I have to admit to being paranoid about leaving my mobile phone switched on, and it starting to ring in church. To compensate, I often leave my phone off for days on end... or at the very least, leave it on silent... or even at home (slightly excessive, and rather negating the point of having a mobile in the first place!)
So whenever a phone goes off in church, my first thought is, "Ha ! Thank God it's not mine..." closely followed by, "...at least I hope not!" Everyone makes mistakes. The irritation sets in when someone starts to answer the phone in church...
So this little snippet from Orthometer made me laugh out loud...
I must admit, the worst case I've seen is when I was up at the Benedictine Abbey once attending evening Vespers and there was a group of tourists in the church (who seemed to have no clue what was going on. . .). When Fr. Abbot began to sing the Our Father (in a religious community this is sung by the superior) at the end of Vespers one of the tourists cell phone began to ring. It didn't just ring, it had a "ring-tune" on it and it was playing "Hips Don't Lie" by Shakira. If you don't know that song, let's just say it's less than appropriate for Vespers.
ReplyDeleteI went to Mass on Corpus Christi (yes, remember those days ...) in 2000 at Westminster Cathedral where they had the first performance of a Mass setting by James MacMillan for SATB Choir, Organ and 4 separate interjections of the Nokia ring-tone, pre-tasteful rall and diminuendo. Interesting in such a large acoustic....
ReplyDeleteFurther, the author of this blog once caused my phone to launch into the Pachelbel Canon 2 minutes before Mass started. A few weeks later the Parish Newsletter said, "Parishoners are politely requested to ensure that their mobile phones are switched off in Church." Oh most definitely mine is now and my sympathies when someone has forgotten. :)
Who, what, when... this blog? You mean ...moi?
ReplyDeleteAnon, your cover is blown... now say something nice, or else...
;-)
Oh, that's good! That video is so funny!
ReplyDeleteI must admit I do leave mine on silent virtually all the time--let's put it this way, I never download ring-tones, and don't know what my ringtone is!
This video is really funny!
ReplyDeleteI recall that during my numerous trips to Poland, there was always up to five cell phone ringings during mass, from the faithful of course. Even during a pilgrimage to Czestochowa, where the priests repeated like mantra during the day to turn off cellulars, there was always a ring or two in a dance-club sounding during mass.
Lovely Blog, obviously, by the way and I know that mine was not the only phone to have gone off. :-)
ReplyDeleteI remember a couple of years ago one of the Catholic papers did a feature on mobile phones going off in Church. They recounted one incident in which the phone went off during the homily. The priest went down and took the call, saying "sorry, your friend can't talk to you at the moment: he's in Church. By the way, why aren't you here?"
ReplyDeleteLast week at Mass there was a woman sitting a few places down from me, and her phone went off.
ReplyDeleteAs you say, it happens. People forget and make mistakes.
What made it worse was that she swore really loud (the 's' word) as she was fumbling through her bag to get the phone.
And it was right after Communion!
My brother then commented to me how the phone ringing was just an accident, but the swearing was definitly the worst and most off-putting part.
This was good to watch, it made me laugh. Luckily its never happened to me, but you can imagine the panic that person must feel when they realise its there phone.
ReplyDelete