St Benedict’s Parish

St. Benedict’s now has 3 Sunday Masses (7:30 am Low Mass, 10 am High Mass, and 12 noon Low Mass), with Confession 30 min prior to every Mass, including their Daily Masses, which are Mon-​Fri 6:30 am and 8 am, Fri 8 am and 7 pm, and Sat 7:30 am and 9 am. The daily confession offered is the traditional confessional with a screen to protect not only the penitent’s, but also the priest’s identity, and with three priests, two priests are normally hearing confessions on Sunday while the third priest is offering the Mass. And, the priests have mentioned that there have been some souls that have chosen confession prior to the 6:30 am daily Mass for their return after several decades away from confession. Because all the sacraments offered are in the Extraordinary Form (according to the liturgical books of 1962) St. Benedict’s does not have Lay Extraordinary Ministers. So, their priests make ALL sick calls, visiting local hospitals and shut-​ins regularly, providing the sacraments, especially Absolution, Extreme Unction (or Anointing of the Sick), and Viaticum (the Most Blessed Sacrament (aka, Viaticum – «with thee on the way»)). Registered members of the parish may elect to receive the traditional annual Epiphany House Blessing during the Epiphany season, where the priests will personally visit each family that requests the Epiphany Home Blessing, and provide the Blessing that uses incense, blessed chalk, and Epiphany Blessed Holy Water — termed the nuclear weapon against Satan– the Epiphany Blessed Holy Water has been part of the Church’s Exorcism ritual for centuries. Attending St. Benedict’s Sunday Mass, one will find a vibrant community with many children, large families, and several homeschooling families. Many events for the family including their annual traditional Christmas pageant where the children dressed as saints and angels present their gifts to the Christ child in the manger. The parish’s Catechism program relies on the Baltimore Catechism. And, there is an adult catechism class for anyone interested in learning more about the Catholic faith – several non-​Catholics attend this class. There are traditional processions (Corpus Christi procession, October Friday evening candlelit rosary processions, and Rogate processions), a semi-​annual Military Mass (Veteran’s Day and Memorial Day) honors the living and fallen veterans), and the parish has an active home enthronement to the Sacred Heart program. An annual Rorate Caeli Mass is offered on the first Saturday of December, which begins with a candlelight procession from the prayer garden to the Church for the Mass that ends at sunrise and is followed by a parish pot-​luck breakfast. This is a family oriented parish seeking to provide its parishioners with Beauty, Truth, and Goodness along their pilgrimage here focusing them on their destination –heaven. Come share the same experience with your ancestors (that are now either part of the Church suffering or the Church militant) in adoring God in the same manner that they did — the Latin Mass!

If doing the same thing over again and expecting different results is crazy than I must be loony. I have gone to this parish 5 or so times over the course of two years and I have to say I see the same problems again and again.
First problem is getting there it is packed into a residential neighborhood and the streets are bad. It isn’t unusual to see cars parked on either side and sometimes even double parked, snow and slush didn’t help this morning either.
Second is the daily confession, 30 minutes before every mass there is always a line of people and upwards of 5 do not get confession on every Sunday which means that they cannot receive the Eucharist if in a state of mortal sin. To cleanse the mortal sin one must go to confession and therein lies the problem. After mass they say «a lot going on today» or that they have confession every day please come another day. If 30 minutes is not sufficient, which it isn’t as there are more than a few people waiting, than bump it up to 45 minutes before a mass.
Third is the volume in the church, it is hard to hear the priest because the acoustics are horrible and there is always a baby screaming. Most of it’s in Latin so you won’t be able to understand it but it is still nice to hear the priest.
Forth and last is the fact that there is never enough parking in the parking lot and I have had to park on the grass or on the side of the road in the residential neighborhood. I got the last parking space this morning and I came about 20 minutes early. I know the plot of land is small but there can be put at least some gravel down on the side nearest the highway to make a parking area that doesn’t get muddy.
All in all if you need a traditional Latin mass go here, if not go to a multitude of other Catholic churches in the area. Other than these nagging problems I have seen no issues of this church deviating from the modern Catholic Church and have not seen any heretical doctrines and the people are always nice. But if you are like me and decide to come to get confession before mass you may be disappointed and this was my final straw.

Latin Mass, FSSP parish! Come dressed in Sunday Best and participate in truly beautiful adoration!