Fr Zeee, the blogger bloggorum has posted a email he received recently of which I quote a portion...
...thinking that kneeling while receiving communion is no different from standing and receiving it in the hands because "Cogito, ergo sum; thus if I think I am reverent, I am" and sterilizing the Novus Ordo form of the mass of its sensory elements, physicality being essential to a sacrament. [M]ost in the Church simply don’t realize how scientism has stealthily poisoned the modern Catholic Church.
The great battle of the Church is against Cartesianism, it always has been so, ever since Eve dethroned God and placed herself at the centre of the universe and eat the fruit. The first commandment, telling us to have no god before God is anti-Cartesian because the god most of us want to place before God is ourself, "I".
Original sin is "I" centredness, Christ liberates us from "I" by commanding us to transcend self by loving God first and foremost and secondly our neighbour as ourselves.
All religions ultimately call us to move from "self" to "other", even stick worshippers. The sacrifice of Christ most perfectly fulfils all religion because it is the ultimate act of selfgiving.
9 comments:
Orthodox priest Fr Stephen Freeman's post today dovetails neqtly with your own:
http://fatherstephen.wordpress.com/2010/05/07/our-selves-our-souls-our-bodies-more-on-faith/
In some parts of the world stick worship is believed to be the glue that holds society together.
Miichael,
religion, from re-ligere, to bind or tie together.
That has to be one of the all time best blog headlines!
Remember Mgr Knox's comment ?
The Cross is just 'I' crossed out.
" (The Liturgy)is careful to enjgage all our senses - all five of the physical senses and perhaps more as well. the icons, the music, the incense - these are not simply aides memoires, reminders; they are pointers towards the present moment, the "acceptable time", the moment of reality in which the liturgy lives...
One of the most important things we need to watch when we are in church is that our time there is not wasted or squandered. The church is not a place to give your mind an exercise. The mind specialises in being in any time but the present, and anywhere but here. Since the time in church should be a concentrated effort to experience the present moment, the mind is not actually very useful."
- Fr Meletios Webber, Bread & Water, Wine & Oil
A Church of Scotland minister is said to have declared scathingly, many years ago now, that if Catholics really believed in the Real Presence in the tabernacle, they would crawl into church on their bellies!
Personally, I think that would be going too far, since I for one, would have difficulty in getting up again.
But the least we can do is to receive with signs of reverence, kneeling and in the mouth, the former as a public declaration to the minister and his ilk of what we believe, and the latter so that we, the laity, do not have to touch the sacred host with our un-anointed hands.
I have noticed that in the absence of kneelers more people now bow reverently before receiving the host, surely a strong hint to the PP that kneelers should be provided!
Jacobi,
The Bishops of Australia asked everyone to bow reverently before receiving Holy Communion. In my experience, most now, do bow reverently.
JARay
Re kneeling for Communion, perhaps if a church has a prie-dieu or two, they could be placed each side of and slightly in front of the PP so that anyone wishing to receive kneeling could do so, without causing too much disruption.
It would give the PP an idea of how many want to kneel and allow communicants to follow a good example.
Just a thought.
Post a Comment