Tonight, Bishop DiMarzio issued the following guidance given the current impact of the coronavirus.
As of tomorrow, Friday, March 20 at noon:
- All churches in the Diocese of Brooklyn and Queens will be fully closed;
- Parish offices will be physically closed;
- Funerals and wedding will not be permitted in church since limiting funerals and weddings to 10 people is proving not to be feasible. If absolutely necessary, a graveside service could be held, at the discretion of the cemetery administration. A memorial Mass for the deceased should be celebrated later. Weddings should be postponed.
Bishop DiMarzio has granted all the faithful of the Diocese of Brooklyn a dispensation from the law
of abstinence for the Fridays of Lent for this year. This is being done to assist people who may have
difficulties in shopping for food or other reasons which would make this practice difficult at this time. Fridays of Lent (and indeed all year) remain days of penance and prayer and that this is needed now more than ever.
We wanted to share this news with you as quickly as possible. Fr. Bill and the Parish Pastoral Council will provide any parish-specific updates in our weekly parish messages that is sent via email and posted on the website on Saturday morning. If you don’t receive our emails, we encourage you to sign-up on our website or by emailing or calling the rectory.
Based upon our initial review of the new mandates, we expect that:
- Tomorrow, Friday, March 20 will be the last day that the church will be open for Eucharistic Adoration prayer and private prayer until further notice.
- The rectory office will be physically closed tomorrow at noon; however, we will remain available by phone or email. Please call us at (718) 625-1177 or email us at rectory@stcharlesbklyn.org.
- We will stream a private Mass this Sunday at 11:15 AM. You can watch it live, and it will also be available on our website for later viewing.
We are continuing to experiment with interactive church events that you can connect to online or dial-in to so that we can stay connected. Tonight, members of our church joined with Grace Church Brooklyn Heights for an engaging discussion on the meaning of Flannery O’Connor’s short story A Good Man is Hard to Find. We will be holding Lenten faith sharing group meetings online this Sunday at 8 AM and 6 PM. Instructions for how to connect are at the bottom of this post.
Please let us know if you have any questions or need anything. Even if we may not be together in person for some time, please be assured that you remain in our prayers.
[Zoom meeting details removed from website for security reasons]