Your opinion on Posture for Reception of Communion

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Trelow:
I would prefer to kneel, but the prescribed norm in the US according to the GIRM is standing, so I have no choice but to stand.
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You absolutely DO have a choice. The Sacred Congregation Of Divine Worship and Discipline of the Sacraments issued a statement back in July, 2002 (go to www.thelaity.com and click on “Church Documents” on the left side of the page and then click on “Kneeling to Receive the Eucharist”.)
ANY Sacred Congregation, when declaring publicly, represents the magisterium of the church, AND MUST BE OBEYED! What they say is the law of the church. Infallible.

You may absolutely kneel, no matter what your bishop or pastor or priest says.

If they demand that you stand, it is THEY are not in union with the church. (How they get away with that is another thread!!!)

Blessings
Angel
 
I bow first, and receive standing; that is the norm in my parish. Some people in my church prefer to kneel; they are never refused Communion.

Interestingly, my church still has most of its Communion rail. The portion directly in front of the altar was removed (allowing the priest to come down to where the communicants are lined up), and the rest was used on the outsides of the ambo and the baptismal pool. The remainder is still standing.
 
"The priest then takes the paten or ciborium and goes to the communicants, who, as a rule, approach in a procession.

*The faithful are not permitted to take the consecrated bread or the sacred chalice by themselves and, still less, to hand them from one to another. *

Regarding this quote, my husband & I recently attended a Mass said for our small group. The priest actually had us standing around the altar as if we were concelebrating, and then had each couple offer the body and blood to each other, directly from the altar. He stood in the background until we were all finished. I was horrified!

We all served ourselves, but what should we have done?
 
Hard to believe people are still arguing over this. As far as I can tell, the only disobedient actors are the bishops and priests that have not made provisions for the kneelers. The GIRM may say that standing in the norm, but the Vatican has said that kneeling is acceptable and cannot be denied.

If headquarters sent word down that you were to make your facility available to the handicapped, you can bet your shoe laces that the manager of the facility would do just that. The Vatican has said the the Eucharist will be made availiable to the people that kneel, but some bishops and priests refuse to make provisions so people can kneel. Their superiors have told them to make the Eucharist available to all parisnoners, but for some reason, they are allowed to disobey.
 
Laurie S. said:
"The priest then takes the paten or ciborium and goes to the communicants, who, as a rule, approach in a procession.

*The faithful are not permitted to take the consecrated bread or the sacred chalice by themselves and, still less, to hand them from one to another. *

Regarding this quote, my husband & I recently attended a Mass said for our small group. The priest actually had us standing around the altar as if we were concelebrating, and then had each couple offer the body and blood to each other, directly from the altar. He stood in the background until we were all finished. I was horrified!

We all served ourselves, but what should we have done?
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You should have never entered the sanctuary. We MUST NOT PARTICIPATE IN THESE SITUATIONS if we expect them ever to stop. Get the courage to do what is right!

Get a copy of Mass Confusion by James Akin to review what is ok and what isn’t. and then REFUSE to participate in anything not allowed.

They (disobedient priests, pastors, bishops) are dragging the faithful from obedience to Rome. and confusing EVERYONE as to what is licit and what is not - next it will be 'what is VALID and what is not".

God help us all to follow the truth.
Angel
 
About six years ago, I went to Mass in the largest Catholic Church in a major city, and everyone knelt at the communion rail to receive communion. And this was at a Novus Ordo Mass.

On the first day of the Novus Ordo, people knelt at the communion rail to receive communion.

Many of the changes in the “Mass” have come through disobedience. Examples include altar girls, communion in the hand, inclusive language. The lesson to be learned in the post-Vatican II Catholic Church is:

Victory Comes through Disobedience

In the post Vatican II Catholic Church, God rewards those who believe whatever they want, teach whatever they want, and do whatever they want. And God gives mortal sins to those who object to these practices, hold firm to the Catholic Faith they were taught, and don’t show up at church.

Either God has changed or the Catholic Church has changed.

It is claimed that the Catholic Church has the authority to bind people to attend Mass on Sunday or they get a moral sin put on their souls by God.

If this is true, then the Catholic Church also has the authority to bind the vile and discusting forces of heresy, schism, and liturgy.

If Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life, how does one reconcile this with 27,000 Christian denominations, and all the many contradictory beliefs held by Catholics?

Jesus says God loves us enough that when we ask for bread, he will not give us a stone.

Apparently, this doesn’t apply to those who seek Him or seek the Truth, that is “right doctrine”.

It is time the bishops start swearing oaths to guarantee that if it says Catholic on the label, it is Catholic inside the box. It is time, the bishops swear that every Catholic church, Catholic school, Catholic religious education program in their diocese teach fully what the Catholic Church believes and teaches.
 
The thread that just won’t die!

I kneel and I don’t know why some people are bothered by those who kneel. If only they would focus their attention on real liturgical abuses instead of worrying about people’s posture for Holy Communion we could rid the Church of abuses.
 
Swiss Guard said:
The thread that just won’t die!

I kneel and I don’t know why some people are bothered by those who kneel. If only they would focus their attention on real liturgical abuses instead of worrying about people’s posture for Holy Communion we could rid the Church of abuses.
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**
**

****The ******Communion **Procession

*When we come forward to receive Holy Communion at the Eucharist, we are not **lining up as isolated individuals, couples, families or groups to be nourished and **sustained for our Christian lives. We come forward together as the Body of Christ to **receive the Body of Christ. We receive the Body of Christ so that we may be more **truly together the Body of Christ in the world. As St Augustine of Hippo reminded us, **at the Eucharist we receive what we are, and we become what we receive: ‘You reply **“Amen” to that which you are, and by your reply you consent. For you hear “the **Body of Christ” and you reply “Amen”. Be a member of the Body of Christ so that *your “Amen” may be true.’

One Bread One Body 94

*The ****Communion **procession expresses the humble patience of the poor moving **forward to be fed, the alert expectancy of God’s people sharing the Paschal meal in **readiness for their journey, the joyful confidence of God’s people on the march **toward the Promised Land. In England and Wales it is through this action of walking *solemnly in procession that the faithful make their sign of reverence in preparation for receiving Communion.

Celebrating the Mass 209

The **Communion **Procession is not simply about getting up out of one’s seat, walking to the minister, receiving communion and walking back to one’s seat and sitting down again.
 
continued

The procession is

• a procession accompanied by song which is to express unity in

spirit by means unity in song and to show joy of heart (cf. GIRM86

• a communal action and not simply a private, individual action (cf.GIRM 86, OBOB 94)

• not merely action but action as prayer, a visible sign of reverence(cf. CTM, 210)

The Church makes quite some demands of this procession. They are not always going to be easy for particular communities of the Church to fulfil. One common reason for this in England and Wales is that many of our church buildings were designed before the renewal of the Liturgy over the past 100 years. A good number of them were designed before theencouragement to frequent communion by Saint Pope Pius X, and theirdesign did not envisage the whole congregation coming forward toreceive Holy Communion. Still more were designed before the more recent encouragement to the ministering of Holy Communion under both kinds, and the additional number of ministers and communion stationsthat this will usually require.

Yet if the **Communion **Procession, and our reception of Holy Communion itself is to be carried out in a worthy fashion we need to overcome these common difficulties. We need to achieve a sense of order and rhythm in the procession, so that it can signify reverence and a communitarian corporate quality in what we do.
 
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Mysty101:
continued

The procession is

• a procession accompanied by song which is to express unity in

spirit by means unity in song and to show joy of heart (cf. GIRM86

• a communal action and not simply a private, individual action (cf.GIRM 86, OBOB 94)

• not merely action but action as prayer, a visible sign of reverence(cf. CTM, 210)

The Church makes quite some demands of this procession. They are not always going to be easy for particular communities of the Church to fulfil. One common reason for this in England and Wales is that many of our church buildings were designed before the renewal of the Liturgy over the past 100 years. A good number of them were designed before theencouragement to frequent communion by Saint Pope Pius X, and theirdesign did not envisage the whole congregation coming forward toreceive Holy Communion. Still more were designed before the more recent encouragement to the ministering of Holy Communion under both kinds, and the additional number of ministers and communion stationsthat this will usually require.

Yet if the **Communion **Procession, and our reception of Holy Communion itself is to be carried out in a worthy fashion we need to overcome these common difficulties. We need to achieve a sense of order and rhythm in the procession, so that it can signify reverence and a communitarian corporate quality in what we do.
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**Do you apply this to the orans posture as well, since there is nothing in the rubrics or the GIRM that gives us persmission to do it? Do you also apply this to holding hands at the Our Father, which we also don’t have persmission to do? **
No, you just apply it to whatever fits your whim. You don’t like people to kneel for Communion so we have to follow your interpretation of the GIRM and be obedient to our local bishops. However, when that same GIRM and those same bishops tell us not to do something you practice, then we don’t have to be obedient. Unity only matters when everyone is united to you.
Like I said in another thread, your hypocrisy is showing.
Let’s stop judging people on their posture for Holy Communion and stop trying to force our will on others and let’s work together to end real liturgical abuses. Then again, maybe some people don’t want real liturgical abuses to end because it fits their whim.
 
It is the act of receiving Christ’s Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity that unites us all as members of the One Body - the Mystical Body of Christ.

Regardless of the posture assumed, it the consuming of the Sacramental species that results in our unity.

To try to distort the Church’s teaching so that “unity” is somehow impeded by an individual communicant’s bodily gesture of reverence is a lame argument, but one which will go on and on, no doubt, as it has in many previous threads.
 
I am quite sick of having to defend a posture which is supported by the Vatican. 😛
 
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