Ten most common liturgical abuses

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JanR said:
I understand the Orans position to be arms open and bent forward, palms up. One of my fellow parishioners called that the Byzantine method. I find it a more open method of praying, that the body language is one of openly offering or openly receiving what God wants us to receive from the prayer, and nobody ever objected when I felt compelled to use it during congregational prayer at Mass. I never associate it with trying to imitate the priest. That never entered my mind. I just felt like praying in a more open manner to God.

It must not be strictly prohibited, or somebody would have said something. We have a few nitpicking folks in the congregation, so it surely would have been mentioned if it was objectionable.

BTW, when I say the blessing at meals during family gatherings, I use this open method of prayer giving thanks.
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My two cents -

I agree that it should not be strickly forbidden. However, when I see people pray the Our Father during Vespers without using the Orans Posture but then the same people use the Orans Posture during Mass - it means they are simply copying the priest or doing what someone told them to do. If one prays the Our Father (and other prayers to the Father) all time (in and out of mass, both publicly & privately) using the Orans Posture, then I’m 100% cool with it.

But annoys me when people only use it when praying the Our Father during mass. It also annoys me (though less) when the only time they use it is when praying the Our Father and never during any other prayer.
 
pnewton said:
the line is crossed when it is stated that the laity are to hold hands, as that is actually proscribing a posture. But then, I object when the opposite happened and someone forbids it, again, adding to the GIRM.
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Even if the priest doesn’t specifically tell people to do it at this at each Mass nowadays, if a pattern has been set up where many laity impose it, and the priest condones, it becomes a de facto rubric. A parish created or condoned rubric.
 
commenter said:
Even if the priest doesn’t specifically tell people to do it at this at each Mass nowadays, if a pattern has been set up where many laity impose it, and the priest condones, it becomes a de facto rubric. A parish created or condoned rubric.
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Well, that I have no problem with, what with the people of the Church being, you know, the Church. If something grows organically, I would rather listen to Gamaliel’s advice.
 
I wonder if there is a list of “top ten things that Vatican II said but are totally ignored”.

Such as:
  1. Establish choir schools for men and boys
  2. Preserve Latin
  3. Organ should be the primary instrument
  4. Gregorian chant should have pride of place.
Etc!
 
The document you linked does prohibit the laity from adopting the gestures proper to the priest, but the orans posture isn’t specifically a gesture, nor is it necessarily proper exclusively to the priest, as it was the prayer posture predating the joined hands posture we use today, and as I hinted at above, the orans posture is a posture, not a gesture, such as when the priest makes the sign of the cross as a blessing, or at the consecration.
 
This assertion is blatantly false, generally the term Sanctuary is used to refer to the actual church space where we pray, and so it is necessary to enter the Sanctuary, if however, you mean the moment we set foot on the altar, this is also false, because it often is necessary for lay people to be on the altar, either to read the Old testament/epistle readings (as people who are lectors (as in those who have received that position within the “ministries” (formerly minor orders) are fairly rare), or as altar servers, a practice that began due to the absence of Acolytes (at the time this occurred, it would have been the third to highest of the Minor Orders, now it is the highest of the two Ministries).
 
From that article:
It was at this time that the faithful were given permission to pray the Our Father with the priest. However, the faithful maintained the same posture as before - standing, with their hands folded in prayer
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I would like to point out that the posture of hands folded in prayer is also adding to the GIRM. I do not use orans, but then I never see it as a “posture reserved for the priest.” It is a posture older than the priesthood and used outside of Catholicism all the time. I do not know that it did arise from imitating the priest. It might also have come from influence of the charismatic movement where hands are lifted in prayer all the time. In any case, the people of God, are the Body of Christ. Perhaps such spontaneous organic developments deserve serious consideration more than regulation.

I am not worried about blurring the lines between laity and priesthood, or other such concepts that spring from clericism. If praying is one of those lines, it ought not ever to exist, any more than reading Scripture.
 
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Michael_Anthony said:
This assertion is blatantly false, generally the term Sanctuary is used to refer to the actual church space where we pray, and so it is necessary to enter the Sanctuary, if however, you mean the moment we set foot on the altar, this is also false, because it often is necessary for lay people to be on the altar, either to read the Old testament/epistle readings (as people who are lectors (as in those who have received that position within the “ministries” (formerly minor orders) are fairly rare), or as altar servers, a practice that began due to the absence of Acolytes (at the time this occurred, it would have been the third to highest of the Minor Orders, now it is the highest of the two Ministries).
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In Catholic terminology, the sanctuary is the area surrounding the altar. The part of the church where the people are gathered is called the nave.
 
I guess the reason CAF exists is because of threads like this one. 🙂 🙃 🙂 🙃 🙂 🙃 🙂
 
CradleRC58 said:
I don’t see the laity using the orans position an abuse.

I always just considered it aping the priest.

But there is this if no one has mentioned it already.

http://www.catholic365.com/article/...-the-orans-posture-during-the-our-father.html

And this…

Liturgy & Sacraments Documentation
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But the woman in the photo is wearing a mantilla. How can it be that a model for Catholic women is committing a liturgical abuse?

O.k. I’ll leave now. Otherwise, I’m going to offend someone and get suspended. 😆
 
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on_the_hill said:
But the woman in the photo is wearing a mantilla. How can it be that a model for Catholic women is committing a liturgical abuse?

O.k. I’ll leave now. Otherwise, I’m going to offend someone and get suspended. 😆
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Look carefully. 🙃 Her hands are folded in front of her.
 
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Yeah, I’ve never been to an Orthodox liturgy (I think that’s what that picture is), but I’ve somehow seen a lot of Paul and Jan Crouch and their ilk on TV, with their swaying and their upraised hands.
I think it maybe depends on how high the hands are held.
 
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Technically, it was around a long time before, though suppressed for quite a while, St. Jerome has instructions on how to properly receive in the hand.
 
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