Servers holding the vestments of priest:TLM

  • Thread starter Thread starter miamaximaculpa
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
M

miamaximaculpa

Guest
Hi,

I don’t know if this thread belongs in Traditional Catholicism, or the Liturgy thread.

Anyway, my local parish is offering the Extraordinary Form on Wednesday nights. I have a question about the liturgy.

When the priest genuflects, the server(s) holds the Priest’s vestments. What is the purpose of the practice?

I’m trying to guess that in the olde tyme days the server was trying to prevent the vestments from getting dirty. Maybe the priests in olden times could have muddy shoes, and that would get up on the clothing? Or perhaps preventing him from tripping on them?

Or is there a deeper/more theological reason?

Thanks,

meamaximaculpa

“Democracy is a device that ensures we shall be governed no better than we deserve.”
– George Bernard Shaw
 
I think the reason was mostly practical, though no one ever told me. The old Roman chasuble [It was called the fiddle back if I remember correctly] was quite stiff. I think we held it out so it wouldn’t jam into the priest’s leg or the floor. As the fuller Grecian chasuble became popular, we still held it out so it wouldn’t snag on his foot.
 
Joe_Kelley said:
I think the reason was mostly practical, though no one ever told me. The old Roman chasuble [It was called the fiddle back if I remember correctly] was quite stiff. I think we held it out so it wouldn’t jam into the priest’s leg or the floor. As the fuller Grecian chasuble became popular, we still held it out so it wouldn’t snag on his foot.
Click to expand...
The older Chasubles were very heavy If you notice the servers also life the Chasuble during the consecration. It was lifted to ease the burdon on the Priest while raising his arms. Or at least that is what I was told many years ago by a Priest.
 
Sorry … none of the above answers are correct. It has nothing “mechanically” to do with vestments. At the Consecration, when the acolyte takes hold of the chasuble, he represents the “connection” of the people assisting at Mass to the priest and the offering the Holy Sacrifice.
 
I find it a little amusing that there have been three answers and three different explanations.

I’d be curious to know how many centuries passed after the first Mass in the Upper Room before it became necessary, for whatever reason, to hold up the priest’s clothes for him.

DaveBj
 
Over time the materials for the vestments became heavier and richer, which impeded the movement of the arms. I believe that it was late on in the middle ages that the elevations at the consecration were first required and by that time the chasuble was too heavy to enable the priest to raise the Sacred Host and the Chalice.

There may be assigned a spiritual reason though, where the people are united to the priest who offers the Sacrifice.
 
This was the same response I got too. It had to do with the weight of the vestments.
stuart12 said:
Over time the materials for the vestments became heavier and richer, which impeded the movement of the arms. I believe that it was late on in the middle ages that the elevations at the consecration were first required and by that time the chasuble was too heavy to enable the priest to raise the Sacred Host and the Chalice.

There may be assigned a spiritual reason though, where the people are united to the priest who offers the Sacrifice.
Click to expand...
 
DaveBj said:
I find it a little amusing that there have been three answers and three different explanations.

I’d be curious to know how many centuries passed after the first Mass in the Upper Room before it became necessary, for whatever reason, to hold up the priest’s clothes for him.

DaveBj
Click to expand...
… or even more amusing, how many centuries passed before drums and electric guitars were acceptable at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.
 
stuart12 said:
Over time the materials for the vestments became heavier and richer, which impeded the movement of the arms. I believe that it was late on in the middle ages that the elevations at the consecration were first required and by that time the chasuble was too heavy to enable the priest to raise the Sacred Host and the Chalice.

There may be assigned a spiritual reason though, where the people are united to the priest who offers the Sacrifice.
Click to expand...
I had forgotten that. I think it more probable than what I posted. I now remember lifting it enough to free the priest’s shoulders.
 
giuseppeTO said:
… or even more amusing, how many centuries passed before drums and electric guitars were acceptable at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.
Click to expand...
My point (which I hid rather well, I think 😉 ) is that Mass in the beginning was something simple, but over the centuries it has acquired so many layers of human tradition that now people are doing things (or seeing/hearing things being done) that nobody knows why they are being said done.

Don’t worry. 500 years from now people will be saying, “Why are there electric guitars and drums at Mass when everyone knows that the coolest instrument is the weuiruwpophone?”

DaveBj
 
DaveBj said:
My point (which I hid rather well, I think 😉 ) is that Mass in the beginning was something simple, but over the centuries it has acquired so many layers of human tradition that now people are doing things (or seeing/hearing things being done) that nobody knows why they are being said done.

Don’t worry. 500 years from now people will be saying, “Why are there electric guitars and drums at Mass when everyone knows that the coolest instrument is the weuiruwpophone?”

DaveBj
Click to expand...
👍
Great point!!
 
DaveBj said:
My point (which I hid rather well, I think 😉 ) is that Mass in the beginning was something simple, but over the centuries it has acquired so many layers of human tradition that now people are doing things (or seeing/hearing things being done) that nobody knows why they are being said done.

Don’t worry. 500 years from now people will be saying, “Why are there electric guitars and drums at Mass when everyone knows that the coolest instrument is the weuiruwpophone?”

DaveBj
Click to expand...
I’ll have to dig it out of my shelves, but there is a great book that describes all of the symbology in the TLM including why the priest genuflects the number of times he does, why he kisses the altar the number of times does, why the book is moved from the right to the left for the gospel, what the left and right side of the altar signify, etc. There are also many things you don’t see (unless you are an acolyte) like how the priest hides the paten under the corporal until the Pater Noster (signifying the revelation of Christ to the Jews). The TLM, at a level many are not even aware of, expresses our faith in a way that reinforces the prayers offered by the priest. It has grown organically over the centuries with this particular rite codified in the 1500’s, ostensibly against the confusion and change brought on by the Reformation.

Most, if not all of this was lost with the introduction of the Novus Ordo.
 
Great post…very good and accurate points. So many Catholics today argue against something they have never experienced nor can they begin to comprehend what they are missing out on
giuseppeTO said:
I’ll have to dig it out of my shelves, but there is a great book that describes all of the symbology in the TLM including why the priest genuflects the number of times he does, why he kisses the altar the number of times does, why the book is moved from the right to the left for the gospel, what the left and right side of the altar signify, etc. There are also many things you don’t see (unless you are an acolyte) like how the priest hides the paten under the corporal until the Pater Noster (signifying the revelation of Christ to the Jews). The TLM, at a level many are not even aware of, expresses our faith in a way that reinforces the prayers offered by the priest. It has grown organically over the centuries with this particular rite codified in the 1500’s, ostensibly against the confusion and change brought on by the Reformation.

Most, if not all of this was lost with the introduction of the Novus Ordo.
Click to expand...
 
giuseppeTO said:
I’ll have to dig it out of my shelves, but there is a great book that describes all of the symbology in the TLM including why the priest genuflects the number of times he does, why he kisses the altar the number of times does, why the book is moved from the right to the left for the gospel, what the left and right side of the altar signify, etc. There are also many things you don’t see (unless you are an acolyte) like how the priest hides the paten under the corporal until the Pater Noster (signifying the revelation of Christ to the Jews). The TLM, at a level many are not even aware of, expresses our faith in a way that reinforces the prayers offered by the priest. It has grown organically over the centuries with this particular rite codified in the 1500’s, ostensibly against the confusion and change brought on by the Reformation.

Most, if not all of this was lost with the introduction of the Novus Ordo.
Click to expand...
What is the title of that book? Sounds very interesting.
 
giuseppeTO said:
There are also many things you don’t see (unless you are an acolyte) like how the priest hides the paten under the corporal until the Pater Noster (signifying the revelation of Christ to the Jews).
Click to expand...
I hope that never happens!!! The corporal is to catch any fragments of the host so they can be properly disposed of. This action would require another corporal under the corporal to catch the body should it fall.

Could you mean under the Purificator or Paten?
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top