Viewpoint: A chance to evangelise - are we missing it?

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Last week, attending my usual Mass, we had a Baptism. This happens quite often, which is a delight. Or it should be.

Alas, for the nth time, the relatives and friends, dressed in their finery, five inch heels, low cut dresses, shiny suits, because it was an event to be followed by a long session in the pub, came in giggling, chatting, taking 'selfies' and photos of others - which they proceeded to do throughout the Mass.

Members of the congregation did ask if they would be quiet, only to get abuse, and in one instance, just short of a fist in the face!

Of course, you don't want to stop proceedings, and you don't want to be perceived as an authoritarian community, always demanding silence and a way of behaving that suits you. But of course, why should those who'd come to pray, have their community's prayerful opportunity wrecked by visitors?

Might the answer be staring us in the face - and one which we do fail lamentably to embrace? This is a chance for evangelisation, isn't it?

Many of the visitors had never been in a church - it was full of signs and symbols whose meaning one cannot guess, people murmuring ritualistic mumbo-jumbo in an impenetrable language (why "And with your spirit"? why "consubstantial" - what does it all mean?); normal life is outside a church, and lived in a totally secular environment, where church is considered weird.

Some of the family members might have been in a church before, perhaps were born as Catholics and Christians nominally, but had rejected, or just walked away, because of boredom, or apathy, or friends and neighbours laughing at them for sticking with anything which interferes with a normal life-style. And the skies had not fallen in on them.

Why can we not have a routine sharing of the event that visitors come for - whether it's a marriage, or a funeral or a baptism, perhaps occurring during the Mass. The usual Mass-goers might not appreciate that the noisy group up at the front, who they've never seen before, are there for a Baptism - all we know is that there is a disruptive group, very self-conscious, who don't want to be told what to do, but in the same way don't want to be out of place.

The immediate relatives, the parents, might have had careful catechesis in preparation for the event - but their friends and family haven't. Surely this is the chance to welcome them at the beginning, to invite the community to welcome them and have a few minutes just before Mass starts - and then some little short meditations throughout explaining what's going on. The deaf community have a signed Mass, where the hand gestures not only express some of the words but also express meaning. "Why am I washing my hands?" "We have readings which discuss... reflect something.."

This could be such an opportunity - they are HERE in our midst, sitting in front of us, a real chance to share what Mass is all about, even in the briefest of moments. As it is, those of us "in the know" are privately seething, thoroughly rattled and upset, when we should be glorifying and thanking the Lord.