Have you ever participated in the consecration of a new church?

[stbruno]

Today I was reading this wonderful rite in the blessing & consecration of a new church. francisdesales.com/consecration/amberg.htm I have never seen this done. Our own parish is close to 90 years old, well before I was born. I wonder if this is still done this way?!

 

[Uncle_Norbert]

I’m trying to find out if/how a Catholic Church building is “UN-consecrated” when taken out of use. I can’t seem to get an answer. Surely, somebody on this forum has the answer?

 

[cameron_lansing]

A church is a sacred place. i.e., a place designated for divine worship, and it is made so by either dedication or blessing (c. 1205).

Canon 1212 provides that sacred places lose their dedication or blessing if they suffer major destruction or if they have been permanently given over to profane uses, de facto or through a decree of the competent ordinary. Here “profane” just means not sacred.

The diocesan bishop must hear (i.e., consult) the presbyteral council, and then he can relegate the church to profane but not sordid use, according to the conditions in canon 1222. The conditions can be viewed by looking up that canon, and that can be easily done on the internet. He effects this through a decree that says the building is no longer designated for sacred worship, and that it is no longer blessed or dedicated.

The altar does not automatically loose its status by this action though. An additional decree would be needed to “remove” the blessing or dedication (c. 1238).

The Blessed Sacrament is removed, and the items for sacred worship are generally removed (such as chalices, tabernacle, etc) and stored. The items are often sent for use in poorer parishes or the mission Churches.

Keep in mind that this does not affect the existence of the parish to which the church building might belong. A parish is a community rather than a place, and It is only for the diocesan bishop to erect, suppress or alter parishes. He is neither to erect, suppress nor alter notably parishes, unless he has heard the presbyteral council (c. 515 §2). That would be an entirely separate question.

As to the initial question, the rites for dedication of a church and altar were revised in 1977. They are somewhat simpler than the former rites last updated in the Roman Missal in 1962, and there are separate rites for the laying of the foundation stone (which is blessed with holy water and just laid by the mason) or beginning work on the building.

At the dedication (and the other rites above) there is liberal use of holy water and incense, and various symbolic handing over of keys, or legal documents of ownership .

The walls and altar are anointed. If there are relics for the altar, they are sealed by a mason.

 

[Evan]

I have been witness to but not a participant in the dedication of a new church.

Ours was dedicated in 1999 and we were invited when the Korean community finished building theirs. The second was interesting. A small part of the ceremony/mass was in english. The part by the bishop. Everything else was in Korean.

We were put up front because the lady seating people was in formation at my wife’s Carmelite community and she is the director of formation. I sat next to the mayor of the city and she was not Catholic.

There was a letter of congradulations read from the Cardinal of Seoul, (he said he could not make it ).

A lot of use of oil, and blessing of the church, the altar, the vessels, the vestments.

I missed the decomissioning of our old Church (we moved to the new one).

 

[SMHW]

Today I was reading this wonderful rite in the blessing & consecration of a new church. francisdesales.com/consecration/amberg.htm I have never seen this done. Our own parish is close to 90 years old, well before I was born. I wonder if this is still done this way?!

I was present when our parish church was dedicated in the mid 1990s. We had a three day celebration of the event. Friday evening we had a prayer service in the original chapel of the first parish in town. There was a simultaneous prayer service in the location we had been using for Sunday Mass. There were processions from both locations which met up and finished processing to the new church.

Saturday was the Dedication Mass. As has been mentioned, the rites have been somewhat modified. The twelve candles are still used. (We light them only on the anniversary of the dedication, which took place on the feast day of our patron saint.) I couldn’t see everything that happened from where I was in the choir area but the Cardinal presided over the dedication Mass and there was definitely lots of incense, blessed oils, and holy water. (We all wondered what would happen with all the incense because the church had a fairly new, state-of-the art fire alarm and fire suppression system, but we managed to stay dry and alarm free that day. Hopefully it will work if there ever IS a fire.)

The Sunday after the dedication was also a big day since it was the first day our pastor was the main presider over the celebration of Mass .

 

[Uncle_Norbert]

A church is a sacred place. i.e., a place designated for divine worship, and it is made so by either dedication or blessing (c. 1205).

Canon 1212 provides that sacred places lose their dedication or blessing if they suffer major destruction or if they have been permanently given over to profane uses, de facto or through a decree of the competent ordinary. Here “profane” just means not sacred.

The diocesan bishop must hear (i.e., consult) the presbyteral council, and then he can relegate the church to profane but not sordid use, according to the conditions in canon 1222. The conditions can be viewed by looking up that canon, and that can be easily done on the internet. He effects this through a decree that says the building is no longer designated for sacred worship, and that it is no longer blessed or dedicated.

The altar does not automatically loose its status by this action though. An additional decree would be needed to “remove” the blessing or dedication (c. 1238).

The Blessed Sacrament is removed, and the items for sacred worship are generally removed (such as chalices, tabernacle, etc) and stored. The items are often sent for use in poorer parishes or the mission Churches.

Keep in mind that this does not affect the existence of the parish to which the church building might belong. A parish is a community rather than a place, and It is only for the diocesan bishop to erect, suppress or alter parishes. He is neither to erect, suppress nor alter notably parishes, unless he has heard the presbyteral council (c. 515 §2). That would be an entirely separate question.

As to the initial question, the rites for dedication of a church and altar were revised in 1977. They are somewhat simpler than the former rites last updated in the Roman Missal in 1962, and there are separate rites for the laying of the foundation stone (which is blessed with holy water and just laid by the mason) or beginning work on the building.

At the dedication (and the other rites above) there is liberal use of holy water and incense, and various symbolic handing over of keys, or legal documents of ownership .

The walls and altar are anointed. If there are relics for the altar, they are sealed by a mason.

Thank you very much for your answer

 

[Seatuck]

Yes! Our new parish church was consecrated by the Bishop 7 years ago. It was a beautiful and moving experience.

 

[AJV]

Today I was reading this wonderful rite in the blessing & consecration of a new church. francisdesales.com/consecration/amberg.htm I have never seen this done. Our own parish is close to 90 years old, well before I was born. I wonder if this is still done this way?!

There changes are very numerous. The old liturgy contained several blessings and exorcisms of water and salt and repeated sprinklings (first water and salt, then water and salt and wine, etc. ). Likewsiethe repeated crossings and anointings of the altar are all simplified- the old rite for example, had the anointing of the sepulcher for the relics, the anointing of the tablet, the anointing of the mortar. Then for the altar proper it was anointed in 5 places twice with the oil of catechumens and once with chrism (each anointing followed by a special incensing). The new rite has only one anointing without the prayers that accompanied the old, the altar being included a single prayer of dedication. Another chief difference is that the old rite took place before Mass and the new is integrated into the Mass.