Norms for Altar & Ambo Building/Placement

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929dad said:
What makes a different shape inappropriate? All these discussions about the placement and decoration of things in a worship space seem to boil down to the tastes of the community. As longs as the appropriate rules and guidelines have been observed, we should embrace creative impetus given to us by the Spirit. Said another way, just because it’s new, doesn’t automatically make it bad.
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No one said new is bad, but some stuff is just bad! Some things appear to go in a park, not in a place of worship.
 
corsair said:
Its amazing how folks like to “put words in Jesus’s mouth”. As far as the pictures of the Altars are concerned, well they are “Ugly as Sin”.
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Lol agreed. I can see the scenario, Jesus walks in and looks at the altar and says, “this is the best you could have done? What happen to the money that through my grace you were able to obtain for remodeling?” “Well my Lord we spent half on the altar and the rest for music books with modern music in them and these non-offensive stained glass windows” says the president of the parish council. Then Jesus just :rolleyes: his eyes. LOL
 
What about how many altars a church can have in the sanctuary? I ask because in a local parish where I go to confession the chapel has two octagonal altars, one right by the other. They used to have one to the side, and they just suddenly added another just like it next to it and further forward. So now there are two, and it seems very weird to be honest. Can a church have two altars in one sanctuary?
 
cothrige said:
What about how many altars a church can have in the sanctuary? I ask because in a local parish where I go to confession the chapel has two octagonal altars, one right by the other. They used to have one to the side, and they just suddenly added another just like it next to it and further forward. So now there are two, and it seems very weird to be honest. Can a church have two altars in one sanctuary?
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The answer to that is yes, since some of the older churches have both a free-standing altar and the pre-Vatican II altar that is fixed to the wall and can be used for the Extraordinary Form Mass. Lucky those parishes where a sledge hammer wasn’t taken to the marble altars in the mid 60s.

The set up you describe though is just weird. Are they the same size? Both free-standing?
 
Phemie said:
The answer to that is yes, since some of the older churches have both a free-standing altar and the pre-Vatican II altar that is fixed to the wall and can be used for the Extraordinary Form Mass. Lucky those parishes where a sledge hammer wasn’t taken to the marble altars in the mid 60s.

The set up you describe though is just weird. Are they the same size? Both free-standing?
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Yep. They are identical and both free-standing. The first had been there since the church was built I believe, and sat off center in the sanctuary. Then one day there was another, just like it, about two or three feet to the side and forward of it. I have no idea how they use them as I don’t go to Mass at that particular church. I only go there for confession. I have to tell you it looks really weird, to say the least.
 
cothrige said:
What about how many altars a church can have in the sanctuary? I ask because in a local parish where I go to confession the chapel has two octagonal altars, one right by the other. They used to have one to the side, and they just suddenly added another just like it next to it and further forward. So now there are two, and it seems very weird to be honest. Can a church have two altars in one sanctuary?
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This is purely based on a 13-year old memory of my previous parish’s move into a new building. The old building was built in 1969; aside from the building itself being shaped to look like a dove from above, it had a separate chapel for tabernacle and daily mass. Both this chapel and main sanctuary had permanently fixed limestone altars. When we moved to the new building in the late 1990s, the archbishop said we couldn’t take both altars with us because we were only permitted one fixed altar according to …? (The new building was more “open concept” without the separate chapel.) Thus, we had the main altar moved and were permitted a “mobile” altar for the side section of chairs used for daily mass.
 
Cor_ad_Cor said:
This is purely based on a 13-year old memory of my previous parish’s move into a new building. The old building was built in 1969; aside from the building itself being shaped to look like a dove from above, it had a separate chapel for tabernacle and daily mass. Both this chapel and main sanctuary had permanently fixed limestone altars. When we moved to the new building in the late 1990s, the archbishop said we couldn’t take both altars with us because we were only permitted one fixed altar according to …? (The new building was more “open concept” without the separate chapel.) Thus, we had the main altar moved and were permitted a “mobile” altar for the side section of chairs used for daily mass.
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Re: the bolded part:
That is probably because there is an important significance of having only one altar, because the altar represents christ. That is why even having a high altar and a freestanding altar is not desirable. Of course, keeping the high altar would be better.
From the CDWDS:
[GIRM 299] does not require … that existing altars be pulled away from the wall.
 
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