Day 394: Wednesday April 14th, 2021

A bit of fun from fond church remembrances. We all have them. We'd love to hear yours...

I was working the thurifer at the cathedral for Holy Thursday liturgy. I forgot to make new charcoals burn for the Transposition of the Blessed Sacrament to the Altar of Repose. After putting incense on dead charcoals, the bishop whispered, "There's no fucking smoke." I damn near died!

When Gus was about 2 years old, we were at mass & the priest elevated the Eucharist & the church was silent & Gus cried “das Jesus! Hi Jesus! I yove you!” & then farted so loudly that without a doubt the whole church heard it .

A typo in a program: “Following tonight’s Christmas concert, you are all invited to join the monks in a sin along.” Smiling face with open mouth and tightly-closed eyes

One rainy Easter Vigil, our pastor held the Easter fire indoors on the altar. Of course the altar cloth caught on fire, and the oldest, tiniest, most badass Church lady pulled out a fire extinguisher (likely from her purse) and saved the night. Indoor bonfires: never a good idea.

Honestly, this was so awkward but it’s hilarious in hindsight...

once at a funeral the priest got a little too excited with the thurible and was windmilling it a bit too wide and it hit the coffin with an almighty THUNK and left a dent

One time the priest made a joke and no one laughed at teen mass so the drummer went ba dum tss during the awkward silence.

Another time the seminarian was preaching and the visiting priest fell asleep and it took a minute to wake him up.

During the Renewal of Baptismal Promises once, I whispered to my two year old son: "say, I do." The priest said: "Do you reject Satan & all his empty promises?" My son waited for the pause after the response & shouted: "I DON'T!" & continued since everyone laughed uproariously.

I was at the all souls day mass and a little girl stage whispered to her mom, "ARE WE HERE CAUSE GRANDMA DIED?"

Out all night working went to early am Mass. Priest giving homily to nearly empty church when I nodded off, and my wedding ring slipped off my finger, pinging and dinging across the hard granite floor. Priest & congregants all stooping underneath pews looking for my ring.

Christmas Eve, reading from Luke: "Lo, the angel of the Lod came upon them," etc., and the preschooler says, full voice, "Hey, that's Charlie Brown!"

A kid was playing with her mom’s iPhone. During the consecration, the priest raised the host. And the entire congregation heard Siri say, “I’m sorry I didn’t catch that.”

Mass is about to start. There's a table w/ the gifts in the center of the center aisle. The cross-bearer is new to serving at Mass. Altar Server: Father, should I go through the table."

Priest: "If you can go through the table, I'll give you $1. If not, just go around the table."

At a 1st Holy Communion, the priest asked the children “What do you get when you grind up wheat add yeast & water, and bake it?” “Bread!” The next question was harder “what do you get when you crush grapes & let them sit?” After a moment of silence a timid voice answered “Jello?”

Little kid, just before Communion: “Oh, good, cookies!”

Me tripping and bouncing along the floor in the rush to collect my raffle prize, breaking a thirty year Church raffle dry spell was, according to the rest of the parish who did see it, very funny Smiling face with open mouth and smiling eyes

A friend had some young children read a short version of the Passion - w/o rehearsals. It went a little sideways: the women on the road “lamenated” Jesus and a guy with a bad heart condition buried him - Joseph of Arrhythmia (we rolled with laughter)

At my cousins wedding, the pastors dog walked into the church through the doors to the sacristy and started weaving in and out of the pews saying hello to everyone

We were having a baptism at the 5 o'clock Mass and there was a rubber duckie by the baby. While they were getting the baby prepped for the baptism, our amazing priest, Father Joe, tossed the duckie into the baptismal font and proceeded to baptise the baby.

Similarly, the evangelical church across the street from our Cathedral was on the same frequency. We got some kicking musical warm-ups until we straightened that out!

Priest’s puppy escaped thru sacristy during mass and burst into sanctuary, taking an innocent and nervous pee. The priest gently wrangled him and was so good-humored about the whole thing. It was a warm and funny as well as tolerant moment.

During my wedding ceremony our priest was talking talking about marriage and said "The mistake.....the mystique of marriage". Needless to say there were quite a few giggles.

During the announcements, the priest says we’re doing a weeding party next Saturday “to take out the small forest growing in the courtyard.” 5yo runs up “You can’t take out a forest! Don’t you know we need trees for the air?!”

At National Shrine (family lives in DC). One of their rotating priests was delivering a particularly dreary, lecturing, overlong homily. Three year old niece comes out with a slow, dramatic, and LOUD “Blah. Blah, Blah.” Stifled laughs for rows all around.

The theater at Fordham is right by the church. They ended up on the same mic frequency. Someone went sprinting next door to tell them. You then heard, "Oh crap! We're on the church's system! Shit, I just said crap! CUT IT!!"