Sarah is a new Catholic and joined the Catholic Church in 2020. (Sarah is uncomfortable using her last name in this story, as she hasn’t yet shared with many people that she converted from being Protestant.) She recently took her 4-year-old and 2-year-old to Mass at a nearby parish without her husband, who works weekends.
They arrived at Mass and found a pew in the back next to the shrine of the holy family. The children appreciated being next to statues of Jesus and Mary and, like many young kids, struggled to sit still. “They were trying not to be loud,” Sarah says. “But we were moving into the consecration, and the more sacred Mass is becoming, the more my stress is going up.”