the difficult minute

I first want to clarify that I wasn’t talking about what is known as the “children’s liturgy of the word,” where kids leave during the readings and the homily, hear child-friendly versions of those, and come back in time for communion. I was talking about children’s-themed Eucharistic Prayers and other parts of the ordinary from the Mass/communion liturgy.

I could maybe understand doing this in a situation where there were only children (plus some, ahem, overseers), such as a children’s camp or retreat or something. I guess. But making it a regular practice, as with the (weekly! in multiple churches!) “family liturgies” they have here in Germany, could only be harmful in the long run. I grew up an evangelical, where we were sent away for “children’s church” during the homily, which made perfect sense given the orientation and substance of evangelical worship. But I don’t think making a parallel stream of children’s worship is appropriate for any liturgical church with a Eucharistic service. It makes the Eucharist - or the Holy Sacrifice, for Catholics - into something that is predicated on rational or verbal competence to ‘understand’ everything that is being said and done. A certain amount of understanding is necessary, yes. But that’s what catechesis is for, that’s what children’s missals are for. In terms of being a ritual and sacramental act, the mystery of faith, I don’t think “accessibility” is really the goal. “Making kids feel welcome” is DEFINITELY not the goal. In fact, you want to convey the sense that not everything here is directly accessible to the human mind, let alone children’s minds. Barring accessibility (which I’m not sure is even established), what is the goal? To make children feel specifically welcomed and addressed in church? To make them feel important? These are things that adults like doing for kids, but I’m not convinced that kids really respond in the way we imagine them responding. I’m just highly skeptical of the whole “let’s celebrate children!” approach. Inserting it into the liturgy really bothers me. What is it like for adults to attend these services? Is it like going to your 8th grader’s “graduation,” where you smile benignly at all the young people, trying to act like adults? The liturgy is an important and a holy thing and not a place to enshrine the weird “children are our future” sentimentality that reigns supreme in some quarters!

That said, I understand what you mean about good priests making the best of things. I would rather attend a children’s liturgy with my favorite priest at home — because he would try to make even that solemn and elevated — than attend a regular N.O. Mass with some priests I have known. But I don’t know that children’s liturgies do much to elevate the tone of our liturgical worship.