Before Consecration during Divine Liturgy

[ConstantineTG]

There’s this part where the priest would wave this cloth (don’t know what its called) over the bread and wine (I believe this is before Consecration, please correct me if I got it wrong and its already the Precious Body and Blood of our Lord). So what is the priest doing here and why?

Thanks!

 

[chaldobyzantine]

The priest does this during the recitation of the creed. The cloth is called an Aër. Waving it is a symbol of the descent of the Holy Spirit. When a bishop is present, he kneels by the Holy Gifts and the Aër is waved above his head by priests.

youtube.com/watch?v=z8YWL3bkWGw

youtube.com/watch?v=hNGE_3fs-0U

 

[ConstantineTG]

The priest does this during the recitation of the creed. The cloth is called an Aër. Waving it is a symbol of the descent of the Holy Spirit. When a bishop is present, he bows over the Holy Gifts and the Aër is waved above his head by priests.

youtube.com/watch?v=z8YWL3bkWGw

youtube.com/watch?v=hNGE_3fs-0U

Yes, I’ve seen that. We had 2 priest and the Bishop. Then next week just the two priests. Normally of course we only have our usual priest.

 

[Mojo674]

Also the aer blocks the face of the priest from the Holy Gifts. This represents the constant shadowing of God in the Old Testament. God was “hidden” in a cloud, pillar of fire, wind, and especially when Isaiah was in the Temple and he had his Revelation, same with Zechariah. It represents that God is hidden even from the priest because the Holy Spirit is descending upon the Gifts as chaldo said.

 

[5Loaves]

youtube.com/watch?v=hNGE_3fs-0U

In this clip with Metropolitan JONAH and Bishop TIKHON you also hear the bells rung which we only have when our altar server is present.