Arinze and Liturgy
The appearance of Cardinal Arinze's podcast elsewhere in the blogosphere reminded me of a useful link to His Eminence's superb talk at Westminster Cathedral back on 1 April (and this is no April's Fool). It's old news, of course, and aroused a lot of interest at the time - but such are the number of Catholic links on the web that it's easy to miss gems like this.
At one point Arinze talks of the Mass as 'the supreme act of adoration, praise and thanksgiving which humanity can offer to God.' After all, 'God is not our equal. He is not our colleague. He is our Creator. Without Him we would not exist at all. He is the only necessary being. It is normal that we acknowledge this fact.' One way of expressing our adoration is by genuflecting every time we pass the Tabernacle - 'a reverential and deliberate act and not a careless bending of the knee to the nearest pillar.'
This is why the Tabernacle should be at the centre of the church (Arinze said, off the cuff, that the only exceptions would be a church like St Peter's, Rome or Westminster Cathedral and not just a large parish church). He noted that 'in some of our churches some misguided person has relegated the tabernacle to an obscure section of the church. Sometimes it is even difficult for a visitor to locate where the tabernacle is, that the visitor can say with truth with St Mary Magdalene: "They have taken my Lord, and I do not know where they laid him" (Jn 20: 13).'
Talking of churches and liturgy, there is much excitement in our diocese with the opening of a 'new cutting edge church' - click here to check out pictures and the full story!
At one point Arinze talks of the Mass as 'the supreme act of adoration, praise and thanksgiving which humanity can offer to God.' After all, 'God is not our equal. He is not our colleague. He is our Creator. Without Him we would not exist at all. He is the only necessary being. It is normal that we acknowledge this fact.' One way of expressing our adoration is by genuflecting every time we pass the Tabernacle - 'a reverential and deliberate act and not a careless bending of the knee to the nearest pillar.'
This is why the Tabernacle should be at the centre of the church (Arinze said, off the cuff, that the only exceptions would be a church like St Peter's, Rome or Westminster Cathedral and not just a large parish church). He noted that 'in some of our churches some misguided person has relegated the tabernacle to an obscure section of the church. Sometimes it is even difficult for a visitor to locate where the tabernacle is, that the visitor can say with truth with St Mary Magdalene: "They have taken my Lord, and I do not know where they laid him" (Jn 20: 13).'
Talking of churches and liturgy, there is much excitement in our diocese with the opening of a 'new cutting edge church' - click here to check out pictures and the full story!
posted by Fr Nicholas at 12:30 am
3 Comments:
Parish Priest Father Tim O’Connor said 'The church is to be a welcoming church - its consecration means that it now belongs to the universal church and beyond.'
...ok....let me catch my breath here. You mean the Roman Catholic Church in the past has NOT been a "welcoming Church"?? You might want to check in with folks like John Henry Cardinal Newman, Ronald Knox, Evelyn Waugh, and about a million others. Note to Fr Tim: "catholic" MEANS universal.
Now, what is one to make of the fact that "it now belongs to the universal church and beyond"??? Question for Fr Tim: Are you hiding something from us? Is there something BEYOND universal???
This "church" is a joke. England is strewn with beautiful churches, large and small. Apparently, architects and "liturgists" are too busy navel gaing and "re-imaging church" (could the jargon be any more annoying?) to learn anything from the past.
Sorry...
Should have been "navel GAZING" in the last sentence.
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