Priest kneeling at communion?

  • Thread starter Thread starter pray4priests
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
P

pray4priests

Guest
Hi all! My first post, so be gentle.

I attended Mass last weekend at a Parish out of state, and noticed a couple of odd occurances. First, the Priest completely omitted the “I confess to Almighty God…”, what I have heard referred to as the Confession of Faith. Is this permissable?

As I was mightily unimpressed with his sermon and his gross overemphasis on “social justice” issues, I wouldn’t be too surprised if he was freelancing on this, but I don’t want to judge this out of ignorance.

Second, and more disturbing, was when I went forward to receive communion. In my home parish, our pastor encourages us all to receive kneeling, on the tongue. So I approached the celebrant and dropped to one knee. To my complete surprise, the priest also dropped to his knees, bringing the Eucharist to my level, before offering it to me!! Has anyone ever heard of this before? Is there some legitimate reason why this priest would do such a thing?

(My brother, a 44 year old doctor, was behind me in line; he later told me that he was tempted to kneel as well, just to see if the priest was looking for extra exercise. In charity, he resisted the impulse.)

I absolutely love these forums. The web can be a scary place, sometimes, with great capacity for tempting one to evil. Catholic Answers is a refuge in a troubled sea.

Thank you and God Bless!
 
40.png
pray4priests:
Second, and more disturbing, was when I went forward to receive communion. In my home parish, our pastor encourages us all to receive kneeling, on the tongue. So I approached the celebrant and dropped to one knee. To my complete surprise, the priest also dropped to his knees, bringing the Eucharist to my level, before offering it to me!! Has anyone ever heard of this before? Is there some legitimate reason why this priest would do such a thing?
Click to expand...
I’ve never seen that before in my life. Do you think he was trying to embarrass you or do you think he was just making sure he didn’t do anything dumb, like drop the host or miss your mouth? Maybe he’s never given on the tongue before? 🙂 I dunno. That’s just weird.

As for the sermon, what do you mean by freelance? If you mean, wrote it himself, I think they all do, which is why some are crappy and some are not. I’ve met too many priests with absolutely no gift for it and I wonder how much training they actually get on preparing their homilies. Some of the craziest ideas get expressed during homilies, but I’m not always sure that they are purposely trying to be heterodox. I just think some of them don’t have the skill to coherently link their thoughts together and relate it to the actual message in the Gospel. Or do you mean that he was speaking without any prepared notes?
 
40.png
pray4priests:
Hi all! My first post, so be gentle.

I attended Mass last weekend at a Parish out of state, and noticed a couple of odd occurances. First, the Priest completely omitted the “I confess to Almighty God…”, what I have heard referred to as the Confession of Faith. Is this permissable?

As I was mightily unimpressed with his sermon and his gross overemphasis on “social justice” issues, I wouldn’t be too surprised if he was freelancing on this, but I don’t want to judge this out of ignorance.

Second, and more disturbing, was when I went forward to receive communion. In my home parish, our pastor encourages us all to receive kneeling, on the tongue. So I approached the celebrant and dropped to one knee. To my complete surprise, the priest also dropped to his knees, bringing the Eucharist to my level, before offering it to me!! Has anyone ever heard of this before? Is there some legitimate reason why this priest would do such a thing?

(My brother, a 44 year old doctor, was behind me in line; he later told me that he was tempted to kneel as well, just to see if the priest was looking for extra exercise. In charity, he resisted the impulse.)

I absolutely love these forums. The web can be a scary place, sometimes, with great capacity for tempting one to evil. Catholic Answers is a refuge in a troubled sea.

Thank you and God Bless!
Click to expand...
I might guess that the priest did this as a form of ridicule. I do know that several priests here will refuse Holy Communion to anyone who kneels and a few will refuse to place the Blessed Sacrament on your tongue. Even though the Bishops have warned them not to refuse. However we do have a priest local here that will not offer Holy Communion in the hand only on the tongue and by intinction. You have no choice, which is also wrong.

It should be remembered that if one is going to receive Holy Communion kneeling. They should kneel, not genuflect. Both knees should be on the floor.

However your pastor by encouraging all to receive kneeling is going against the Norm established by the US Bishops. Who last year when they approved the new GIRM stated that the norm for receiving Holy Communion in the US is standing, however anyone who kneels is not to be refused. They are to be spoken to after Mass.
 
I would think that he did this so not to drop the sacrament from a standing position… but maybe I’m reading it wrong.
–Ann
 
They are to be spoken to after Mass.
Click to expand...
Spoken to sounds like a reprimand - I think more accurately it says
“should be addressed pastorally, by providing the faithful with the proper catechesis on the reasons for this norm”.
Click to expand...
(It does not describe what constitutes “proper catechesis”.)

Even so dioceses vary in practice. Bishop Fabian Bruskewitz of Lincoln, Nebraska, has specifically stated that people may kneel if they prefer, other Dioceses are very strict.

To have a priest ridicule anyone during Mass is hard to conceive of but I guess it happens.

Isn’t it interesting that some gesture of reverence before receiving is called for (people used to genuflect or make the sign of the cross or bow) but now I see very few doing this - probably afraid they will be ridiculed if they even do the prescribed bow prior to receiving.

I am obedient to not kneeling when I attend an N.O.M. but I really don’t understand why Catholics should be forbidden any sign of reverence which has been normal in the past and is still the norm in some countries - there are so many serious liturgical abuses that need attention that this seems petty to me.
 
Thanks for all the replies.

Jennstall - I spoke about freelancing with regard to omitting the Confession of Faith, not the sermon. Acutally, most of the priest’s time for his sermon was spent asking the congregation questions like, “Ok, Who has a birthday today? Who is celebrating a wedding anniversary?” amd the like. Not that he tied these questions to anything else, he just invited everyone to applaud for anyone who responded “yes”.

With regard to the priest kneeling to offer the Host, my personal belief is that he did it because he wished to discourage people from kneeling in reverence. Have you noticed that almost all the changes to the liturgy involve removing gestures and language that is reverential? Church Authority seems never to propose ditching things like the sign of peace, etc.

Finally, I believe that receiving the Eucharist standing, and in the hand, is an indult from the Holy See, not the standing (pardon the pun) rule. The indult was granted because so many parish pastors were emulating protestant congregations in these matters and ignoring the rule. Remember, at the Vatican, one must receive kneeling and on the tongue.

Lastly, the GIRM is not the final rule on rituals and procedures. Where the GIRM exceeds its mandate, or actually contradicts the rule of the Holy See, Catholics may in good faith ignore it.
 
“Finally, I believe that receiving the Eucharist standing, and in the hand, is an indult from the Holy See, not the standing (pardon the pun) rule. The indult was granted because so many parish pastors were emulating protestant congregations in these matters and ignoring the rule. Remember, at the Vatican, one must receive kneeling and on the tongue.”

The US Bishops did ask permission and received it and made it THE NORM in the US.

“Lastly, the GIRM is not the final rule on rituals and procedures. Where the GIRM exceeds its mandate, or actually contradicts the rule of the Holy See, Catholics may in good faith ignore it.”

Say what? Who interprets the GIRM? NO not you. The Bishop does. If there is ever a contradiction between the GIRM and the instructions of the Holy See, it is the Holy See who will clarify it, no we are not free to ignore it.
 
Sorry Bro Rich, but the matter is closed, the USCCB exceeded its authority when it tried to make kneeling for communion illict. The CDW sent 3 letters to bishops saying that those who kneel for communion are not acting in an illicit manner, also we much remeber that a norm does not have the force of canon law.

In any event, in my diocese, 2 parishes, incuding the one I go to still use an altar rail, and another parish has many who kneel for communion.
 
40.png
JNB:
Sorry Bro Rich, but the matter is closed, the USCCB exceeded its authority when it tried to make kneeling for communion illict. The CDW sent 3 letters to bishops saying that those who kneel for communion are not acting in an illicit manner, also we much remeber that a norm does not have the force of canon law.

In any event, in my diocese, 2 parishes, incuding the one I go to still use an altar rail, and another parish has many who kneel for communion.
Click to expand...
I wish we all still had altar rails and used them but very few still have them. The Bishops never tried to ban kneeling when receiving Holy Comunion. They even included that no one who does kneel should be denied Communion. Establishing liturgical norms is within the competency of the Bishops conferences as well as individual Bishops in certain areas.

Read the latest Instruction on the Liturgy from Rome. It makes very clear the role of the Bishops in relationship to the liturgy.
 
Our parish priest seldom, if ever says the “I confess” at Mass. I really don’t know why. And everybody receives communion standing, some in hand and some on the tongue. We have no communion rail. Since the church was built in the mid-sixties, I doubt if it ever did.
 
Canon law protecting the laity trumps a norm. The laity have a right to receive communion standing or kneeling, end of discussion.
 
40.png
JNB:
Canon law protecting the laity trumps a norm. The laity have a right to receive communion standing or kneeling, end of discussion.
Click to expand...
I’m glad we agree.
 
We don’t have any idea as to the intention in the Priests heart at that moment, therefore we cannot judge, much as we would like to.

We could always speculate but that is futile.

God Bless,
fergal
 
Hi Pray4priests,
What an appropriate name! Fergal is correct we cannot judge what was in his heart…
perhaps as he reflected on his action later, (assuming his action was a challenge) he felt some sort of remorse …
After all, he’s not here to “bruise the reed” as a very humble elderly priest once told me …Annunciata:)
 
I would not go so far as to critize this priest

Without a paten being present, the position your priest took was good one for insuring the host was not dropped in the process.

There was a reason altar boys held patens when the faithful were using the communion rails.
 
40.png
Pray4Priests:
First, the Priest completely omitted the “I confess to Almighty God…”, what I have heard referred to as the Confession of Faith. Is this permissable?
Click to expand...
“I confess…” is one option that may be performed as the Penitential Rite. Another is the Kyrie eleison (Lord, have mercy/Christ, Have Mercy).
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top