Update, July 31, 2024: Spanish bishop condemns ‘scandal’ of apparent pool-side Mass, priest apologizes after outrage
WAINGUGNA, Spain (LifeSiteNews) — A Spanish Salesian priest celebrated Mass on the side of a swimming pool, allowing a boy and girl in their bathing suits to elevate the chalice and the host.
In recent days, a Salesian priest offered a Novus Ordo Mass for the Spanish summer camp participants he was chaplaining for. The notable aspect about the Mass was that it was held on the side of the swimming pool of the camp headquarters, with the assembled teenagers in the pool in their swimming costumes.
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Father Marco Antonio Martínez Moreno posted since-deleted images of the Mass onto his social media pages, on which he is particularly active. The images depict Moreno, vested in his alb and stole, standing behind a low table positioned right on the edge of the swimming pool.
One image depicts him addressing the teenagers and young children in the pool, another shows him sitting on the edge of the pool with his feet in the water while still vested and addressing the group.
Yet another image shows Moreno – still liturgically vested – flanked by a girl in a bikini and a boy in swimming shorts during the Mass. The girl is holding the chalice aloft, and the boy is holding the host in a manner which would appear to be the elevation of the consecrated species that occurs at the end of the Canon of the Mass.

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The original images of the Mass were deleted by Moreno after InfoVaticana published a report on July 30.
The General Instruction of the Roman Missal (GIRM) containing the rubrics for the Novus Ordo states that Mass should be held “in a church or, if there is no church or if it is too small, then in another respectable place that is nonetheless worthy of so great a mystery.”
For the congregation’s positioning, the GIRM notes that they “should be arranged with appropriate care so that they are able to participate in the sacred celebrations, duly following them with their eyes and their attention.”
The Salesian summer camp for which Moreno was the chaplain appears to have been mostly based around water sports, with Moreno’s numerous photos and videos documenting that camp participants spent the majority of time in swimwear, such as shorts and bikinis.
Posting a short video to his Facebook page that showed the camp members dancing in their swimwear to pop music, Moreno commented “And after the training day in the morning and a splendid afternoon, it’s time to celebrate the night with Salesian joy giving it all. Don Bosco already said it: Love what they love so that they love what we love.”
The event was held in the Diocese of Asidonia-Jerez, led by Bishop José Rico Pavés, an auxiliary bishop until moved to the diocese in 2021. LifeSite has contacted both him and the superiors of the Salesian provinces of Spain asking about the matter. This report will be updated upon receipt of a response.
The fact that Moreno has swiftly deleted the images of the Mass suggests that he, at the very least, has become aware of the attention he is drawing.
However, InfoVaticana reported that Moreno has a history of controversy, making headlines in 2020 for “doing magic tricks [in] a Mass with the students of the Nuestra Señora del Rosario school in Rota.”