Question on Altar Cloth

[sacristan1]

My question is regarding the altar cloth at my new parish. Everywhere I have served there has always been a white altar cloth on the altar for mass. At the parish I am attending now, the top altar cloth is always the color of the liturgical season. There is a small white cloth at the side where the altar servers patens are placed for cleaning during the purification and of course the white corporal, but no white cloth covering the mensa. I am familiar with the GIRM # 304 that gives instruction on the altar cloth indicating the uppermost cloth on the altar must be white in color. How can I approach this matter gingerly. This truly bothers me and I am so new that I just don’t know how to go about asking about it. Do I just let it go or bring it to someone’s attention?

 

[DCNBILL]

My question is regarding the altar cloth at my new parish. Everywhere I have served there has always been a white altar cloth on the altar for mass. At the parish I am attending now, the top altar cloth is always the color of the liturgical season. There is a small white cloth at the side where the altar servers patens are placed for cleaning during the purification and of course the white corporal, but no white cloth covering the mensa. I am familiar with the GIRM # 304 that gives instruction on the altar cloth indicating the uppermost cloth on the altar must be white in color. How can I approach this matter gingerly. This truly bothers me and I am so new that I just don’t know how to go about asking about it. Do I just let it go or bring it to someone’s attention?

If you know who is responsible for decorating the sanctuary you could forward them a copy of the GIRM instructions, sometimes these things are not so much a matter of disobedience but of ignorance.

 

[laszlo]

Are you in the US?

This is the regulation for the universal Church

1. At least one cloth should be placed on the altar out of reverence for the celebration of the memorial of the Lord and the banquet that gives us his body and blood. The shape, size, and decoration of the altar cloth should be in keeping with the design of the altar.
   ewtn.com/library/CURIA/GIRM.HTM

This is for the US

1. Out of reverence for the celebration of the memorial of the Lord and for the banquet in which the Body and Blood of the Lord are offered on an altar where this memorial is celebrated, there should be at least one white cloth, its shape, size, and decoration in keeping with the altar’s design. When, in the dioceses of the United States of America, other cloths are used in addition to the altar cloth, then those cloths may be of other colors possessing Christian honorific or festive significance according to longstanding local usage, provided that the uppermost cloth covering the mensa (i.e., the altar cloth itself) is always white in color.

nccbuscc.org/liturgy/current/chapter5.shtml#sect2

 

[sacristan1]

Thank you so much for your answers. I do not know who is responsible for caring for the sanctuary…this is a very large parish. Should I try to bring this to someone’s attention and if so, what would be the most appropriate way to do that without creating ill feelings.
There are several priests and a couple deacons and it surprises me that no one has mentioned this before.