Vaccine Passports:-

This week the First Minister updated the Scottish Parliament on the current situation. She confirmed the importance of regular testing and ventilation, as we have continued to emphasise for parishes. She also dealt with the issue of extending Vaccine Passports. The full details will be confirmed next week, but it looks likely that they will be extended to cinemas, theatres, and some hospitality venues.

The First Minister specifically said, however, that “exceptions would also be retained for worship, weddings, funerals and related gatherings.” Any extension of the scheme should not therefore affect us directly (although depending on the definition of “some hospitality venues” it may affect some activities in parish halls. I will update you should that occur).

There are no suggestions of further restrictions at the moment, but we see such things happening in other countries so we need to wait and see how things develop.  

Christmas

We have been asked about parishes which tend to have large attendances at some Christmas Masses, especially Vigils. Obviously we don’t know whether large numbers will come this year, and last year we had strict caps at Christmas so we can’t assume things will be the same this year. We would say that parishes which normally have large numbers attending the Vigil should have some booking system in place, even if only for that Mass. We don’t want a situation where people are crowded in, standing around the walls, etc., and if that’s likely we need to adopt some approach that helps avoid it, and booking in advance is preferable to turning people away on the night.

There is no decision about this as yet but everyone will be kept informed of any changes in circumstances concerning Christmas masses.