If you only saw this short clip I posted on social media, you didn’t get the whole picture. And the problem is that most people didn’t want to get the big picture: Sacred spaces matter. Let me explain
"Since reverence is due to God, and since it is shown through signs, we must treat the vessels and places dedicated to God with the greatest honor."
-St. Thomas Aquinas
In the full episode I wasn’t out to make a mountain out of a molehill. I was bothered that a kid was playing in the sanctuary, but that wasn’t the heart of my point in the episode. It’s not the end of the world that a child is doing that—though, to be clear, the sanctuary isn’t a playground. The real issue runs deeper—Catholics have lost a sense of the sacred. And, with it,. a sense of the divine, and a sense of sin. (continues below)
Full Episode:
“But it’s just a kid!” Yes, I understand that. But that isn’t the point. But let’s talk about “just a kid” for a moment. Since the first century, children grew up with an understanding of holy places and sacred spaces. This wasn’t because they were inherently holier, but because their upbringing steeped them in the reverence demonstrated by the adults around them. The sense of the sacred wasn’t an abstract idea—it was lived, breathed, and modeled daily. When they entered a sanctuary, they knew they were on holy ground because everyone around them treated it that way. Those kids grew to be adults; parents who handed this sense of the sacred down to their own children, and so on down the line.
"When you enter the church, leave behind all worldly cares and approach as if you were entering heaven itself; for this is the house of angels, the house of God."
-St. John Chrysostom (Homily on Matthew 90.2)
But, again, a child playing in the sanctuary isn’t the end of the world. Neither is a latte during mass. Neither is eating lunch in the pews at mass. Neither is regularly showing up 20 minutes late. Neither is, and neither is….are you getting it? These are symptoms of a much larger problem: across the board, Catholics have lost their sense of the sacred. And when adults lose that sense, children never gain it. Because the children have to get it from the adults, and the adults don’t have it to give.
Might they gain it on their own, in time? Of course they might. But it would be only a shadow of what their grandparents had at their age.
This loss isn’t just about behavior in church—it cuts to the heart of Catholic identity. Reverence for sacred spaces and moments shapes how we see God, the Church, Sacraments, grace, and our role in it all. If we have no sense of the sacred, we have no sense of the Divine, and, consequently, no sense of sin.
"We must empty Purgatory with our prayers. But men have forgotten eternity, and that is why they sin without fear."
-St. Padre Pio
When that reverence fades, our faith life is inevitably diminished. If we want the next generation to understand and honor the sacred in a way that securely puts them on a path to their personal excellence in holiness, we have to model it again. It starts with us—recovering that sense of awe, treating holy places as holy, and letting our actions teach what our words alone cannot.