Raising interlocked hands during the doxology

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blaskoman

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If holding hands during the Our Father is meant to express unity, what are we to make of raising of the hands during the doxology? (What I like to call the “blast off” phase). Does this gesture represent our unity lifted up to God? A casual observer may say that this portion of the prayer could be the high point of the Mass or at least more important than the Our Father! After all, raising ones arms is quite significant.
 
blaskoman said:
If holding hands during the Our Father is meant to express unity, what are we to make of raising of the hands during the doxology?..
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I don’t know, because the rubrics don’t envision hand holding during the Our Father. It’s a liturgical novelty that seems to suggest the false notion that our unity lies not in our union with Christ, but rather in our union with each other.

So you’ll have to ask whoever it was that invented it, if you can find them. I doubt that you’ll find a truly coherent answer.
 
blaskoman said:
If holding hands during the Our Father is meant to express unity, what are we to make of raising of the hands during the doxology?
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As a short person who has been subjected to this while holding the hand of a tall person, it can sometimes express penance rather than unity, when you are having your arm stretched farther than it should go by someone else … ouch! :o

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I prefer to just clasp my hands in personal prayer at that point.
 
the_phoenix said:
As a short person who has been subjected to this while holding the hand of a tall person, it can sometimes express penance rather than unity, when you are having your arm stretched farther than it should go by someone else … ouch! :o

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I know what you mean!! :cool:
 
blaskoman said:
If holding hands during the Our Father is meant to express unity, what are we to make of raising of the hands during the doxology? (What I like to call the “blast off” phase). Does this gesture represent our unity lifted up to God? A casual observer may say that this portion of the prayer could be the high point of the Mass or at least more important than the Our Father! After all, raising ones arms is quite significant.
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Haven’t we had enough of these threads already:confused:
 
I have never seen the congregation holding up their hands during the doxology. I presume the priest or the liturgical leaders of your parish told the people during the mass to do this. However, such an action is not really a part of the mass. If the congregation was told to do this, requiring the people to do this is out-of-line. What theological reason lies behind this there? You would have to ask the priest or liturgical leaders of the parish about this.
 
The holding of hands came to be when VCII brought changes to the liturgy. People were given little if any instruction as to what they should be doing. Many began this gesture not realizing what this part of the liturgy was about. This is not a time for comraderie. It is a time of surrender to what we are about to receive. Therefore a raising of the hands in the orans position…as if to say “I surrender” allows one to enter more fully into this part of the liturgy. When the changes came a few years back there was the opportunity for more catechesis in each parish as directed by local bishops. Unfortunately, many still do not understand this concept or were never told of this.
 
Our previous Archbishop sent a letter to all priests forbidding the laity in hand holding. To my knowledge the new Archbishop has not changed things. Unfortunately, nobody pays attention to the Archbishop. Pray for us. 😦
 
triumphguy said:
Haven’t we had enough of these threads already:confused:
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I don’t know but I suspect that others think. “Haven’t we had enough of these novelties already?”
I think that as long as you have these things happening you will have these threads! And as long as you have these threads you will have people sick of these threads.

If you give a mouse a cookie…
 
ClearWater said:
I prefer to just clasp my hands in personal prayer at that point.
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Same here. :gopray: Like that.
Hoosier_Daddy said:
I don’t know but I suspect that others think. “Haven’t we had enough of these novelties already?”
I think that as long as you have these things happening you will have these threads! And as long as you have these threads you will have people sick of these threads.

If you give a mouse a cookie…
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:amen:
 
corsair said:
Our previous Archbishop sent a letter to all priests forbidding the laity in hand holding. To my knowledge the new Archbishop has not changed things. Unfortunately, nobody pays attention to the Archbishop. Pray for us. 😦
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Yeah. When asked why he doesn’t stop people from doing this, our pastor simply sighed and said “Sometimes you just have to pick your battles.”

That’s the real problem. People get hostile when you tell them that something they’ve been doing for as long as they can remember is actually not supposed to be done. It’s a tough position for a pastor, because it’s a relatively small issue compared to the backlash that addressing it would provoke.
 
QUOTE=JoLoT Many began this gesture not realizing what this part of the liturgy was about. Well, actually JoLou, they did understand what that part of the liturgy was about. It was about a prayer that starts with “Our Father”, which is a communal petition, as opposed to a personal petitions such as “My Father”; and holding hands was seen as a sign of unity, with all uniting in the “Our /Father”.

It may well be that does not trip your trigger or float your boat; and as none other than Archbishop Chaput, when he was Archbishop of Denver said, those who do not want to hold hands should be allowed to not hold hands, and no one should criticize them.
{QUOTE=JoLo This is not a time for comraderie. Right you are, and those who started this did not see it as a time for comraderie; they saw it as a time for unity, for which they fervently prayed. Comraderie was after Mass.
 
triumphguy said:
Well I think there’s bigger fish to fry.
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Like what? This is the reply of priests and people alike that there are bigger fish to fry and that you have to pick your battles and then nothing. Crickets. What are these bigger fish in the parish of the OP? That argument would be good if one could smell fish being cooked anywhere. But in some areas nobody is fighting other battles or is frying bigger fish. I am fortunate to live in a city where ONE parish is frying big fish and fighting battles. The parish is loudly pro life and pro family. It says so on the front of the Parish Parking lot in a gigantic sign. We adore. We pray. We have large families. We are reverent. And we make a huge difference in our community.

We do not hold hands, raise hands or do any other funky innovation. We have more vocations than any parish around.

The other parishes in the area, Yup. Lots of happy clappy stuff.

Liturgy will affect belief. 100%
So while some like you may think this battle beneath them and would rather fight the bigger battles, remember that for some of us, this is part of the bigger battle. And frankly (and I am not talking about you personally) we are sick and tired of hearing people talk about picking and choosing battles that NEVER pick or chose anything.

These are big battles/fish. But notice how those small battles are not prevalent in places that have chosen to battle/fry.
I think it is because those small battles are fought and won already.

What was that thing about being trusted with small things before bigger ones.

We have bigger fish to fry is just a rallying cry for keeping the status quo.
 
Ok so none of you answered what justification is used when raising hands during the doxology…

I personally think it comes from people imitating the priest, some of whom raise their hands to signal the ending of the Our Father and before they lower their hands.
 
MorEphrem said:
Ok so none of you answered what justification is used when raising hands during the doxology…

I personally think it comes from people imitating the priest, some of whom raise their hands to signal the ending of the Our Father and before they lower their hands.
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I think that could be part of it. Sometimes I see people doing this when praying in the “orans” position rather than holding hands. Honestly, this is why it should be addressed. People are confused.
 
Hoosier_Daddy said:
Like what? This is the reply of priests and people alike that there are bigger fish to fry and that you have to pick your battles and then nothing. Crickets. What are these bigger fish in the parish of the OP? That argument would be good if one could smell fish being cooked anywhere. But in some areas nobody is fighting other battles or is frying bigger fish. I am fortunate to live in a city where ONE parish is frying big fish and fighting battles. The parish is loudly pro life and pro family. It says so on the front of the Parish Parking lot in a gigantic sign. We adore. We pray. We have large families. We are reverent. And we make a huge difference in our community.

We do not hold hands, raise hands or do any other funky innovation. We have more vocations than any parish around.

The other parishes in the area, Yup. Lots of happy clappy stuff.

Liturgy will affect belief. 100%
So while some like you may think this battle beneath them and would rather fight the bigger battles, remember that for some of us, this is part of the bigger battle. And frankly (and I am not talking about you personally) we are sick and tired of hearing people talk about picking and choosing battles that NEVER pick or chose anything.

These are big battles/fish. But notice how those small battles are not prevalent in places that have chosen to battle/fry.
I think it is because those small battles are fought and won already.

What was that thing about being trusted with small things before bigger ones.

We have bigger fish to fry is just a rallying cry for keeping the status quo.
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Here’s two bigger fish
Getting the dads back to church.
Engaging the youth in a real, positive manner instead of the pablum we feed them
MorEphrem said:
Ok so none of you answered what justification is used when raising hands during the doxology…

I personally think it comes from people imitating the priest, some of whom raise their hands to signal the ending of the Our Father and before they lower their hands.
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I think it’s the only time in the liturgy where the priest makes an ambiguous gesture (as required by the GIRM) at the same time as calling for a response from the congregation, in standing and saying the Our Father. So they just return the gesture and say the Our Father.

Since it’s ambiguous the response isn’t necessarily to raise one;s hands, but with the influence of the Charismatic movement this gesture is seen as now belonging in the Catholic church, and voila you get people raising their hands.

Hardly a mortal sin, and not even grave matter, and definitely NOT indicative of an imminent tumble off a cliff of liturgical abuse.
 
triumphguy said:
Here’s two bigger fish
Getting the dads back to church.
Engaging the youth in a real, positive manner instead of the pablum we feed them.
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Absolutely! And one way we can do that is by not making men come into a church where they have to hold hands and lift up hands in some sort of hands across america sign. Teens too.

You look around the church and you see no men in the pews? Well, it could have to do with all the butterflies and flowers liturgy we got going on in some places.

But those are your big battles. And if you started a thread about them and someone came on a poo pooed your battles I would defend you as well.
 
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