"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
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
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.
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.
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!
Anecdotally, whether due to parishioner age or lack of formation, we never had them in Florida. There is nothing like receiving the way we were intended while on vacation! Sometimes (even now) you get odd looks for receiving on the tongue. This too shall pass :)
I attend mass in the diocese of Charlotte and would appreciate knowing in which parishes "the Father so-and-so show" is playing, because I haven't found it. I have seen some "holier than thou" congregants performing their own pious practices (sometimes very obviously ostentatiously) such as veiling, kneeling to receive Holy Communion, holding hands during recitation of the Lord's Prayer, etc. It seems like this is what Bishop Martin is trying to address. And it seems like he is onto something, because the fierceness with which poeple are clinging to their personal preferences makes me wonder if they are making idols out of them.
You think Bishop Martin also wants to stop women who choose to veil in Mass from doing so? On what conceivable basis? And has he expressed any opposition to holding hands during the Our Father? That would be heartening, actually, since that's the one of your list that's actually a novelty.
I attended a Baptism of an 8 mth old in Leitrim last week. The priest had the need to deviate from the formal practice to show the young adults he was his own man. After blessing the child he insisted that the 60 people attending come forward and make the sign of the cross on the child. The child screamed and clawed at every hand that came near her for the 10 mins it took. The child was traumatised but the priest saw nothing wrong. Only 2 or 3 of us refused to comply with the priests vanity solo run.
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.
"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
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
Yep. Can't walk it back because that takes humility and having to see the issue through the eyes of others.
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.
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.
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!
Anecdotally, whether due to parishioner age or lack of formation, we never had them in Florida. There is nothing like receiving the way we were intended while on vacation! Sometimes (even now) you get odd looks for receiving on the tongue. This too shall pass :)
I attend mass in the diocese of Charlotte and would appreciate knowing in which parishes "the Father so-and-so show" is playing, because I haven't found it. I have seen some "holier than thou" congregants performing their own pious practices (sometimes very obviously ostentatiously) such as veiling, kneeling to receive Holy Communion, holding hands during recitation of the Lord's Prayer, etc. It seems like this is what Bishop Martin is trying to address. And it seems like he is onto something, because the fierceness with which poeple are clinging to their personal preferences makes me wonder if they are making idols out of them.
You think Bishop Martin also wants to stop women who choose to veil in Mass from doing so? On what conceivable basis? And has he expressed any opposition to holding hands during the Our Father? That would be heartening, actually, since that's the one of your list that's actually a novelty.
I attended a Baptism of an 8 mth old in Leitrim last week. The priest had the need to deviate from the formal practice to show the young adults he was his own man. After blessing the child he insisted that the 60 people attending come forward and make the sign of the cross on the child. The child screamed and clawed at every hand that came near her for the 10 mins it took. The child was traumatised but the priest saw nothing wrong. Only 2 or 3 of us refused to comply with the priests vanity solo run.
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.