Roman Catholic Church Reemerges From COVID-19

Outdoor masses held as state transitions out of phase I

When the world was turned on its head by the coronavirus and the stay-at-home mandates that came along with it, Hicksville’s Holy Family Roman Catholic Church did a massive pivot to make sure its flock would stay spiritually connected. Given that the last public mass was on March 16 at the beginning of the pandemic’s stay at home orders, teleconferences and social media played an enormous part in keeping the community connected while maintaining social distancing measures. But the boldest stroke of outreach came on Sunday, May 31, when Father Gerard Gentleman and associate pastors Fr. Daniel Opoku-Mensah and Fr. Liam McDonald assisted by Pastoral Year Seminarian, Christopher Heller celebrated two masses on the Feast of Pentecost from atop of the lower roof of the church’s Parish Center.

With the weather cooperating by way of sunny, but moderate temperatures, these holy men conducted the mass while overlooking a parking lot of more than 100 cars packed with parishioners, who remained in their vehicles, despite not being able to receive Holy Communion. A loudspeaker system was set up so those attending could hear, while a Zoom session was simultaneously streaming for anyone who might not have been able to make out what Gentleman may have been saying. For the Ronkonkoma native, who has been pastor of the Hicksville parish for the past 11 years, it was a rewarding and surprisingly straightforward event that was repeated the following weekend.

“When we were told we could have gatherings of either 10 in the church or have people in the parking lot if they stayed in their cars, obviously the second option worked for us,” Gentleman explained. “We looked at different ways to do it, whether it was to have a stage put together or on the back of a truck. But it wouldn’t be that high, so we looked at the building and noticed our lower roof. If had gone any higher, we would have been behind trees. So we decided to give it a try. We decided that it would be a great spot for us to do it from. We had already put together a sign-in list via computer to see if people wanted to help us and what their skills were.”

A parishioner who was a New York City police officer and a DJ offered the use of his sound equipment. While an FM transmitter that was ordered didn’t arrive until the second weekend, the acoustics produced by the gear worked fine.
“When our parishioner brought his equipment, it made such a difference,” Gentleman said. “It drew people in, because those that didn’t hear that we were going to be doing it, certainly heard us as we were doing it and showed up. That’s kind of how it came together. It looked like a doable thing where we could end up going out from a faculty room in the school, climb down a ladder and do it. In a lot of ways, it was a lot easier than we expected it to be.”

The seeming spontaneity of this outdoor mass also caught the attention of a neighbor running by who chose to remain anonymous, but was nonetheless pleasantly surprised at what he was witnessing.
“I rounded a corner on my run this morning I suddenly heard music and singing,” he said. “I then noticed a number of cars in the parking lot of Holy Family Parish. I stopped in my tracks when I realized the priests of the parish were on the roof of the school holding outdoor mass. These are the same priests that during the height of the pandemic took to the streets of the neighborhood in Eucharist procession. How cool are these guys? In a time with so much turmoil in our streets, how beautiful to have them bringing people together. Imagine if other places of worship followed and brought their neighborhoods together in this way.”

Technology has proved to be a boon for all facets of the Holy Family community in enabling all involved to remain connected. Gerard and his staff have been streaming three times a day throughout the week—morning mass, midday Eucharistic adoration and an evening praying of the rosary. Up until Phase one, a weekend mass was pre-recorded and uploaded. With Phase Two having kicked off, the church can shift from allowing only 10 people per event (baptism, wedding, funeral service) to only allowing a quarter of the congregation to gather, in this case a maximum of 125 people. Most weddings have been postponed or rescheduled and at this current time, baptisms and funerals are being limited to one family per ceremony up to the aforementioned 25 percent mark. Handling masses going forward using this metric has also required the church adapt and refine its approach.

“We now have permission from the state and bishop to operate the church within 25 percent of capacity,” Gentleman said. “We’ve marked out the church and done the best we could to specify what would keep us socially distant. We’re trying something that people seem to be responding to—they’re signing up for masses online. So the mass has 125 capacity and parishioners can see that maybe 59 people have already signed up for it. So if they can choose, maybe they will go to one that less people have signed up for. It helps them but it also helps us to see if more people are showing up than we have room for. We don’t want to have a situation where we have people arguing and be upset at the door. So this alleviates this a little bit.”

But despite all this, Gentleman admits the forced separation triggered by the pandemic has made for difficult times over these past few months.
“For us as Catholics, being able to come to mass and being able to receive the Eucharist is part of who we are,” he said. “Not being able to do that in of itself, was very hard. Nobody has gone this long in their life without having been able to go to mass, receive Holy Communion and being a part of this. So this whole experience has been such a challenge for [our parishioners] to accept and to adapt to what we’ve done. The other challenge has been us not knowing what we don’t know. We’ve gotten some information on those who were sick and passed away. We were able to do some things—blessings at cemeteries and all that. We know that there are a lot of people that were not connected to us with technology, so that was a thing. Not being able to communicate with people and remain connected was problematic. Then hearing that someone was sick and maybe dying and we weren’t able to be present for them. As anybody knows, experiencing death is a terrible thing. Experiencing it through this [current situation] is as someone said to me, very cruel in that we can’t do this as we normally would. Not being able to be with someone as they’re dying in the hospital and walk them through those scary times is extra sad.”

Despite all these obstacles, Gentleman has seen how the commonality of faith and love has enabled Holy Family to weather this pandemic storm.
“I am particularly grateful to the support we’ve gotten from the parish,” he said. “It has been a challenging experience, but the people of the parish have made it a lot easier because of their kindness, support and adaptability.”