The bishop of Belleville has reportedly sent a letter to at least one more parish in Illinois instructing parishioners to follow the liturgical norms of kneeling during Mass (see previous story here). Unfortunately, however, some unhappy parishioners are complaining about the directive, and one "adjunct professor of religious studies" has called the instruction (try not to laugh): "liturgical nitpicking that winds up harming the solemnity of the liturgy." So now kneeling harms solemnity? How exactly does that happen? Reading a bit further into one news account reveals the root of the problem, namely that these people fail to appreciate that the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is a solemn sacrifice - the very re-presentation of Calvary. Instead, they have imbibed the Protestant "meal concept" mentality as evidenced by the assertion that "We should all be sitting around a table sharing a meal." Since they mistake Mass for a meal, no wonder they don't want to kneel! Pray that the Bishop will - posthaste - give these parishioners some much needed instruction on the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass!
"Enter, let us bow down in worship; let us kneel before the LORD who made us." (Ps. 95:6)
"In the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those that are in heaven, on earth, and under the earth" (St. Paul, Phil. 2:10)
"A faith or a liturgy no longer familiar with kneeling would be sick at the core." (Cardinal Ratzinger, the future Pope Benedict XVI)
"In the Mass there is offered to God a true sacrifice, properly speaking, which is propitiatory for the living and the dead." (Pope Pius IV)
"If any one saith that the sacrifice of the mass is only a sacrifice of praise and of thanksgiving; or that it is a bare commemoration of the sacrifice consummated on the Cross, but not a propitiatory sacrifice; or that it profits him only who receives; and that it ought not to be offered for the living and for the dead for sins, pains, satisfactions, and other necessities; let him be anathema." (Council of Trent)
"And thenceforth, the Apostles, and their successors in the priesthood, began to lift to heaven that 'clean oblation' foretold by Malachy, through which the name of God is great among the gentiles. And now, that same oblation in every part of the world and at every hour of the day and night, is offered and will continue to be offered without interruption till the end of time: a true sacrificial act, not merely symbolical, which has a real efficacy unto the reconciliation of sinners with the Divine Majesty." (Pope Pius XI, "Ad Catholici Sacerdotii", 1935 A.D.)
"The august sacrifice of the altar, then is no mere empty commemoration of the passion and death of Jesus Christ, but a true and proper act of sacrifice, whereby the High Priest by an unbloody immolation offers Himself a most acceptable victim to the Eternal Father, as He did upon the cross. 'It is one and the same victim; the same person now offers it by the ministry of His priests, who then offered Himself on the cross, the manner of offering alone being different. The priest is the same, Jesus Christ, whose sacred Person His minister represents." (Pope Pius XII, "Mediator Dei", 1947 A.D.)
Related: Kneeling (Reflections) | Holy Eucharist / Holy Sacrifice of the Mass
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