Why are people still not bowing?

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jmcrae said:
If you’re doing it properly while reading along, your book or card will be touching the floor -
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Just an FYI, this is the position the altar servers are supposed to take in the EF while kneeling and reciting the Confiteor. :bowdown:
 
PrincepsAuguste said:
I feel the same way about kneeling during communion. I stop kneeling after the host has been deposited in the tabernacle, while just about everyone else stops when the priest sits down. I am fairly certain that I am right, considering that we are not kneeling to the priest but to the real presence of christ in the room. However, I often find myself kneeling until the priest takes his seat simply because that is what everyone else does.
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same here,i know its the presence that i;m acknowledging .but i knell till the priest sits down.
 
Last week in church a five year old pointed to an elderly man a few rows up who was barely kneeling (this man is in his eighties and walks slowly with a cane) and said to his mother in a “whisper” that went through the Church – “That man is not kneeling! Someone should tell him to kneel NOW!” the mother had to explain that he was old and not physically able to kneel. The five-year-old answered “So? Did God say it was ok?”

I was behind the child so I heard the whole conversation. It is NOT comforting to me that ANOTHER generation of ritual police are being raised 😃
 
I was born and raised Roman Catholic, and the first time I ever encountered the bow during the Creed was a recent visit to a Western Rite Orthodox Divine Liturgy in the Rite of Pope St. Gregory the Great. The bow was never ever a part of my Roman Catholic heritage growing up, in any of the churches I attended; and I was a senior altar server by the time I departed my native parish during middle school. I honestly did not have any knowledge of this practice until three weeks ago when I attended a Western Rite Orthodox church and the liturgy book noted the bow, and everyone bowed, so I did too. It’s a beautiful and reverent, pious practice, so why isn’t it more widely taught and practiced in Roman Catholic parishes? I promise I’m not trying to spark any arguments or make any kind of “point” as I’m an Orthodox Christian, I just wish this particular little gesture was more widely known and practiced in the churches of my bretheren Catholics.
 
Carefree_T said:
I was born and raised Roman Catholic, and the first time I ever encountered the bow during the Creed was a recent visit to a Western Rite Orthodox Divine Liturgy in the Rite of Pope St. Gregory the Great. The bow was never ever a part of my Roman Catholic heritage growing up, in any of the churches I attended; and I was a senior altar server by the time I departed my native parish during middle school. I honestly did not have any knowledge of this practice until three weeks ago when I attended a Western Rite Orthodox church and the liturgy book noted the bow, and everyone bowed, so I did too. It’s a beautiful and reverent, pious practice, so why isn’t it more widely taught and practiced in Roman Catholic parishes? I promise I’m not trying to spark any arguments or make any kind of “point” as I’m an Orthodox Christian, I just wish this particular little gesture was more widely known and practiced in the churches of my bretheren Catholics.
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It isn’t more widely practiced because the rubric is ineffective. See my first post in this thread for my reasoning.
 
coachdennis said:
Last week in church a five year old pointed to an elderly man a few rows up who was barely kneeling (this man is in his eighties and walks slowly with a cane) and said to his mother in a “whisper” that went through the Church – “That man is not kneeling! Someone should tell him to kneel NOW!” the mother had to explain that he was old and not physically able to kneel. The five-year-old answered “So? Did God say it was ok?”

I was behind the child so I heard the whole conversation. It is NOT comforting to me that ANOTHER generation of ritual police are being raised 😃
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I agree. It was bad enough when the nuns were calling people out for their “sneeling” posture (half kneeling, half sitting) in the 50’s.
 
In my parish, the pew cards do say to strike the breast and to bow. Very few do though (and I don’t). I have always seen it as something optional, for very religious people to do, as most people don’t do it.

And before anyone thinks anything, my parish is respectful - everyone genuflects towards the tabernacle when they enter, and when they are about to enter a pew, and everyone bows to the alter when they walk in front of it.
 
:confused:

Do your pew cards say these are optional? Ours don’t, and neither do the missals.
SilverCamellia said:
In my parish, the pew cards do say to strike the breast and to bow. Very few do though (and I don’t). I have always seen it as something optional, for very religious people to do, as most people don’t do it.

And before anyone thinks anything, my parish is respectful - everyone genuflects towards the tabernacle when they enter, and when they are about to enter a pew, and everyone bows to the alter when they walk in front of it.
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Samuel63 said:
It is an indicator that the pastor has not instructed the parshioners, or the parish is not reverent. It could be both.

Given the state we are in now, I would guess the parish is flat out irreverent. Here is a test. Do most of the attendants genuflect toward the tabernacle upon entering the church or taking a seat? Does anyone bow to the altar?
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I genuflect towards the tabernacle entering and leaving Mass.Admitedly,this is something I didn’t do prior to being my husband’s RCIA sponsor several years ago(I was a lazy Catholic for many years)I re learned so much about our faith that I had either forgotten or never paid attention to in the first place. My point being,I think it would benefit all laity to take brush up courses in our faith on a regular basis.So many just don’t know any better:(
 
agnes_therese said:
:confused:

Do your pew cards say these are optional? Ours don’t, and neither do the missals.
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The pew cards don’t say that bowing and striking the breast are optional. But as very few people do it, I take it as one of the things you can ignore on the pew card. Just like parts of it are skipped over in various masses (I don’t know why as I am not fully Catholic, I assume it’s something to do with the time of year or something).
 
ProVobis said:
I agree. It was bad enough when the nuns were calling people out for their “sneeling” posture (half kneeling, half sitting) in the 50’s.
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“sneeling” :rotfl: does that make one who sneels a sneeler?
 
SilverCamellia said:
The pew cards don’t say that bowing and striking the breast are optional. But as very few people do it, I take it as one of the things you can ignore on the pew card. Just like parts of it are skipped over in various masses (I don’t know why as I am not fully Catholic, I assume it’s something to do with the time of year or something).
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They are not optional; it’s just that people either don’t know about the rubric at all or mistakenly think it is optional.
 
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