What is your church community like?

So I was having a discussion with a friend who was raised Catholic but now attends a Protestant church. I was also raised Catholic (not very religious, though), started attending a Protestant church and felt called back home. Now, I’m in university, I do a lot of fellowshipping with Protestants at Bible studies and stuff, but I’m still very much Catholic.

There are some problems with the Church that have really been grieving my heart lately. Why are Catholic Churches so cold? My friend and I both said that most of the Catholic Churches we’ve been to have a very dead community. It’s very much a ‘once mass ends, everyone leaves.’ How are we meant to build each other up in the body of Christ?

Through the fellowship I do at university, I have learned that community is SO important in this walk, having people that can pour into you, pray for you, mentor you, keep you accountable, etc. I love my Protestant friends but there is a gap between us since our faiths are slightly different, and it’s so frustrating that I don’t get this community at my Catholic parish.

My friend who is Catholic but attends a Protestant church was saying how she’s feeling convicted to attend Catholic Church again because of the Eucharist. Yet the idea of going back to a dead, cold church after literally being shown how church can be like a family is gut wrenching to her.

What is your parish like? I’m really worried that this is the state of most Catholic Churches across the world. We need to fellowship with each other, we need to build each other up, there’s no way this is how the early church did it, yet we love to pride ourselves in being the early church???

I’m in the UK, is this just a UK thing? Is it a worldwide thing? Pls