Camping On Sundays

A reader writes:

Hi Jimmy,

You had a post on your blog about staying home from Mass when sick.
Beside infirmity, are there any other legitimate reasons for staying
home from Mass?  The particular situation I’m wondering about is going
away on a camping trip.

There are other reasons. The care of children is one, for example.

As to camping trips, business trips, and vacations, your obligation is to go to Mass if you reasonably can get to one on Sunday, based on where you are that day. The Church does not understand the obligation to ensuring that you are in a place where you can reasonably get to Mass. Thus if you are in a place where you cannot reasonably get to Mass on a Sunday or holy day, you do not have to go, and you are not legally obligated to cancel or avoid planned trips on this account.

As to what counts as being able to reasonably get to Mass, St. Alphonsus Ligouri spoke of having to ride to Mass for more than fifteen minutes by donkey as being enough. The donkey isn’t the essential part of this though, as people were used to travelling by donkey back then (it was easier for them to do this than it would be for us).

Author: Jimmy Akin

Jimmy was born in Texas, grew up nominally Protestant, but at age 20 experienced a profound conversion to Christ. Planning on becoming a Protestant seminary professor, he started an intensive study of the Bible. But the more he immersed himself in Scripture the more he found to support the Catholic faith, and in 1992 he entered the Catholic Church. His conversion story, "A Triumph and a Tragedy," is published in Surprised by Truth. Besides being an author, Jimmy is the Senior Apologist at Catholic Answers, a contributing editor to Catholic Answers Magazine, and a weekly guest on "Catholic Answers Live."

8 thoughts on “Camping On Sundays”

  5. Hey, Jimmy, thanks for helping me with this. I am a Boy Scout leader and have sometimes felt conflicted on this. Also, on our family vacations I wondered if we were doing EVERYTHING we could to make it to Mass, and would not enjoy myself as much as I might have. This will help me to be less anal on the issue, and not behave like an ass.:)

  6. I teach a confirmation class in my parish and one of my students has seldom if ever missed Mass on Sundays. This is surprising when you realize that she is very active in many different sports that take her all over the state on weekends for most of the year. Mom has always found a local Catholic church and the coach knows they will be gone for an hour. The other Catholic kids often join them. It has been a good experience for parents and kids, and this young woman is very devout. Good parenting can foster that sort of reverence for God, and that is what I see there. I wish I had done that.

  7. I remember as a boy scout, my father coming to get me where ever I was camping and taking me to mass on Sunday mornings. I was the only boy in the pack going to church on the Sundays we were camping. I was terribly embarrassed at the time. Now that I understand, I make sure my cub scouts get to mass as well.

  8. Priests and confessors may, for justifiable pastoral reasons, dispense individual faithful from fulfilling the Sunday obligation. It is one of the faculties priests receive at ordination.
    “When such serious circumstances arise which prevent a person from attending Mass, he should definitely take time to pray, read the prayers and readings of the Mass in the Missal, or watch the Mass on television and at least participate in spirit.” (John-Paul II, Dies Domini)

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