I don't see any review from an Annie, nor anything posted in a June review. However, as a young-ish Catholic who is new to the area, I must say that I didn't feel welcome or respected at this church.
Call me naive, but I had hoped to find a community of Catholics who supported my lifestyle as a young, unmarried, conservative Catholic. Instead, I found ridicule and derision from people my parents' age and older. I received open criticism when I mentioned simple things like: daily Mass, the Rosary; Theology of the Body,etc. It felt like St. Brendan people made a deliberate decision to exclude strict Catholics from their brood; the rallying cry was the ever-tiresome "spirit-of-Vatican-II" when people said/taught that their political preference (i.e. heresy; e.g. birth control, immigration (this is a bilingual parish, and I still overheard white parishioners complaining about the "damn Mexicans" during coffee and donuts after mass), etc) trumped the catechism.
And the devout young people are being told that Satan has a hand in *their* response to this rejection?
I tried to talk the pastor about this. I had hoped that, since I was new to the place, he would make time for me. But he blew off our meeting and sent me to meet the PA, who made it clear that she didn't like "young neo-conservatives upending [her] work." (She said that after I asked if there were TOB resources at this church. I cancelled our second meeting after hearing this commentary.)
I don't have any right to impugn the spirituality of the people at this parish. But it seems to me like they are more interested in being "Saint Brendan" than they are being "one, holy, catholic, and apostolic" with the rest of the Church. And based on the verbiage of other reviews here, it sounds like anyone who objects to the way this parish operates is instantly, automatically labelled as being motivated by "Satan's hand." I don't know if that's a knee-jerk thing for charismatics, or if the people there are just really full of themselves/defensive/angry. Either way, it's not the way Christians behave.
Neither the parish, nor the community are worth your time or money. And if you're a new Seattlite like me, go anywhere else for mass. This place is what our Lord called "infertile ground." read more