us.
Helplessly, I considered how little could be done to stop this man were he inclined to open fire upon us. Could I charge at him with a flagpole? It seemed to me that were something terrible to unfold these people had no recourse beyond ducking beneath a pew and playing dead.
With visions of a parish awash in blood, I decided to act. I exited a side door, meaning to alert the rectory to a possibly alarming situation. Seeing the sacristan, I told her, instead.
“Well,” came the untroubled reply, “sometimes we get some strange people during the meal hour, but let’s go see.”
Long story short, the man in the hoodie had arrived early for a rosary-and-dessert meeting. The picnic bag was full of, um, picnic stuff.
And the long, heavy bag? It held a ridiculously sturdy collapsible chair meant for camping.
Well. Sometimes being a writer means one is blessed with a little too much imagination, perhaps.
Sharing the story later with my family, I took some good-natured ribbing, including an observation that I couldn’t be a martyr, even if someone killed me fast enough. But there were also consoling reassurances that it was better to be aware than oblivious, “…even if you do end up feeling foolish.”
Seeing something and saying something possibly did make me look foolish to the sacristan, but I actually didn’t feel foolish — only sad that our society is in such distress that my imagination went there at all.
Elizabeth Scalia is editor-at-large for OSV. Follow her on X (formerly known as Twitter) @theanchoress.
