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Joe Coleman's avatar

"Everyone walking up to Communion together symbolizes our 'pilgrim journey.'" As if we don't all walk up the same aisle when going to an altar rail lol

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Kelly Garrison's avatar

I truly don't want to be uncharitable but this feels like doubling down on something just for the sake of it because he'd rather do that than admit he was wrong

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Nell's avatar

Yep. Can't walk it back because that takes humility and having to see the issue through the eyes of others.

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Elizabeth's avatar

As someone who is a member in the Diocese of Charlotte, I can tell you nobody likes the extraordinary ministers delivering communion. The line for the priest is always the longest. Since there is only one TLM chapel, from me at least that is an hour drive when before it would've been around 40 minutes. Lots of parishioners at our church kneel. I have seen more women veiling at mass.

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Deacon Brad's avatar

The GIRM itself leaves plenty of room for shenanigans. The old rubrics were clear and unequivocal. Bishop Martin is the throwback, insisting there is only one way to do things. Certainly not in the spirit of the Council!

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Quackamatic's avatar

This seems like a weird line in the sand for a bishop to draw, and it not only excludes trad Catholics but also Catholics from non-US traditions. It feels like a “English only policy” and “our house, our rules” when there’s a range of accepted practices in the broader church…and that’s fine. I object to the idea that there’s a “more pious” way of receiving the Eucharist, though. That seems to be unnecessarily divisive, too.

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James Hickman's avatar

The bishop might consider: in other parts of the universal Church and in fact the official and only norm, properly so-called, is kneeling. Under Benedict XVI, we saw an increase in the use of kneelers for Holy Communion at papal Masses. The bishop risks leading his sheep to mistakenly identify Pope Benedict XVI as a source of division simply because he encouraged kneeing to receive Holy Communion or to think that Rome and other dioceses do it wrong. But the real answer: currently, the Church authorizes both. The real concern should be intention, and it’s unlikely we will be able to discover that faithful Catholics who kneel are actually in fact doing this to divide the Church. We should assume good will of the bishop and hope and pray he will assume good will of his sheep.

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