ATTENDING MASS ON A HOLY DAY

New Zealand Tablet, 13 January 1921, Page 32

ATTENDING MASS ON A HOLY DAY

The rich brogue of the Adams Street car conductor might have added, “All out,” for as the car stopped the 98 passengers rung up on the dial swung to the street, and joined the throng that'jammed the corner before the old gray church, once the pride and glory of Chicago’s great West Side (says a Catholic News Service message, under date November 5, to an exchange). It was 12.10 noon on All Saints’ Day and a nasty drizzle of rain overhead, and the greasy, muddy stones of the Desplaines Street’s teaming thoroughfare made it most unpleasant. , , Still before the old church was a jam of taxi-cabs and private limousines, tramcars, and light delivery motors, parked while the owners and drivers passed into the church. Uniformed “ policemen on the wido, high stone steps directed the throng that had come across the river, from the loop district and from the nearby factories and freight offices for the noon Mass, arranged by the Rev. William J. McNamee for the workers who have to leave their outlying or suburban homes too early to attend in their own parishes. Five Thousand Push Into Church. “High Mass in the Church. -Low Masses in the basement and in the gymnasium,” directed the city policemen as the doors of the great edifice swallowed up the throng of worshippers by the thousand. Close to 5000 people pushed into the church and chapels for the three Masses, those whose time was limited seeking the low Masses, while those who had an hour for lunch crowded into the main church.

Inside they filled the pews, the benches that crowded the space between the front seats and the Communion rail, then the chairs placed within the rail, even up to the steps of the altar itself. The choir

gathered about a small organ under the pulpit, thus leaving the spacious choir gallery for the worshippers, who, after filling all this space, stood crowding, shoulder to. shoulder, up and down The aisles, in the rear of the pews and out in the entry to the outer doors. As all answer to the sceptic’s claim that religion is for the women, let it be known that fully half of the worshippers in the main church were men. There were the managers from the big stores in State Street and Michigan Boulevard, and there were floor walkers, saleswomen, and cash girls. There were heads of La Salle and Monroe Street banks, with clerks, stenographers, and messengers from these same institutions.There were owners and foremen from the industrial district and workers from their plants. There were contractors from the public improvements and laborers off these jobs, white-collar- men and blue-shirt men, kneeling side by side, worshipping the .same God before the same altar. At 12.35 by the clock on the pulpit front the Communion was over, and a few hundred who probably had to be back at their desks at 12,45 went out. At 12.40 this congregation of strangers sang together the “O Salutaris,” and five minutes later,. Benediction over, they raised their voices in the “Te Deum.” Hungry But Happy. Again the doors swing open and the thousands pass out into the rain, to taxi-cab, limousine, tramcar, delivery waggon, or street- car, to resume their work-a-day life, for the observance of a holy day is not for the driven workers of great cities. Over the Adams, the Jackson, Monroe, and Madison Street bridges across the Chicago River to Chicago’s heart, the congested loop district, go the men and women, lunchless, with their lunch time spent in the worship of their God, and their lunch money spent in car fares or tossed into the contribution box. They face - a long, hungry afternoonbut they have done their duty.