Holy Thursday - Foot Washing Ritual

[The_Reginator]

It was party time in our parish this year.
Young children running up to take part in the spectacle, men and women washing each other’s feet.
I had to do a lot of heavy praying during this just to keep a proper perspective on the Mass.

 

[Malkin71]

I have a question regarding the ritual washing of feet on Holy Thursday Mass.

In a nutshell, is it valid for women’s feet to be washed in that ritual?

I live in the Archdiocese of Washington DC and I’ve heard conflicting stories on this matter.

Some parishes do, others don’t. In fact, in my own parish, the Hispanic community has only ever washed men’s feet, whereas the english speaking community has washed both men and women’s feet for some time (some say as long as 30 years). The 30 years is significant (ref Canon 22 - 28):

vatican.va/archive/ENG1104/__P4.HTM

That being said, I’ve seen other links that seem to say that only men may have their feet washed. Ref:

cuf.org/Faithfacts/details_view.asp?ffID=71

ewtn.com/library/Liturgy/ZLITUR26.HTM

Finally, here’s something from the ADW:

usccb.org/liturgy/q%26a/general/feet.shtml

Thank you in advance for your thoughts on this matter.

I am all in favor of having only men having their feet washed. I stopped going to Holy Thursday Mass because of this. It was difficult to see how some of the women dressed when they were on the altar. Especially one person comes to mind.

 

[AwaitingHeaven]

Hi Folks,

Well, it is nearly one year since my initial posting here. After last year’s incident, I decided to join our parish’s Liturgy Committee in the hopes of being an official voice and recommend that our parish be faithful to the norms and teachings as put forward by our Roman Catholic Church.

Our parish liturgy committee meets once per month and with Lent beginning on Feb 17th, our committee met and planned for Lent earlier this week.

I asked if we intended to wash the feet of just men as proscribed by the Sacramentary. The answer was no, that both men and women’s feet would be washed. Our pastor (same as from the year before) was not there when this discussion started, but came in mid-way. Everyone seemed very uneasy about the subject. BTW, our committee is composed of more women than men.

I tried to explain the matter, citing my concern over disunity with Rome and the how the all male priesthood might come into question for some when they witness the washing the feet of 12 men and women…

My concerns were essentially dismissed with comments to the effect that I am likely the only one thinking that way. Interestingly (sadly), someone from our Liturgy Committee did remark that they were not sure about the all male priesthood, which, to me, was proof in and of itself that my suspicions were true.

When our pastor arrived and he said we would be washing both men and women’s feet. He cited standing custom, compliance with USCCB guidance, mentioned our own Archbishop washing the feet of women, stated that this is a very minor rite in the Church.

Of the 10-12 people in that meeting, I seemed to be alone, at least nobody spoke up and all were nervously looking around as either our pastor or one of the leading women of the group, a consecrated virgin mind you, did most of the talking.

There were 4 other men there that evening.

So, sadly, our parish will once again be performing this ritual in an illicit manner.

During advent, I wrote a letter to our bishop, citing this matter and asking for clarification and a response to these concerns. As of yet, I have not heard anything.

Should I not receive a response from our bishop, or receive a response that simply points me to the USCCB’s ruling on the matter, I am contemplating writing to the papal nuncio and asking for assistance.

Longer term, I will encourage others that feel as I do about this issue to join our Liturgy Committee, especially women.

Any further advice?

 

[jmcrae]

Any further advice?

Yes; try to find out where it’s coming from. Not that you can really stop it. I noticed that the leader of our Bible Study is “prepping” the Bible Study participants to agitate for female foot-washing, this year, by equating male-only foot-washing with slavery and women not being allowed to vote, etc.

Some of the Bible Study participants are in key positions on Parish Council, so I expect we’re going to have someone propose this to happen, this year. The priests are from India, and it won’t be very difficult to convince them that this is “longstanding Canadian custom that we must follow, in order to be liked by the people.” It doesn’t help that in other parishes in the Diocese, they do even weirder things that this. (One parish has the foot-washing done by the Altar Servers instead of by the priest, including female servers, which to my way of thinking completely defeats the point of the exercise.)

Fortunately, the office secretary (who isn’t from India) takes the traditional view, so if the proposal is discussed in the office, she’ll put in her own emotional two-cents - she’ll say something like “you’d never catch me taking my panty-hose off for a priest,” which hopefully will shut down the discussion right there and then - assuming she’s given the chance, of course - if the discussion takes place outside of the office, then it will likely end up that she will, in fact, be taking her panty hose off for the priest. I’ve already given her a heads-up, though, of what’s going on in the Bible Study, so if it does happen, she knows who to blame.

What I find, though, is that the liberals argue from an emotional stand-point, which is really difficult to combat with logic and rules. Once people have become emotionally convinced of something, the only way to reverse the damage is by means of another emotional argument.

 

[Phemie]

Yes; try to find out where it’s coming from. Not that you can really stop it.

What I find, though, is that the liberals argue from an emotional stand-point, which is really difficult to combat with logic and rules. Once people have become emotionally convinced of something, the only way to reverse the damage is by means of another emotional argument.

In my recent experience it comes from the pastor. I haven’t had one in the past 12 years who would have agreed to deliberately washing only the feet of men. Now if only men volunteered, so be it, but they wouldn’t recruit only men.

It doesn’t help that the ORDO released by the CCCB says to have a cross section of people from the parish. They’ll argue that if you exclude women and children you don’t have a cross-section of anything.

For the record, here’s the USCCB’s response to the question:
I

usccb.org/liturgy/q&a/general/feet.shtml

The CCCB in its publication on Holy Week doesn’t even mention the priesthood aspect of the Washing of the feet:* At the Last Supper, Jesus washed his apostles’ feet to give them an example of love and service. Its re-enactment is a reminder that all Christians are called to love and to serve others.*

cccb.ca/site/content/view/2326/1226/lang,eng/

 

[benedictgal]

Here is what the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments noted in its authoritative document, Paschale Solemnitatis:

1. The washing of the feet of chosen men which, according to tradition, is performed on this day, represents the service and charity of Christ, who came “not to be served, but to serve.” [58] This tradition should be maintained, and its proper significance explained.

Even though this document was promulgated back in 1988, it has not been abrogated. This document should be the guiding principle for any parish planning Lent and Holy Week services.

adoremus.org/PaschaleSolemnitatis.html#anchor268078

Bear in mind that the statement made by the USCCB was made one year before PS came into effect. Thus, the statement made by the CDWDS remains the prevailing one.

 

[EvelynEVF]

I’ll be interested to see what my parish does this year. We have a newer priest who seems to be transitioning away from some of the illicit stuff his predecessor did. Last year he explained that the “everybody washes everybody” model we had been doing was very nice and many people loved it, but it wasn’t an appropriate thing for this liturgy. So he washed the feet of 12 volunteers, The sign up sheets were up for a loooong time before they got filled in. I think people were all fine with their own spouse/children, but once it was just the priest doing the washing, it was less comfortable. I wonder if this year he will take the next step to men only.

 

[jmcrae]

In my recent experience it comes from the pastor. I haven’t had one in the past 12 years who would have agreed to deliberately washing only the feet of men. Now if only men volunteered, so be it, but they wouldn’t recruit only men.

It doesn’t help that the ORDO released by the CCCB says to have a cross section of people from the parish. They’ll argue that if you exclude women and children you don’t have a cross-section of anything.

The only group in the parish that hasn’t got any males in it is the CWL - which has the priest as its spiritual director, so he, actually, could be representing them.

I always thought it was supposed to be a representation of those who were ordained to service by means of the priesthood, though. And I have never met any women who needed lessons on serving. C. S. Lewis pointed out that the least religious woman probably performs more service in the course of her daily routine than the most saintly man in all of Christendom, with the possible exception of Christ Himself.

 

[amystephan]

Sadly we received a new priest last June who has announced that the foot washing will be ommitted from the Mass. He has been vey proud to announce during Mass that all of the Holy Week Masses will be sweet, respectful, to the point and most of all short. He is a “balla bing, balla boom and done” person. Does not want to be inconvienced any longer than absolutely necessary. Get them in and get them out. He also cut the youths’ presentation of the living stations down to eight. He was quoted as saying he didn’t want anyone in the church longer than a half hour. This also included the benediction. Which, if I had been a vistor to the church last week, I would have thought that the Priest was the Deacon and that the Deacon was an incompetant Priest that needed the Deacon to tell him what to do.

Sorry to go on. We are having a VERY difficult time tranistioning. Our Parish is shrinking weekly.

 

[Mrs_Sally]

I deeply appreciate everyone’s sharing both knowledge and opinion.

It seems we there’s a wide range of experiences here, from the very orthodox (full compliance with the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church - ie - 12 men) to a free for all (washing of hands, everyone washing feet, etc).

My dilemma is that our parish and apparently our archdiocese has been non-compliant for some time, and upon approaching my pastor about this non-compliance, I’ve been told that our ritual will include both men and women.

I do not want to be disobedient to my pastor, nor to my bishop, but I also do not want our Church or Archdiocese to be disobedient to the Holy Father and the Roman Catholic Church.

Any advise on what I should do next?

By the way, I’ve received much support from both men AND women of the parish wishing for us to return to orthodoxy here. In fact, much like this on-line poll, the sentiment is a landslide towards orthodoxy. There are a few in the parish though, including our pastor, that feel very strongly that this ritual must include both men and women.

Thank you in advance for your continued guidance and prayers.

What would your pastor do if the women selected simply refused to participate? If the overall parish sentiment is to not have women participate, than the women asked can simply say no. Our parish usually washes the feet of 12 men from the KoC, perhaps it would work to simply arrange for 12 knights or males ushers tobe the ones to come up.