Churches Creative in Filling Adoration Slots

Jesus waits in adoration chapels across the Diocese of Baton Rouge for people to come to him with everything that is on their hearts and minds and in their souls. 

Although overall the churches are blessed with committed adorers, there are occasions when the chapels are empty because people are ill, aging or busy.

Given these realities, some churches, while actively sending out calls for committed adorers, have made adaptations that preserve the reverence for the Blessed Sacrament while keeping the chapel open and available for adorers to stop by.

The adoration chapel at Holy Rosary Church in St. Amant sits to the right of the church’s Full of Grace Café. The beautifully renovated chapel, with hardwood floors and stained-glass shaped windows to further illuminate the atmosphere, includes a custom-built tabernacle that has small doors that can be opened when visiting the chapel and closed when leaving if the chapel is unoccupied.

Wendy Enloe, director of adult faith formation and spiritual director at Holy Rosary, acknowledges the difficulty of “filling up the schedule 24/7.”

Accommodating for that includes using an access code to enter the chapel, which adds flexibility.

“We still have people who are committed adorers, but it invites people to come when they can,” said Enloe.

Many people do that, such as parents who bring their children for religious education classes, people on lunch breaks or on their way home and college students. 

Many people stop by before or after Mass. The adoration chapel also provides a quiet place to reflect for people on retreat at Holy Rosary’s new retreat center.

Enloe noted people expressed thanks for the availability of the chapel. One mother noticed that “something was going on” with her college-age daughter through her restless behavior. She suggested her daughter visit the adoration chapel, which helped.

“We have people who say they don’t have time to be committed adorers but they can go at ‘odd’ hours,” said Enloe.

At St. Alphonsus Church in Greenwell Springs, the tabernacle has an element that operates like a “pop up” TV console in the cabinet upon which the tabernacle sits. By pushing a button, one lowers a wooden covering to expose the Blessed Sacrament or raises it to repose it.

In the past, adorers walked up some steps to retrieve Blessed Sacrament to repose it in a side tabernacle. 

“It was too dangerous (to go up and down the steps) for people in their 80s,” said Susan Hankel, community outreach assistant for St. Alphonsus. 

Some people did not know whether or not to repose the Eucharist in the event that someone should come in after they left.

The people expressed their appreciation to the church for solving the problem from a safety and procedural aspect.

“It also took the stress from our committed adorers when they had difficulty finding a substitute when they could not make their hour,” said Hankel.

She has discovered making the change has helped to raise the number of people visiting the chapel, which is open from 6 a.m. to midnight (with a code entry required after office hours).

“Some people who were not signed up did not come in because they didn’t think they were able to because they were not committed adorers,” Hankel said. “They thought, ‘If I were not able to be there I would have to find someone to take my place.’ ”

Hankel said having to make changes to the chapel because of the occasional emptiness is unfortunate, but the reality of what churches in general are dealing with today,  the captains of particular hours work diligently to fill all time slots. Meanwhile, people are looking at breaks in their schedules and saying, “I can do that.”

“Really, I think it’s the best way to keep the chapel going,” Hankel said.

At the adoration chapel at St. John the Baptist Church in Zachary, a key opens and locks the adoration chapel. There are instructions to follow for people who stop by the chapel, which is accessed through a pass code. 

Similar to other parishes in the diocese, St. John hosts community-wide 24-hour adoration once a month. For St. John it’s the third Monday of the month. 

Although there have been nights when people have slept there to make sure the hours are filled, overall, the community embraces this concept and participates, according to Suzanne Payne, former director of religious education at St. John, who led efforts in renovating a part of the old St. John the Baptist Church to make a larger adoration chapel. 

Similar to Holy Rosary and St. Alphonsus, people “do their part” at St. John to spend time before the Eucharist.

“You can stop in. Jesus is thrilled that you stopped by to see him,” said Payne.