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Corki
Guest
That is like saying that Sunday Mass attendance is required UNLESS a person is dispensed or unable to attend due to illness or care of a child. Does that make Sunday Mass attendance any less of a requirement? No. It is simply a requirement for which there are exceptions. The same goes for kneeling at Latin Rite Masses.
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DannyBoy_7
Guest
Hello,
Kneeling is non-optional for me. Our Lord Jesus Christ is before us. He is God. I have often thought about the time of meeting Christ in the first judgement. The moment I pass from this life, how else could I even consider standing in front of God? I could not do it. For me it is not just reverance but a desire to try to love the best I know how My king. I can do nothing else. Nor would I ever choose to today.
Kneeling is non-optional for me. Our Lord Jesus Christ is before us. He is God. I have often thought about the time of meeting Christ in the first judgement. The moment I pass from this life, how else could I even consider standing in front of God? I could not do it. For me it is not just reverance but a desire to try to love the best I know how My king. I can do nothing else. Nor would I ever choose to today.
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Neofight
Guest
Again, the generalities made are troubling…The same does not go for ALL Latin Rite Masses. Franciscans within the Latin Rite, who are not subject to a Bishop, do not have a requirement to kneel, and most (notice I use the qualifier “most” and am not so bold to say “all” or to imply “all”) do not.
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TimothyH
Guest
The Cistercian monks I have met also do not kneel.
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Corki
Guest
Actually, they have been given an exception to the general norm to kneel. But the exception, would not apply if a Franciscan priest were to say Mass at a regular diocesan parish. The directive to kneel does not come from the Bishop so it is irrelevant whether a priest is subject to the Bishop in terms of kneeling. It is part of the universal norm. The only part that is at the direction of the Bishop is kneeling after the Agnus Dei, and even that is only for dioceses in the US.
The exception, even as it exists, applies to Franciscan communities and Masses at their community chapels or oratories.
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Mintaka
Guest
It’s weird for Franciscans not to kneel, given that St. Francis of Assisi was a big booster of kneeling. (In his time, it was an optional devotional posture used for prayer and at Mass. He was big on pushing his Franciscans to kneel as much as possible.)
Before there were pews in European churches, the default posture was to stand. If you got tired (or during the homily), the usual posture was to sit on the floor (which was why people brought along rugs, little chairs, pillows, etc.). Since women and children usually were placed either on one side of the church or in back, they usually sat through most of Mass, which allowed the kids to see and the women to rest.
During and after St. Francis’ time, the usual posture during the Consecration and other important times of Mass was to kneel on the floor. (Or on your rug, pillow, portable kneeler, etc.)
In European churches that have chairs instead of pews, one often used to see people reversing the chair in front of them to face them, and making it into a kneeler. (Which is to say that they would kneel on the seat.)
There were some European ethnic groups that never got into kneeling much; but most of the ones which came to the US were big into kneeling. (The Irish who weren’t even legally allowed to go to Mass anywhere in Ireland, and had priests sneaking around saying Mass outside on rocks, would always kneel during Mass, even in snow or mud.) That’s why the US Church applied for, and got, an indult permitting even more kneeling than usual in US Masses. (This was about 150 years ago or more.)
US seminaries in more recent times have pushed the idea that it is somehow better to kneel less, and that we should do everything exactly like the European ethnic groups which kneel the least. The only reason they can push this with a straight face is that they don’t give a care about their ancestors or St. Francis. (Or more likely, the teachers’ teachers wanted change for disruption’s sake, and the current teachers and students just don’t know any better.)
PS - If you want to read about St. Francis and the lay kneeling movement, you want to read the biography of St. Francis by Fr. Augustine Thompson, OP. It’s called Francis of Assisi: A New Biography, it came out in 2012, and it’s pretty much all stuff from Italian primary sources. Check your library for it.
Before there were pews in European churches, the default posture was to stand. If you got tired (or during the homily), the usual posture was to sit on the floor (which was why people brought along rugs, little chairs, pillows, etc.). Since women and children usually were placed either on one side of the church or in back, they usually sat through most of Mass, which allowed the kids to see and the women to rest.
During and after St. Francis’ time, the usual posture during the Consecration and other important times of Mass was to kneel on the floor. (Or on your rug, pillow, portable kneeler, etc.)
In European churches that have chairs instead of pews, one often used to see people reversing the chair in front of them to face them, and making it into a kneeler. (Which is to say that they would kneel on the seat.)
There were some European ethnic groups that never got into kneeling much; but most of the ones which came to the US were big into kneeling. (The Irish who weren’t even legally allowed to go to Mass anywhere in Ireland, and had priests sneaking around saying Mass outside on rocks, would always kneel during Mass, even in snow or mud.) That’s why the US Church applied for, and got, an indult permitting even more kneeling than usual in US Masses. (This was about 150 years ago or more.)
US seminaries in more recent times have pushed the idea that it is somehow better to kneel less, and that we should do everything exactly like the European ethnic groups which kneel the least. The only reason they can push this with a straight face is that they don’t give a care about their ancestors or St. Francis. (Or more likely, the teachers’ teachers wanted change for disruption’s sake, and the current teachers and students just don’t know any better.)
PS - If you want to read about St. Francis and the lay kneeling movement, you want to read the biography of St. Francis by Fr. Augustine Thompson, OP. It’s called Francis of Assisi: A New Biography, it came out in 2012, and it’s pretty much all stuff from Italian primary sources. Check your library for it.
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Neofight
Guest
Again, generalities…At the Franciscan served diocesan parish, there are no kneelers and no kneeling, except at the choice of the individual, and the Bishop has not mandated, nor prohibited one or the other…and its not a matter of his not knowing, as he visits the parish several times a year.
Granted, it is the universal norm, but not kneeling (or mandating of kneeling by parish or dioceses) certainly does not bring into question the validity of these masses, nor raise the issue of whether the masses are licit or illicit…there doesn’t seem to be any canon law case precedence (that I am aware of, if you know of one, I would like to have background on the case), which would indicate it is not a significant issue to review the applicability to CL…Canon Law is like Constitutional Law…if there is silence on the matter by the the Holy See, like the SCOTUS, it is considered a non-issue.
Again (and I promise this will be my last time to chime in on this), my point is not the reverence of kneeling, but that this is another one of the many issues that is not clearly black and white, regardless of our personal tastes.
Peace and all good!
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Corki
Guest
A norm is, by definition, a generality. In those parishes you describe, if the Bishop chose to remind the faithful of the requirement to kneel, he would be well within his scope to do so. If it’s a diocesan parish the presence of absence of kneelers has nothing to do with which priests may be assigned there.
And no one but you ever brought up the issue of this even remotely affecting validity.
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PeopleB4Things
Guest
I can’t kneel. I’ve had lifelong chronic inflammation of scar tissue on my shins. I once apologized to Cardinal Sheen after a confirmation mass. He chuckled and said that there was no need to kneel. God doesn’t judge us on whether we kneel or not. He judges us on what’s in our hearts. Hope that answer helps.
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TyburnTreeHuggr
Guest
This just makes anybody with any knowledge oh Irish history’s heart bleed! You can bet my ancestors were persecuted for their Catholicism for hundreds of years; I’d be ashamed to do less than they with it.
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Elizium23
Guest
Who is Cardinal Sheen?
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Kal2012
Guest
Personally, I like kneelers, so it was a shock when I moved to an area where most of the local parishes don’t use them.
The one parish I do like has kneelers, but it’s awkward to use them as most of the congregation seems to think that using them is optional and when I did use it I found my face nearly planted in the back of the person in front of me because they opted to sit. (Oh - and they were individual chairs, not pews, just for clarification.).
I was quite annoyed and decided to sit because, at least, I’d have a bit more personal space and wouldn’t feel like I was going to be smothered by some random guy’s bulky coat.
In that situation, I’d almost prefer no kneelers just so the expectation of what to do is clear - instead of everyone just randomly doing their own thing. As a visitor, it seemed very disorganized.
I never thought I’d care about whether a parish had kneelers, but I really, really do. Kneelers is a selling point to me.
The one parish I do like has kneelers, but it’s awkward to use them as most of the congregation seems to think that using them is optional and when I did use it I found my face nearly planted in the back of the person in front of me because they opted to sit. (Oh - and they were individual chairs, not pews, just for clarification.).
I was quite annoyed and decided to sit because, at least, I’d have a bit more personal space and wouldn’t feel like I was going to be smothered by some random guy’s bulky coat.
In that situation, I’d almost prefer no kneelers just so the expectation of what to do is clear - instead of everyone just randomly doing their own thing. As a visitor, it seemed very disorganized.
I never thought I’d care about whether a parish had kneelers, but I really, really do. Kneelers is a selling point to me.
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PeopleB4Things
Guest
Who’s Sheen?
An old archbishop dude we had to watch videos of in Catholic school. He would also visit our church sometimes. While our masses were packed, overflowing into our chapel, gym and cafeteria, he wasn’t a big deal. At least not to himself. In personal meetings, he was small in presence, self deprecating, meek in demeanor, gracious to all of us with whom he had time to meet and talk. Different from his on stage persona. He seemed like another every day Joe living his life trying to walk the path of Christ the best he could. He talked about his successes and his failures. I really like the old dude. He was perfectly imperfect and he was open to loving his fellow flock members no matter how messed up we were.
An old archbishop dude we had to watch videos of in Catholic school. He would also visit our church sometimes. While our masses were packed, overflowing into our chapel, gym and cafeteria, he wasn’t a big deal. At least not to himself. In personal meetings, he was small in presence, self deprecating, meek in demeanor, gracious to all of us with whom he had time to meet and talk. Different from his on stage persona. He seemed like another every day Joe living his life trying to walk the path of Christ the best he could. He talked about his successes and his failures. I really like the old dude. He was perfectly imperfect and he was open to loving his fellow flock members no matter how messed up we were.
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Oneofthewomen
Guest
Your are talking about Archbishop Fulton Sheen. He was never a Cardinal.
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