Hi, Heather:  Sorry to hear about your trials and tribulations in your new
church.  This past summer a notice appeared in our (Catholic) church
bulletin - you could have knocked me over with a feather.  Our pastoral
associate, who is an older lady and right hand to our pastor, meaning she
really runs things, he just thinks he does, felt that the issue of moms
nursing their babies during Mass needed to be addressed.  She later told me
that the suggestion had come from our Liturgical Music Director.  He was
noticing that many moms were hanging about uncomfortably in the back of the
church or in the church lobby which has a wall of glass and piped-in sound
so that one can still see and hear the service, furtively nursing their
babies.  He wondered if it had been communicated to these moms that it
somehow wasn't OK to nurse during the Mass.
Anyway, she wrote in the bulletin that nursing babies were welcomed with
open arms in the main sanctuary as well as anywhere else in the church.
But... if a mother felt uncomfortable nursing in "public" she was welcome
to use the pastoral assistant's office.  The Sunday that her notice
appeared in the bulletin she came up to me (she knows what I do for a
living, as many of our parishioners are also "my moms and babies") after
Mass and asked me if what she had written was OK.  She was terrified of
offending someone.  I hugged her and told her it was the best thing she
could have done and that the moms and babies of the parish would gratefully
thank her.  We also have a large, young parish, doing about 30 baptisms a
month.
Sorry for the length.  I think your pastor, Heather, is most likely to
listen if you throw in lots of passages from the bible about how both Old
and New Testament figures (including Jesus) were nursed.
God Bless.

Pam Hirsch, RN,BSN,CLC
Clinical Lead, Lactation Services
Advocate Good Shepherd Hospital
Barrington, IL  USA

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