www.byzcath.org Forums General Discussions Town Hall I'm astounded!!

Shlomo Amado and Khrystyna,
The traditional signs and symbols that you are discribing are for the Roman Church. Within the Eastern Churches we have other rich traditions to show our devotion, such as bowing when entering Church.

Poosh BaShlomo Lkhoolkhoon,
Yuhannon

Dear Yuhannon,

Yes indeed, we were addressing Roman traditions but by no means trying to undermine the riches of the Christian East. There is no competition here, simply faithfulness to our liturgical patrimonies.

Khrystyna

Actually the Iraqi Saddam regime has been one of the only Arab regimes which is tolerant with the Christian Chaldean community and who has christian officers in the government.

The muslim Kurds have always been the worst enemies of Christian Chaldeans in Iraq, they have always hated Christians, specialy Syriacs and Chaldeans who live mainly in the North. And now when Saddam is gone they'll hate them more because they will be seen as supporters of the Baath and the Kurds will start killing them and taking the Christians's houses.

Let's pray for Catholicos Mar Raphael, and the Chaldean people of Iraq.

Traditional RC's also bow their heads or cross themselves at the mention of the name of Christ.

Logos Teen

Dear Logos Teen,

Right you are! I've also always loved the bow made at the announcement of the Incarnation during the Profession of Faith and was always impressed at how Anglicans/Episcopalians bowed towards the processional cross as it passed.

Of course you know that the Roman Catholic bishops have now proposed that Roman Catholics make a simple bow of the head as they approach and receive Holy Communion in acknowledgement of the Real Presence before them. And of course, the East's employment of the profound bow is a beautiful sign of reverence. Worshipping with both mind and body is the way to go!!

Khrystyna

You know it's strange to me , that there has been all this 'fuss' in the US about the sign of reverence before Receiving.

It does not seem to have caused the same problem in this side of the Pond - here some kneel to Receive, some stand, before approaching the Priest/EEM some make the Sign of the Cross , others do not, Some make a wee nod of the head and others [ me ] make a deep bow. We even have one handicapped person who calls out "ooh thank you" - but we know exactly what she means.

Anhelyna

Dear Khrystyna:

It's interesting that you mention "a simple bow of the head" prior to reception of our Lord in the Eucharist. We've just been instructed in a rather emphatic way that that is simply not the correct posture. We've been told here in my parish that our bishop has interpreted the requirement as being the profound bow of the whole body--to the waist--that our Byzantine brethren would be familiar with. In fact, we're told that the simple bow is simply irreverent.

But then, I've read many diocesan websites around the states and find that there are as many interpretations of the new rules surrounding the celebration of the Latin Liturgy as there are bishops and their liturgical commissions. and there are as many dispensations to the agreed on rules for the American adaptations as there are rules. And the best part is that there is as yet no approved translation of any of it!

It reminds me of a story an Orthodox priest friend of mine told me about individual interpretation of liturgical rules within Orthodoxy. Seems an old Russian lady stood throughout the bishop's serving of the Liturgy in her church and kept shaking her head and clucking with her tongue rather loudly at every move the poor man made. At the end of the Liturgy he asked her what was the trouble. She told him that he was doing it all wrong. So he said that his uncle was the Metropolitan and had taught him how to serve as a bishop. To which she replied that HER uncle was the Patriarch and she was going to tell him about both of them!

May the Good Lord help us all.

BOB

Someone, please agree with me that this summarizes the cause of about 75% of Novus Ordo problems. Way too many "may do this/may do that"* in my opinion.

Logos Teen

*This is assuming we are speaking within the confines of one culture. I think some flexibility has been rightly applied to Masses of different cultures (i.e. a Chinese Mass, a French Mass, etc.).

Dear friends,

You have all made some excellent observations. Anhelyna, in many of our parishes there are the same variations -- some folks genuflect, some make the Sign of the Cross, some make a simple bow of the head, some simply receive. A friend of mine who is an Extraordinary Minister of the Eucharist is very annoyed when people say "thank you" after receiving the Host. Seems a little education is needed here!

Of course, the business of genuflection has some diocesan and parish officials in a frenzy. Some priests have absoutely forbidden (which I don't think they have the right to do) anyone to genuflect when receiving and I say piffle on them. It's never caused a problem at my parish, people just instinctively know to step back a little if the person before them genuflects.

Our priests, in response to a parish survey that advised them that people want to know more about the structure of the Mass and the whys and wherefores of how things are done, have offered the "simple bow" of the head as a sign of reverence before receiving. BUT ... in acknowledgement of Bob's comments (loved the story about the Russian lady!!) several years ago I attended Mass at a newly formed parish where kneelers had not been installed. Now, this was before I had ever attended an Eastern liturgy so when the priest elevated the Body and Blood and the people made a profound bow I was flabbergasted! Now, of course, I realize what an ancient and deeply reverent gesture this is, but at the time I scratched my head and was trying to figure out what the heck was going on.

Bob, you are correct, there is as of yet no uniform standard but I sure wish someone would come up with one. I agree with Logos Teen, there will always be variations in the "culture" from one parish to another but some liturgical uniformity would be helpful. There just seem to be TOO many options these days.

And I'm still trying to figure out if "Art and Environment in Catholic Worship" has been superceded by "Built of Living Stones".

Khrystyna

It's interesting to me that when we begin to discuss the ways in which we honor the Lord we immediately move to discussing the things that make us different and what separates us than to those things which we share from our common patrimony in the pre-schism Church. I especially wonder at the fierce reactions to what are termed “latinizations” that have crept into much Eastern practice.

I keep going back to the story of Sts. Cyril and Methodius traveling to Rome to seek the Pope's blessing on their mission in Moravia when they were challenged by the German missionaries in the same territory for their use of the vernacular language (Slavonic). It's very instructive to me that the Pope at that time ordered copies of their service books placed on all the altars of the city to show his support for their liturgical practice and orthodoxy, as well as to show that the books were worthy of honor in the Church wherever they were used.

I suspect that our pre-schism brethren would have had a much easier time going from one place to another and entering the worship of the local community than we would or do today. I believe that it's because we have all developed in the isolation that all these schisms have given us and also given us this mind-set wherein we still react in an “us vs. them” way every time we see something that we are not familiar with or which we want to identify as “not ours.” Sadly we will never fulfill our Lord's prayer “that all may be one” as long as we have this reaction.

This is not to say that I favor some type of amorphous mixture of liturgical practices that would leave everyone wondering if they were in the right place or feeling out of place and uncomfortable—if you want that, just go from parish to parish and diocese to diocese in the Latin Church in North America today. But I wonder about the need to so fiercely focus on eliminating any practice that seems not to belong to a particular local church.

Add to this, the fact that history has mixed us together, whether we like it or not. The Armenian Church has some latinizations that I have discussed with one of our brothers in that local church. I asked if it would disturb someone in the pew who does not have our liturgical and historical interest in the fine points of liturgical practice to see something disappear that made him/her feel at home. The wholesale elimination of things and rituals is what has so polarized many Latin parishes because someone decided that they were “out” and everyone could “like it or lump it.” I asked in a discussion of mitres, for example, if the whole issue shouldn't be resolved in favor of the Syriac Orthodox tradition where it seems they use none at all. I wonder how the average person in the pew would react to just that.

It seems to me that we all need to respectfully learn about and appreciate each other and our worship forms with the idea that none is more valuable than the others. After all, the Holy Spirit has moved each community to develop even when we have been in isolation and what we may have borrowed from each other has His stamp on it, too.

BOB