Striking the breast during the Confiteor

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wynd

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Is striking the breast during the Confiteor prescribed in the GIRM or some other document? Maybe I’m not looking hard enough but I can’t seem to find it.
 
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wynd:
Is striking the breast during the Confiteor prescribed in the GIRM or some other document? Maybe I’m not looking hard enough but I can’t seem to find it.
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It was the custom before VII. When you say “my own fault, my own fault, my most greivous fault.” you would strike your breast three times.
 
Why not follow a tradition…there sure seems to be a lot of things going on today during Mass that has never, ever been called for before by the GIRM, the Magisterium, or Tradition…
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wynd:
So it isn’t prescribed for us now by the Church?
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Perhaps when they re-instate the mea culpa mea culpa mea maxima culpa into the new translation you might see people do it again. That is if the priest actually uses it in mass.
 
The current Latin text of the Novus Ordo mass (which is the official text by the way–some people seem to think the English text is the official text of the Catholic Church) reads: “mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa.” That phrase is identical to the Tridentine phrase said before Vatican II. The present English translation of the Latin paraphrases “my fault, my fault, my grievous fault” as “my own fault.”

With respect to striking the breast, the rubrics instruct “et, percutientes sibi pectus, dicunt,” which, roughly translated means, “they strike their breast, saying.”

So in answer to your question, yes, you are required to strike your breast at the mea culpa in the Novus Ordo mass.
 
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SFH:
The current Latin text of the Novus Ordo mass (which is the official text by the way–some people seem to think the English text is the official text of the Catholic Church) reads: “mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa.” That phrase is identical to the Tridentine phrase said before Vatican II. The present English translation of the Latin paraphrases “my fault, my fault, my grievous fault” as “my own fault.”

With respect to striking the breast, the rubrics instruct “et, percutientes sibi pectus, dicunt,” which, roughly translated means, “they strike their breast, saying.”

So in answer to your question, yes, you are required to strike your breast at the mea culpa in the Novus Ordo mass.
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One strike, not three, right?

Sacred Signs by Fr. Romano Guardini is a fascinating read and a great addendum to this topic. It’s available on-line for free at ewtn.com/library/LITURGY/SACRSIGN.TXT
 
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AltarMan:
One strike, not three, right?

Sacred Signs by Fr. Romano Guardini is a fascinating read and a great addendum to this topic. It’s available on-line for free at ewtn.com/library/LITURGY/SACRSIGN.TXT
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In the Traditional Mass it wa struck on each repetition of my fault, so three times. If the new translation combines it into one my fault, I would guess strike it one time.
 
Peace be with you!

In the Spanish Mass at my parish, everyone does this, but not in the English Mass. In the Spanish Mass they say “de mi culpa de mi culpa”.

In Christ,
Rand
 
Ok, thanks everyone. I am writing a paper on prescribed/non-prescribed gestures and was looking for a citation I could use.
 
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wynd:
Ok, thanks everyone. I am writing a paper on prescribed/non-prescribed gestures and was looking for a citation I could use.
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It would be great to see your paper when it’s finished. It could probably stir up a lively debate on its own. Will you share once it’s finished?

Good luck with it!
 
The Holy See clarified the official position on the number of breast-strikes at the Confiteor - only once. The following can be found here.
Query: During the recitation of certain formularies, for example, the “Confiteor, Agnus Dei, Domine, non sum dignus,” the accompanying gestures on the part of both priest and people are not always the same: some strike their breast three times; others, once during such formularies. What is the lawful practice to be followed?
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The words, “Through my own fault” in the “Confiteor” are annotated in the reformed Roman Missal with the rubric: “Thy strike their breast” (“Ordo Missae” no. 3). In the former Missal at the same place the rubric read this way: “He strikes his breast three times.” Therefore, it seems that the breast is not to be struck three times by anyone in reciting the words, whether in Latin or another language, even if the tripled formulary is said (“mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa”). One striking of the breast is enough. Clearly, also, one gesture is enough in those languages in which the words expressing fault are translated in a simpler form, for example in English, “I have sinned through my own fault”; in French “Oui, j’ai vraiment peche’.”
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