Dante’s Advice for the 10th Circle of the Cry Room
Did you know Dante liked to put on his bed robes at night and pretend to be Caesar? Neither did I!
As 2000 years of sacred architecture attest, we Catholics love to infuse our structures with sacramentality. The physical form of any church worthy of its parishioners speaks to spiritual realities. The sanctuary correlates to heaven, the altar to the throne of the Triune God, the nave to the Mystical Bride of Christ, His Church, and the cry room to the 10th circle of hell.
One theory of hell, mentioned in Benedict’s Spe Salvi (47), is that it is, in a sense, the same thing as Heaven – the fire of divine love “which both burns and saves” – as experienced by those who hate God rather than those who love Him. A soul in Hell will curse that same love it would have praised, had it not lost grace. A visit to the cry room similarly turns beautiful things on their head. A touching reading, an edifying homily, a moment where the song of angels almost seems to pierce through the human veil of our perception: all become pain because of the knowledge that – in this cry room, this place of wailing and gnashing of teeth – we parents are unable to partake fully of the graces pouring forth from the sanctuary.
The trick to the cry room is to make the experience less like Hell and more like purgatory. Allow me to play the role of Dante and provide a few tips for parents and priests:
- Remember the purposes of purgatory and hell, and treat the cry room likewise. Hell is a place without hope. If the cry room is hell, the hope lost is the prospect of ever returning to the nave of the Church. Purgatory, on the other hand, is all about coming to one’s proper home in heaven and completes the return of God’s people to Him, started in a lifetime of repentance and ongoing conversion. When you enter the cry room, remember that you are trying to calm your child down so that he may return to his proper place in the nave. To that end, stop treating the cry room like a play area. What child is going to calm down and return to Mass when he knows that, for his poor behavior at Mass, he gets rewarded with immediate recess? Instead, leave the toys in the pew when you make your exit. Calm your child in the cry room, resolve the issue that’s got him worked up, and show him that you – and he – will continue praying along with the Mass as much as possible. After a few minutes, ask if he’d like to go back to his pew and return to his toys. (Note: it’s my opinion that toys at Mass should be 1) silent, 2) non-electronic, and 3) a temporary, transitional solution.)
- The cry room is for those kids who have shown themselves unprepared for Mass on a given day. Your child’s behavior probably changes frequently enough throughout the day and from one day to another. Don’t assume that you need to go straight to the cry room every time you attend Mass. If you do, the poor kid will never really practice proper behavior at Mass, nor realize or understand what’s going on in the liturgy, and will be surrounded constantly by the fun all the other children are having – and he’s missing out on – leading to resent and rebellion at the prospect of going to Church.
- The cry room is for those kids who have shown themselves unprepared for Mass on a given day. Are your kids unprepared for Mass? Can you do anything to prepare them better? (I’m seriously examining myself with this question, too.) Perhaps you could dress them well, tell them the stories from the readings in narrative fashion, and pray an Our Father with them on the way to Mass? Don’t forget to end Mass with a visit to the tabernacle where they can express their love for Jesus and practice the proper reverence.
- The cry room is for those kids who have shown themselves unprepared for Mass on a given day. (Getting a little sick of reading that sentence?) The cry room is NOT for adults. I don’t care if you arrived late. I don’t care if you plan to leave early. (Note: you know that Judas left Mass early, too, right?) If you’re an adult without any child supervision, stop acting like a child! Go into the nave of the church!
- Fix the walk of shame. Like Hell, a trip to the cry room brings a touch of nervous embarrassment. If you’re a parent, you know what I’m talking about: the “walk of shame.” You make your way up the aisle (preferably a side aisle) with a whining, crying, or screaming child, sometimes with that extra special added awkwardness of carrying your the purse your wife forgot to take out with the other child she’s already removed. This is the #1 reason for the problem I mentioned in #1 on this list. People figure if they’re going to be that ashamed, they might as well just spend the whole Mass in the cry room. Priests: make your parish a family-friendly place. Change the attitudes of parishioners – as well as your own attitudes – to appreciate children with sincerity. I know, I know, the bratty tots interrupt your homily on the connection between silence and patience and it just makes you want to scream! Yes, I get it! Nevertheless, make the parish a family-friendly place. Parents: There’s only so much priests can do to change attitudes in the parish. You know what would help them? Your fellow parishioners need practice getting used to young people at Mass. An increasing presence of tiny humans might just do the trick. Procreate and dominate!
- Don’t thrust your perception of the cry room as hell on the people around you. Can you imagine what purgatory would be like if you were surrounded by lost souls screaming aloud the entire time? When you’ve resolved to use the cry room the right way, you’ll inevitably find other parents who fall under the impression that, once in the cry room, it’s perfectly fine to allow their children to do whatsoever they please. As a consequence, you can’t pay attention to what little of the Mass you can hear through the speaker and your kids really resent you – and this fun-less church – for not being as lax as that other parent. So if you’re one of those parents who make the cry room hell, cut it out!
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About the Author
Micah Murphy, a cradle-Catholic from Omaha, Nebraska, has been active in online apologetics since his coming of age discovery of the faith. Having graduated from Franciscan University of Steubenville in 2007 with his BA in Theology and Catechetics, Micah became a youth minister and then a teacher of Sacred Scripture at Loyola College Prep in the mission Diocese of Shreveport, where he now lives with his wife, Jennie, and their three children. A man of concrete thinking, Micah prefers scriptural to scholastic theology, in addition to catechetics, canon law, Latin grammar, Catholic facts both trivial and muy importante, and anything else that requires great precision.
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Love it. Our church was built in the 1950s and as such doesn’t have a cry room. We get to use the good old fashioned vestibule, with no speakers, and barely a view of the sanctuary. As a result, I try to avoid leaving Mass with my kids as much as possible. And, if we do feel the need to leave the nave, we make sure our kids know it’s not play time and that the goal is to calm down and get back inside. Too many parents take the exact opposite attitude to the one you describe here.
Particularly love your line about procreating and dominating. We’re really working hard on that front. :)
@bridget, our current building was opened in 1942.
Our chapel barely had room for a confessional, let alone a cry room. So we prepared by:
1) taking our children to church weekly even when they were days old. I cannot tell you how many folks have asked me when a good age is to start taking kids to church… REALLY??
2) When my kids could talk, we taught them the same thing: “We’re here to listen to God… not you.” It might sound a little harsh, but they figured out quick that chit-chat is for after Mass.
3) One toy. Our criteria was “squishy and quiet.” And it was over by age 3.
4) Prayer books are fantastic in place of toys.
Thanks for reading.
This is great:) Thanks for the laughs–and the tips.
Every single young Catholic family I know struggles with their kids at mass, whether they take them to daily mass or just mass on Sundays. When we see other families we haven’t visited with a in a while, we ALWAYS end up starting to talk about mass behavior, trying to glean tips from each other and secretly feeling incredibly grateful to know that other families like us deal with the same thing at mass.:)
My husband and I have had our fair share of difficulties with our two little children in mass. Our church doesn’t have a cry room. You have to go all the way outside with a loud child, unfortunately. I know that the Lord pours down graces on us parents who practice love and patience with our kids and with our spouse too at mass! I believe that with all my heart.
We have started a “lap or pew” policy in the last couple of months that has helped things. The kids are getting used to it now, especially since we started doing a “lap or next-to-us-on-the-couch policy in family prayer time at home too to “practice” for mass, in a sense. At home, they can fuss all they want, too, and we don’t have to take them outside.:)
We brings mostly religious books and a sippee cup of plain water to mass–no snacks. We have a three-year-old and a 16-month-old, by the way. If either of the kids gets too loud (or the older one gets disobedient or rowdy), we take the younger one outside until she is calm, but don’t let her get down out of our arms at all to run around, she has to stay “held.” The older one gets punished in time-outs outside until he chooses to apologize sincerely and can tell us the correct behavior (quiet, lap-or-pew) he is expected to have back in church.
Still, I generally have to discipline the kids once or twice almost every mass. I’ve gotten through a couple of daily masses in the last few months with no time-outs though–praise be to God.:)
My prayer before every mass is that the Lord would either make my children behave perfectly, or He would give me the grace I need to be a wise and patient mother to them as He works on my soul a little bit more through that challenge.
As a mom of 9 and a cry room-hater, I loved your article, but I’m not quite sure what you meant to say in #6. It seemed to end abruptly without really clarifying your point. Nonetheless, this article should be required reading for every parish!
Very sweet and humorous! Two minor points: It would technically be the Tabernacle that is the throne of God — the altar is the table for the feast. We bow to the altar, but we genuflect to the Tabernacle. The other point is just the translation of Dante’s inscription above the gates of Hell. You probably didn’t write that, but just for clarification, it should read, “Abandon all hope, ye who enter.” (“Lasciate ogni speranza, voi ch’intrate.”)
Thanks for a fun read!
Thanks for your input. Since it’s an analogy, I don’t think we need to get too picky. I consider the altar more analogous to God’s throne because of the sense in which the Cross is Christ’s throne, and since the selfsame Sacrifice of the Cross is made present on the altar, I consider the altar as related to the Cross, and therefore as a type of throne. The tabernacle, of course, could also be seen as a type of throne, though I think since the tabernacle correlates to the tabernacle of the Old Testament, which held the Ark of the Covenant (which was itself closer to being a throne), what hold Jesus within the tabernacle (i.e., a ciborium) is more closely regarded as a throne, while the tabernacle itself is a microcosm of heaven (I’m going to coin a new word: microouranos).
This could be a very interesting discussion.
As for the specific phrasing of Dante, thanks! I just used the old standby paraphrase, but it’s really neat to see the original Italian.
My policy was absolutely no food, no toys, but religious books (books of saints, etc) were OK. As a 50-something, I can ignore a lot of the little whines, talking, etc. But please do remove kids in tantrum mode. Also, please don’t let teenagers/preteens use video games and iPhones. A guest at my daughter’s wedding (full liturgy) asked if his HS-aged kids could use their phones/ipads in church. We said no. They chose to attend the reception, but not the wedding.
Nearing 80, married 57+ years to my BW, dad of five, Grandpa of 12 and G-Gpa of 3; an indelible memory to me from over 45 years ago: When our babies were small, my wife & I would split masses on Sunday. I’d go to a 7:30, then return home for breakfast. Then she’d to to the 10:30.
As our children got older, we’d take them, fasting, to the first Sunday morning mass with promise: “If you’ll stay quiet (be good), we’ll take you to an IHOP for breakfast afterward.”
One Sunday, our middle daughter – about 3 at the time – took a monkey containing a music box into church. During the
Consecration, it started playing and I couldn’t make it stop except by tightly gripping the windup crank! It seemed like the longest Mass we ever attended; and my left thumb still aches at the memory. (No cry room there at the time.)
Thanks for recalling the memory.
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