Please tell me what the kneeling actually means

[Lapey]

The problem with ‘blessing’ is that only priest or bishops have the right to bless officially, and the communion in the majority of the parishes is distributed by laymen and laywomen. They are not authorized to bless.

I would tend to agree with the documents and most of the comments that to “give a blessing” at this time inside the liturgy is inappropriate. With that said, blessings of many types and purposes are appropriate in their context. My reasoning for commenting is that you left out the deacon. The deacon is also the ordinary minister of many different blessing occassions; of objects and people and buildings, whatever may need to be blessed for furthering the sactification of the faithfull.

There are certain situations and instances where it is only proper for a bishop to give a blessing, naturally that would disqualify the priest and deacon. I would have to go back to the books to list the instances, but there are several. The main example I can give is the sacremental oils blessed at the diosecan Chrism Mass. This can only be done by the sitting diosecan bishop. It cannot even be done by the vicar general in the absence of a sitting bishop.

 

[w0231136]

Did he make the Sign of the Cross over you? If not, it wasn’t a blessing.

Yes he touched my forhead and did a cross over me.

 

[Jim_Dandy]

Yes he touched my forhead and did a cross over me.

Then it was a blessing. This is probably approved by the bishop of the diocese. If so, the bishop and the priest are both disobedient to the Vatican regarding this practice. Perhaps they don’t know it is strongly disapproved; but they should know. Again, the liturgy belongs to the universal Church, and no individual has the right to change it. Individual blessings are not authorized during the liturgy. Before or after Mass, it would be fine, but not during the Mass. See the documents of Vatican II, the quote from the Catechism, and the directive from the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments in Rome I posted previously.

As noted in the directive from Rome, everyone in the congregation receives a blessing only a few minutes later. Not only are such blessings forbidden, they are redundant. It sends a message that the final blessing of the congregation is not effective and that those who “get blessed” obtain a personal blessing that others at the Mass don’t receive. There are other problems with what it teaches.

Through every word, every movement, every gesture of the Mass the Church is teaching. She has the right to say how and what she will teach. The Church says, “Don’t mess with the Mass.”

All clergy should follow the GIRM (General Instructions for the Roman Missal) and Redemtionis Sacramentum in the celebration of Mass. They both can be read on the 'Net.

Jim Dandy