A pagan soldier’s words at the heart of the Mass

The Church has always baptized what is good in the world rather than pretending the Gospel arrives in a cultural vacuum. The prayer millions say before Communion—“Lord, I am not worthy that you should enter under my roof, but only say the word and my soul shall be healed”—comes from a Roman centurion, a Gentile officer of the occupying power. Jesus marveled at his faith and said He had not found such faith in Israel. The Church placed those words in the Mass. That is not a Vatican II novelty. It is how the people of God have worked from the beginning.

 A pagan soldier’s words at the heart of the Mass

In Matthew 8 and Luke 7 a centurion asks Jesus to heal his servant. When Jesus offers to come to the house, the soldier replies that he is not worthy to have the Lord under his roof; a word will suffice. Jesus praises him. The Latin form, Domine, non sum dignus, entered the Roman Mass in the later Middle Ages as the priest’s (and later the people’s) preparation for Communion. “Servant” became “soul.” The physical roof became the soul and body that receive the Eucharist. The text is Scripture; the speaker was a pagan.

The Church did not invent a pious phrase and then discover it in the Gospel. She took the Gospel’s own record of a Gentile’s humility and faith and set it at the moment when Catholics approach the Real Presence. The centurion is not baptized in the narrative. His words are still used because they express what every communicant must say: unworthiness plus trust in Christ’s word.

 Inculturation is older than the Council

Critics of post-conciliar liturgical adaptation often treat “inculturation” as a 1960s experiment that risks syncretism. Sacrosanctum Concilium 37–40 does authorize prudent adaptation of rites to cultures, provided the substance of the Roman rite is preserved and organic development is respected. Abuses and poorly discerned experiments have given the word a bad name. The principle itself is not new.

Israel already practiced a form of it. The patriarchs built altars at existing sacred sites. Israel’s calendar of pilgrimage feasts—Passover, Weeks, Booths—mapped onto agricultural rhythms shared with neighboring peoples, then filled them with the memory of YHWH’s acts. Temple architecture and furnishings drew on Phoenician and Canaanite craftsmanship; Hiram of Tyre supplied materials and skill for Solomon’s temple. Some psalms take the language of Baal’s victory over the sea and apply it to the Lord who is mightier than the waters. Musical forms and instruments were not invented in a vacuum.

The prophets did not condemn every shared form. They condemned idolatry, sacred prostitution, child sacrifice, and the pretence that YHWH was one god among many. When Israel simply copied Canaanite worship, the result was “pagan Yahwism,” not faithful adaptation. When Israel took a form and redirected it—sacrifice to the one God, harvest feast as covenant memorial—the form served revelation. The difference is conversion of the meaning, not mere decoration.

The early Church did the same with the Roman world: basilica architecture, legal language, calendar dates, and rhetorical styles were pressed into service. Christmas on 25 December is the classic (and still debated) example of taking a midwinter festival and filling it with the Incarnation. The centurion’s prayer is cleaner still: it is already Gospel text spoken by a Gentile whom Jesus commended.

 Discernment, not syncretism

True inculturation baptizes; syncretism mixes incompatible claims. Using a pagan’s humble confession because Christ Himself endorsed it is the first kind. Importing a fertility goddess statue or treating indigenous rituals as if they already accomplish what the sacraments accomplish is the second. The Church’s own later instructions on liturgical adaptation warn against replacing biblical texts with other religions’ prayers and against gestures that keep their old religious meaning.

The centurion episode already contains the criterion. Jesus does not praise Roman military religion. He praises faith that recognizes authority and unworthiness before the true Lord. The Mass keeps the words and changes the object: not a servant on a sickbed, but the soul about to receive the Lamb. That is how Israel treated harvest festivals and how the Church has treated language, art, and custom ever since. The scandal is not that a pagan once spoke the words. The scandal would be refusing to let Christ claim them.

St. Gregory the Great

Two days after St. Giles’s quiet forest feast, the calendar turns to a very different September saint. St. Gregory the Great is remembered on September 3. He died on March 12, 604, and the East still marks that date. In the West the memorial was moved to September 3 so it would not fall in Lent—the day he was consecrated pope in 590.

If Giles is the hermit who hid, Gregory is the monk who could not hide. Rome dragged him out of the cloister and set him on Peter’s chair while the city was dying of plague.

 A noble who wanted a cell

Gregory was born in Rome around 540, into a family that already knew both the Senate and the altar. His father Gordianus served as prefect of the city. His mother Silvia is venerated as a saint, as are two aunts. A great-great-grandfather had been Pope Felix III.

He received the education of a late-Roman aristocrat and rose, as his father had, to become prefect of Rome—the highest civil office left in a city that was no longer the capital of an empire. Then he walked away. He sold estates, founded six monasteries in Sicily and one in his family villa on the Caelian Hill, and became a monk. Later he would say those years of “silence of the heart” were the happiest of his life.

The Church did not leave him there. Pope Pelagius II ordained him deacon and sent him as papal ambassador to Constantinople. He kept a monastic rhythm at the imperial court for six years, then came home to his monastery. In 590 the plague took Pelagius. Clergy, people, and Senate chose Gregory. He tried to refuse. Tradition says he even tried to flee. He was consecrated anyway—on September 3.

He was the first monk to become pope.

 A city of famine, Lombards, and fever

The Rome he inherited was a ruin with a famous name. The Western Empire was gone. Lombards pressed from the north. Grain failed. Plague emptied streets. The emperor in Constantinople was far away and often unhelpful.

Gregory did what a prefect would do and what a monk would do at the same time. He organized food for the poor from the Church’s estates. He ransomed captives. He negotiated with Lombard dukes when the imperial army would not come. He emptied treasuries to keep people alive. Romans later called him consul Dei—God’s consul—and “Father of the City.”

He also took a title that every pope after him has used: Servant of the Servants of God. It was not decoration. For Gregory, office was a burden accepted for other people’s souls.

 The pastor who wrote the job description

His most lasting book is the Regula Pastoralis—the Pastoral Rule. Written at the start of his pontificate, it tells bishops how to live and how to preach: not one sermon for every hearer, but different medicine for the proud and the timid, the rich and the poor, the young and the old. Medieval Europe treated it as a manual for anyone who had charge of souls. Kings kept copies. Bishops were examined on it.

He also wrote the Moralia on Job, homilies on the Gospels and Ezekiel, hundreds of letters, and the Dialogues, which preserved the memory of St. Benedict for the West. He is one of the four traditional Latin Doctors of the Church.

Artists show a dove at his ear because a secretary’s legend said the Holy Spirit dictated his words on Ezekiel. The image is a claim about his work: the Church remembered him not only as an administrator, but as a man who listened before he spoke.

 Chant, England, and the shape of worship

“Gregorian chant” bears his name. He did not invent plainchant from nothing, but he reformed and organized the Roman liturgy so thoroughly that later centuries attached the music to him. He is patron of musicians, singers, choirs, teachers, and students for that reason—and because he believed worship should form the soul, not merely decorate the hour.

He is also, in a real sense, a patron of England. Seeing fair-haired Anglo-Saxon boys in a Roman market, he is said to have punned, Non Angli, sed angeli—not Angles, but angels. In 596 he sent Augustine of Canterbury and a band of monks from his own community to preach to the English. The mission took root. English Christians never forgot the pope who sent it.

 How to keep September 3

Gregory’s day is a feast for people who did not want the job and did it anyway.

A simple way to mark it:

- Pray for pastors, teachers, and public servants who are tired and still responsible.  

- Listen to a piece of Gregorian chant—not as museum music, but as the sound of a Church trying to pray with one voice.  

- Read a short passage from the Pastoral Rule if you lead anyone: a classroom, a household, a parish, a team. Gregory’s test is blunt. Desire for power disqualifies. Love of the flock does not.

He suffered from chronic illness in his last years, likely gout and the aftereffects of austerity. He kept writing and giving. One of his final recorded kindnesses was sending a warm cloak to a poor bishop who felt the cold. He died on March 12, 604, and was buried at St. Peter’s. The people did not wait for a formal process. They called him the Great.

Giles teaches the holiness of refuge. Gregory teaches the holiness of being fetched from refuge when the city is on fire. September holds both: the hermit in the thicket, and the monk who became, against his will, the shepherd of a broken Rome.

St. Gregory the Great, pope and doctor, servant of the servants of God, pray for those who lead, those who sing, and those who would rather pray in silence than sit in the chair.

Is Liturgical Dance Allowed in the Roman Rite?

Is Liturgical Dance Allowed in the Roman Rite? An Examination of Liturgical Documents, Historical Context, Scholarship, and Comparative Practice Across Rites

The question of whether liturgical dance is permitted in the Roman Rite of the Catholic Church remains one of the more frequently raised and contested issues in contemporary liturgical practice, particularly in parishes influenced by post-conciliar experimentation. Advocates often present it as an embodiment of active participation called for by the Second Vatican Council, a recovery of biblical models such as David’s dance before the Ark, or a legitimate expression of cultural identity and joy. Opponents argue that it introduces secular performance aesthetics into the sacred action, distracts from the objective character of the rite, and contradicts the received tradition of the Latin Church. A careful reading of official documents, supported by historical evidence and theological scholarship, yields a clear conclusion for the ordinary celebration of the Roman Rite in Western cultural contexts: choreographed or free-form liturgical dance is not authorized within the Mass or other liturgical celebrations. Unauthorized introduction constitutes an abuse. This expanded treatment draws more extensively on primary sources, additional historical testimony, the specific provisions of approved inculturated uses, scholarly analysis, and the contrasting practices of Eastern rites in order to provide a fuller account.

 Biblical, Patristic, and Early Historical Foundations

Scripture contains positive references to dance in contexts of praise. Miriam the prophetess led the women of Israel with timbrels and dances after the crossing of the Red Sea (Exodus 15:20–21). King David danced before the Lord with all his might as the Ark of the Covenant was brought to Jerusalem (2 Samuel 6:14–16). The Psalms exhort the people to praise God with timbrel and dance (Psalm 149:3; 150:4). These passages demonstrate that bodily expression of joy before God is not alien to revelation. Yet they do not prescribe the form of the Christian eucharistic liturgy that developed from the Last Supper and the apostolic breaking of the bread. The New Testament itself contains no directive to incorporate dance into the Lord’s Supper or the assemblies described in Acts and the Pauline letters.

In the early Church, the attitude toward dance was predominantly cautious or prohibitive when it risked association with pagan cults, theatrical spectacle, or moral disorder. Church fathers such as St. John Chrysostom warned that “where there is dance, there is the devil,” while elsewhere acknowledging that God gave feet so that human beings might dance with the angels. St. Basil the Great could speak of dancing as a noble activity of the angels, yet practical discipline restricted its place. Councils of the fourth through seventh centuries repeatedly addressed dances connected with weddings, vigils, or festivals that had entered or threatened to enter ecclesiastical settings. Canons condemned saltationes (leaping dances) linked to pagan customs or excess, seeking to protect the sobriety of Christian worship and the dignity of sacred space. Scholarly studies of conciliar canons and papal letters from this period (for example, analyses of texts from the fourth to seventh centuries) show that while Christians continued to dance in social and even some popular religious contexts, the hierarchy sought to exclude disorderly or secular forms from the formal liturgy and church buildings.

Medieval Western sources reveal a more nuanced picture. Twelfth-century liturgists such as John Beleth and Sicard of Cremona discussed the circular dance (chorea) metaphorically in relation to the Easter liturgy, drawing on earlier monastic writers such as Honorius Augustodunensis. They noted that certain churches permitted limited festive games or circular movements in cloisters during the “December freedom,” yet they also recorded prohibitions against dances in churches, cemeteries, and processions. Later councils, including Vienne (1311–1312) and Basel (1431–1436), renewed condemnations of dissolute circular dances and entertainments that had crept into churches on certain feast days, describing them as abuses that turned the house of prayer into a place of spectacle. These historical layers explain why the Latin tradition developed a preference for regulated, sober gestures—processions, genuflections, bows, and the ordered movements of ministers—rather than free or choreographed dance within the Mass itself.

 The Second Vatican Council and the Framework of Adaptation

Sacrosanctum Concilium (SC), the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy (1963), provides the foundational principles. The liturgy is the exercise of the priestly office of Jesus Christ; in it the sanctification of humanity is signified by signs perceptible to the senses and is effected in a manner proper to each of these signs (SC 7). The Church earnestly desires that all the faithful be led to that full, conscious, and active participation which is demanded by the very nature of the liturgy (SC 14). At the same time, the Council declares that the Church has no wish to impose a rigid uniformity in matters that do not involve the faith or the good of the whole community; she respects and fosters the genius and talents of the various races and peoples. Whatever in their way of life is not indissolubly bound up with superstition and error she studies with sympathy and, if possible, preserves intact; sometimes she even admits such things into the liturgy itself, provided they harmonize with its true and authentic spirit (SC 37). Provisions are to be made for legitimate variations and adaptations to different groups, regions, and peoples, especially in mission lands, provided that the substantial unity of the Roman Rite is preserved (SC 38–40).

These texts open the door to cultural adaptation but close it against unilateral innovation. No person, not even a priest, may add, remove, or change anything in the liturgy on his own authority (SC 22 §3). The General Instruction of the Roman Missal (GIRM) develops the Council’s teaching on gesture: the gestures and bodily posture of the priest, deacon, ministers, and people must be conducive to making the entire celebration resplendent with beauty and noble simplicity, clarifying the true and full meaning of its different parts, and fostering the participation of all. Attention must be paid to what is determined by the GIRM and by the traditional practice of the Roman Rite, and to what serves the common spiritual good of the People of God rather than private inclination or arbitrary choice (GIRM 42). Dance is simply not among the gestures foreseen by the liturgical books of the Roman Rite.

 The 1975 Notitiae Essay: Authoritative Point of Reference

The most direct treatment of the question appears in an essay published by the Congregation for the Sacraments and Divine Worship in its official journal Notitiae 11 (1975), pages 202–205, under the title “The Religious Dance, an Expression of Spiritual Joy.” The Congregation explicitly labeled it a “qualified and authoritative sketch” and “an authoritative point of reference for every discussion on the matter,” recommending it for study by diocesan liturgical commissions. English translations circulated widely, including in The Canon Law Digest and reprints by the U.S. Bishops’ Committee on the Liturgy.

The essay acknowledges that dance can be an art that expresses human feelings, particularly joy, and that mystics have known moments of dancing as an overflow of divine love. It then draws a crucial cultural distinction. In certain cultures, dance remains reflective of religious values and becomes a clear manifestation of them. The Ethiopian tradition is cited at length: even today there exists a religious ritualized dance, clearly distinct from martial or amorous dance, performed by priests and levites before beginning a ceremony and in the open area in front of the church; the dance accompanies the chanting of psalms during the procession. When the procession enters the church, the psalmody continues with bodily movement. Similar elements appear in the Syriac liturgy through psalmody, and a highly simplified form occurs in the Byzantine wedding rite when the crowned spouses make a circular revolution around the lectern with the celebrant. Among the Israelites and certain primitive peoples, continuous bodily movement accompanies prayer.

The essay then states the decisive judgment for Western culture: “However, the same criterion and judgment cannot be applied in the western culture. Here dancing is tied with love, with diversion, with profaneness, with unbridling of the senses: such dancing, in general, is not pure. For that reason it cannot be introduced into liturgical celebrations of any kind whatever: that would be to inject into the liturgy one of the most desacralized and desacralizing elements; and so it would be equivalent to creating an atmosphere of profaneness which would easily recall to those present and to the participants in the celebration worldly places and situations.”

It further rejects so-called artistic ballet because it would present a spectacle at which one merely assists, whereas a fundamental norm of the liturgy is the participation of all. The dance has never been made an integral part of the official worship of the Latin Church. Where local churches have accepted dance, sometimes even in the church building, it was on the occasion of feasts to manifest joy and devotion, but always outside of liturgical services. Conciliar decisions have often condemned religious dance because it conduces little to worship and can degenerate into disorder. If a proposal for religious dance in the West is to be acceptable, it must occur outside the liturgy, in assembly areas that are not strictly liturgical, and priests must always be excluded from the dance.

This text remains the baseline reference. Subsequent official responses treat it as controlling for the Roman Rite in Western settings.

 Later Clarifications from the Holy See and National Conferences

Cardinal Francis Arinze, Prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, addressed the issue repeatedly. In a 2003 interview he stated: “There has never been a document from our Congregation for Divine Worship and Discipline of the Sacraments saying that dance is approved in the Mass. The tradition of the Latin Church has not known the dance. It is something that people are introducing in the last ten, or twenty years.” He emphasized that the Mass is primarily for the adoration of God (the vertical dimension), not mutual entertainment, and that most dances staged during Mass belong in the parish hall—if they are suitable even there. Some he had witnessed were offensive.

In 2012 the Congregation issued a formal reply (Prot. n. 544/12/L) to a query about a parish “liturgical dance and drama ministry”: “The liturgical law of the Roman Rite does not foresee the use of dance or drama within the Sacred Liturgy, unless particular legislation has been enacted by the Bishops’ Conference and confirmed by the Holy See. Any other practice is to be considered an abuse.” Such activities could be useful outside the Sacred Liturgy for catechesis and evangelization if directed by the bishop and clergy.

The 2004 Instruction Redemptionis Sacramentum reinforces the general principle. It condemns elements of spectacle and recalls that no one may add, remove, or change anything in the liturgy on personal initiative (citing SC 22 §3 and canon 846 §1). Although dance is not named, any insertion of elements not contemplated by the liturgical books falls under its prohibitions.

The 1994 Instruction Varietates legitimae (On Inculturation and the Roman Liturgy) provides the positive criteria for cultural adaptation. Among some peoples, singing is instinctively accompanied by hand-clapping, rhythmic swaying, and dance movements. Such forms of external expression can have a place in the liturgical actions of these peoples on condition that they are always the expression of true communal prayer of adoration, praise, offering, and supplication, and not simply a performance (VL 42). Adaptations depend entirely on the authority of the Church—the Apostolic See through the Congregation, and within legal limits the conferences of bishops and the diocesan bishop. Inculturation is never left to personal or collective initiative (VL 37).

National conferences have applied these norms. After reprinting the 1975 essay, the U.S. Bishops’ Committee on the Liturgy directed that all dancing (ballet, children’s gesture as dancing, clown liturgy) is not permitted to be introduced into liturgical celebrations of any kind. Similar clarifications appear in other Western conferences. Practices such as Matachines dances in Hispanic communities are typically limited by diocesan guidelines to before or after Mass and outside the liturgical action proper.

 Theological Scholarship: Ratzinger and Others

Joseph Ratzinger (later Pope Benedict XVI) offered one of the most influential theological critiques in The Spirit of the Liturgy (2000). He wrote: “Dancing is not a form of expression for the Christian liturgy. In about the third century, there was an attempt in certain Gnostic-Docetic circles to introduce it into the liturgy... The cultic dances of the different religions have different purposes—incantation, imitative magic, mystical ecstasy—none of which is compatible with the essential purpose of the liturgy of the ‘reasonable sacrifice.’ It is totally absurd to try to make the liturgy ‘attractive’ by introducing dancing pantomimes (wherever possible performed by professional dance troupes), which frequently (and rightly, from the professionals’ point of view) end with applause. Wherever applause breaks out in the liturgy because of some human achievement, it is a sure sign that the essence of liturgy has totally disappeared and been replaced by a kind of religious entertainment... None of the Christian rites includes dancing.”

Ratzinger distinguished carefully between the rhythmic processional movements found in certain African or Ethiopian contexts and the Western-style dance performances that turn the liturgy into a show. Scholarship continues to explore the tension between embodied expression and the structured, hierarchical character of traditional liturgy. Some recent academic work examines the potential of liturgical dance as a research field while acknowledging that within the Roman Catholic Church it remains constrained by official norms. Other studies document the historical presence of limited festive or metaphorical dance imagery in medieval Western sources without overturning the practical exclusion from the Mass.

 Approved Inculturation: The Zairean (Congolese) Use

The Zairean Use (also called the Zairean Rite or Congolese Rite), officially the Missel romain pour les diocèses du Zaïre, was approved by the Congregation for Divine Worship in 1988 after lengthy dialogue. It remains within the framework of the Roman Rite while incorporating Congolese cultural elements. Features include an entrance procession with singing and clapping according to the rhythm of the hymns, the Gloria accompanied by dancing around the altar (symbolizing Christ as the living stone), lively music with traditional instruments, and congregational movement. Dancing among the congregants is permitted as an expression of faith and joy, performed with dignity and without the disorder of secular forms. Pope Francis has praised the Zairean Rite as a promising model of inculturation, noting that it was the first and, until recently, the only fully approved inculturated rite of the Latin Church after Vatican II, and citing it in connection with calls for similar attentiveness in other cultural contexts such as the Amazon.

This approved use illustrates the proper path: hierarchical study, experimental stages, and formal confirmation by the Holy See, ensuring that movements remain expressions of communal prayer rather than performance.

 Practices in Non-Roman Rites and Eastern Traditions

Eastern Catholic Churches and their Orthodox counterparts present a different picture because their rites developed in cultural matrices where ritualized movement retained religious significance.

In the Ethiopian (Ge’ez) tradition, shared by Ethiopian Catholics and the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church, liturgical dance is an established and highly codified element. The dabtara (cantors) perform aqwaqwam (or ‘aqwaqwam), a complex system of rhythmic bodily movements accompanying chant, using the prayer stick (maqwamiya), sistrum (sanasel), and drum (kebero). Dancers form parallel lines or circles, moving in stylized patterns that tradition traces to a heavenly revelation received by St. Yared. These dances occur especially in the Mahlet (night office) and on solemn feasts, before or in connection with the Qeddase (Mass). They are distinct from secular dance, taught in specialized church schools, and regarded as a terrestrial participation in the dance of the twenty-four elders of heaven. The 1975 Notitiae essay explicitly recognized this tradition as a legitimate cultural expression.

Syriac traditions incorporate movement with psalmody. In the Byzantine Rite (used by numerous Eastern Catholic Churches as well as the Orthodox), a simplified circular procession of the newly crowned spouses around the analogion with the celebrant occurs in the wedding service; it is sometimes described as a dance, though brief and highly ritualized. Historical Byzantine sources record occasional festive dancing in churches on great solemnities in certain periods, yet the Divine Liturgy itself does not feature free choreographed dance. Cultural and folk dances commonly accompany parish festivals outside the formal liturgy. Church authorities historically regulated dances that risked disorder (for example, canons of the Council in Trullo).

Armenian tradition preserves processional and festive movements with pre-Christian roots reinterpreted in a Christian key. In general, Eastern rites possess richer ceremonial movement than the classical Roman sobriety, yet their dance-like elements are traditional, regulated by the rite’s own books and customs, and ordered to prayer rather than modern expressive performance.

 Outside the Liturgy: Popular Piety, Catechesis, and Pastoral Practice

The 1975 essay and later responses leave limited space for religious dance outside the Sacred Liturgy. It may occur on feast days to express joy and devotion, preferably in non-strictly liturgical spaces, with priests excluded. Catechetical and evangelizing uses are possible under episcopal direction. Popular piety—processions, ethnic religious dances such as the Matachines, or festival celebrations—often accompanies the liturgical year. Diocesan norms typically insist that these remain distinct from the Mass itself so that the integrity of the rite is preserved.

 Conclusion

In the Roman Rite as ordinarily celebrated in Western cultural contexts, liturgical dance is not permitted within the Mass or other liturgical actions. The 1975 Notitiae essay, reinforced by Cardinal Arinze’s statements, the 2012 Congregation response, Redemptionis Sacramentum, the GIRM’s regulation of gesture, and the criteria of Varietates legitimae, establishes that unauthorized introduction is an abuse. Genuine inculturation, exemplified by the approved Zairean Use, can admit communal rhythmic movements when they express true prayer and receive hierarchical confirmation that preserves the substantial unity of the Roman Rite. Eastern rites such as the Ethiopian, and to a more limited extent the Syriac and Byzantine, incorporate traditional ritualized movements rooted in their own histories; these are not equivalent to contemporary Western “liturgical dance” performances.

The deeper theological issue, articulated by Ratzinger and others, concerns the nature of the liturgy as the opus Dei—God’s work—rather than a human production or entertainment. The authorized gestures of the Roman tradition already engage the body in a manner ordered to adoration, thanksgiving, and communion. Adding forms culturally associated with the secular, the romantic, or the spectacular tends to obscure the sacred mystery. Fidelity to the liturgical books, the authentic teaching of the Holy See, and the common spiritual good of the faithful remains the sure guide.

 References

- Sacrosanctum Concilium, Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy, Second Vatican Council, 1963, especially nos. 7, 14, 22, 37–40.

- General Instruction of the Roman Missal (third typical edition), especially no. 42.

- Congregation for the Sacraments and Divine Worship, “The Religious Dance, an Expression of Spiritual Joy,” Notitiae 11 (1975) 202–205 (English in Canon Law Digest VIII, 78–82).

- Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, Varietates legitimae, 1994, especially nos. 37, 42.

- Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, Redemptionis Sacramentum, 2004.

- Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, Prot. n. 544/12/L, 10 September 2012.

- Cardinal Francis Arinze, interview in National Catholic Register, 5 October 2003, and related addresses.

- Joseph Ratzinger (Benedict XVI), The Spirit of the Liturgy, trans. John Saward (Ignatius Press, 2000), especially pp. 198–199.

- Missel romain pour les diocèses du Zaïre (Zairean Use), approved 1988; related commentary by Pope Francis and Congolese liturgical studies.

- Scholarly works on Ethiopian aqwaqwam and dabtara traditions (ethnomusicological and liturgical studies).

- Historical studies of medieval liturgists (John Beleth, Sicard of Cremona, Honorius Augustodunensis) and conciliar canons on dance.

- Secondary resources: Adoremus Society analyses; Catholic Answers Q&A; U.S. Bishops’ Committee on the Liturgy directives (early 1980s); diocesan guidelines on Matachines and similar practices; academic treatments of dance in early and medieval Christianity.

 

Pope Leo XIV's Letter on Liturgy

Pope Leo XIV’s Recent Letter on the Liturgy: A Clear Call for Formation, Fidelity, and Reverence

In the summer of 2026, as the Catholic Church continues to navigate questions of identity, worship, and unity in a rapidly changing world, Pope Leo XIV issued a concise yet significant letter that has drawn careful attention from bishops, priests, liturgists, and the faithful. Dated June 29, 2026, and publicly released on August 14 in connection with a major conference on liturgical formation, the letter was addressed to Cardinal Arthur Roche, Prefect of the Dicastery for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments. It was written on the occasion of a gathering at the Benedictine Abbey of Mount Angel in Oregon (August 14–19, 2026), organized by the Dicastery to explore practical paths for the liturgical formation of God’s people.

This short papal message—rooted firmly in the Second Vatican Council’s Sacrosanctum Concilium, Pope Francis’s 2022 apostolic letter Desiderio Desideravi, and Leo XIV’s own recent Wednesday catecheses—does more than offer polite greetings or generic encouragement. It articulates a coherent vision of the liturgy as the living heart of the Church’s life, insists on ongoing formation for clergy and laity alike, underscores the formative power of Sunday Mass itself, and calls for clear fidelity to the approved post-conciliar rites. In doing so, it signals that the new pontiff takes the sacred liturgy with the utmost seriousness and intends to continue the trajectory of careful reform, organic development, and ecclesial communion charted by the Council and his immediate predecessors.

What follows is a detailed examination of what the letter actually says, why it matters in the broader context of contemporary Catholic life, and the unmistakable indications that Pope Leo XIV regards the liturgy not as a secondary or purely aesthetic concern, but as central to the Church’s mission, identity, and spiritual vitality.

 The Context: A Conference Rooted in Desiderio Desideravi and Sacrosanctum Concilium

The Mount Angel gathering was deliberately framed not primarily as a scholarly academic conference but as a time of spiritual discernment. Participants included cardinals, bishops, and lay people from diverse backgrounds, meeting in a monastic setting to develop concrete, shared proposals for liturgical formation across the Church. The choice of a Benedictine abbey underscored the desire for prayerful reflection rather than purely technical debate. The event responded directly to the invitation in Desiderio Desideravi for deeper formation so that the People of God might enter more fully into the beauty and theological depth of the liturgy.

Pope Leo’s letter situates itself explicitly within this framework. He begins with cordial greetings and immediately recalls Pope Francis’s teaching: the Apostolic Letter Desiderio Desideravi “described the beauty of the liturgy’s theological and spiritual depth” and “emphasized the need for an attentive and ongoing formation of clergy and laity alike in revitalizing the liturgical life of the universal Church.” He further quotes Francis’s later clarification that such formation “is not a specialization for a few experts, but rather an inner disposition of all the People of God.” Leo therefore encourages the participants “to explore concrete paths for liturgical formation at every level in the Body of Christ.” At the same time, he insists that priority must not be excluded for those who, by the sacrament of Holy Orders, are called to be “mystagogues”—guides who take the faithful by the hand and accompany them into knowledge of the holy mysteries.

This dual emphasis—universal formation as an interior disposition of the whole Church, combined with special attention to the formation of priests—sets the tone for the entire letter. It is pastoral, practical, and theologically grounded.

 What the Letter Says: Formation Through and for the Liturgy

The core of the message develops three interconnected themes: the primacy of Sunday Eucharist as the ordinary school of liturgical formation; the necessity of the ars celebrandi lived by the entire assembly; and the non-negotiable requirement of fidelity to approved texts and rites.

First, Leo identifies the regular Sunday gathering for the Eucharist as the primary practical opportunity for formation. “These celebrations are anchored in the annual rhythm of the liturgical year, with the Paschal Mystery at its center. For this reason, it is essential that they also be profoundly formative, promoting an ever deeper understanding of the ars celebrandi, expressed not only by the celebrant of the liturgy, but also by the entire assembly.” Through proper education and reverent worship, he continues, “Catholics will be formed both for the liturgy and by the liturgy.”

This is a rich claim. The liturgy is not merely something the Church does; it is something that forms the Church. Participation is not passive attendance but an active immersion that shapes faith, identity, and mission. By locating formation first and foremost in the ordinary Sunday celebration, Leo avoids any suggestion that liturgy is the preserve of specialists or occasional grand events. The weekly encounter with the Paschal Mystery, structured by the liturgical year, is itself the school in which the faithful learn to pray, to listen, to offer, and to be transformed.

Second, the Pope stresses fidelity. “Moreover, in order to promote the dignified celebration of the sacred mysteries, we must emphasize the need for fidelity to the approved texts and instructions.” He explicitly links this to his recent series of catecheses on Sacrosanctum Concilium: “I have called attention to the respect that all those called to prepare the celebration of the divine mysteries, and priests in particular, must show toward the rites promulgated by Pope Saint Paul VI and Pope Saint John Paul II.” Such respect, he insists, must spring “from an inner attitude of openness and trust in God, manifesting humility before his greatness and sincere fidelity to ecclesial communion.”

The language is deliberate. “Respect” and “fidelity” are not bureaucratic compliance; they flow from humility before God and communion with the Church. The rites in question are those of the post-Vatican II reform—the ordinary form of the Roman Rite as revised under Paul VI and further developed under John Paul II. By naming these specifically, Leo underscores continuity with the Council’s call for reform and with the subsequent magisterial implementation of that reform.

The letter concludes by entrusting the deliberations to Mary, Seat of Wisdom, and imparting the Apostolic Blessing as a pledge of wisdom and peace.

 The Broader Catechetical Context: Leo’s Teaching on Sacrosanctum Concilium

The letter does not stand alone. It explicitly refers to Leo’s ongoing Wednesday general audience series on the documents of the Second Vatican Council, particularly the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy. Beginning in May 2026, these catecheses have provided the theological foundation for the letter’s practical exhortations.

In the first of these addresses (May 20, 2026), Leo emphasized that the Council Fathers sought not merely an external reform of rites but a deeper contemplation of the living bond that constitutes the Church: the mystery of Christ. The liturgy “touches the very heart of this mystery: it is at once the space, the time and the context in which the Church receives her very life from Christ.” Christ is present in the proclaimed Word, the sacraments, the ministers, the community, and most of all in the Eucharist. The liturgy immerses the faithful in the Paschal Mystery—Christ’s passion, death, resurrection, and glorification—so that they are refreshed, encouraged, and renewed in faith and mission. It forms an open, welcoming community and must be lived out in daily ethical and spiritual life.

Subsequent catecheses developed the relationship between tradition and legitimate progress. Drawing on Pius XII’s Mediator Dei and the Council itself, Leo affirmed that the Church is a living organism that grows, matures, develops, and adapts while safeguarding the integrity of doctrine. Authentic renewal requires careful theological and pastoral study so that new forms grow organically from existing ones. Tradition and progress are not opposites; tradition is like a river that carries its source while flowing forward. He urged those who prepare the divine mysteries—especially priests—to uphold respect for the texts and regulations of the liturgy with openness, humility, trust in God, and sincere fidelity to ecclesial communion.

Later addresses continued to explore the liturgical year, Sunday as the foundation and kernel of the whole year, and the formative character of the weekly celebration of the Eucharist. Throughout, the consistent thread is that the liturgy is not peripheral. It is the source and summit of the Church’s life, the place where redemption is made present, and the privileged means by which the faithful are formed as a priestly people.

The June 29 letter to Cardinal Roche is thus the practical outworking of this catechetical teaching. Where the audiences provide the “why,” the letter provides concrete direction for the “how”: form the whole People of God, prioritize the formation of priests as mystagogues, let Sunday Mass itself be the primary school of the ars celebrandi, and celebrate with fidelity to the approved rites.

 The Importance of the Letter

Why does a relatively brief letter of greeting and encouragement matter? Several reasons stand out.

First, it reinforces the centrality of liturgical formation in the post-conciliar Church. More than sixty years after Sacrosanctum Concilium, the full reception of the liturgical reform remains incomplete in many places. Abuses, routine celebrations that lack reverence, insufficient preparation of ministers and readers, and a widespread sense that the liturgy is something done “for” the people rather than something in which the people actively participate continue to hinder the Church’s spiritual vitality. By calling for concrete paths of formation at every level and by identifying Sunday Mass as the ordinary locus of that formation, Leo addresses a real pastoral need. Formation is not an optional enrichment for the interested few; it is necessary for the Church to live the liturgy as the Council envisioned—as the source and summit of Christian life.

Second, the letter contributes to the ongoing discernment about unity in the Roman Rite. In recent years, questions surrounding the celebration of the pre-conciliar liturgy (the 1962 Missal) have generated significant tension. Pope Francis’s Traditionis Custodes (2021) and its accompanying letter sought to regulate that celebration more carefully in the service of ecclesial unity, affirming that the liturgical books of Paul VI and John Paul II constitute the unique expression of the lex orandi of the Roman Rite. Leo’s explicit call for respect toward those same rites, coupled with his emphasis on fidelity to approved texts and instructions, is widely read as a signal of continuity rather than reversal. Cardinal Roche himself has publicly indicated that the new Pope does not intend to overturn Traditionis Custodes or return to the freer permissions of Summorum Pontificum. The letter’s language of humility before God and fidelity to ecclesial communion frames the issue theologically rather than polemically: authentic liturgy serves communion.

Third, the letter models a style of papal teaching that is both continuity-oriented and forward-looking. Leo draws heavily on Francis while also developing his own series of catecheses on the Council. He does not innovate for the sake of novelty; he returns to the sources—Vatican II, the liturgical reform, the living tradition—and applies them to the present need for formation and reverence. In a Church sometimes polarized between those who see the post-conciliar liturgy as a rupture and those who treat it as a settled but poorly implemented achievement, this approach seeks the middle path of organic development: retain sound tradition while remaining open to legitimate progress.

Fourth, the letter has practical pastoral implications. Dioceses, parishes, seminaries, and liturgical commissions are invited to take formation more seriously. Priests are reminded that their role as presidents of the assembly requires not only technical competence but an interior attitude of openness and humility. Lay ministers—readers, extraordinary ministers of Holy Communion, musicians, servers—are part of the same formative process. The entire assembly is called to grow in the ars celebrandi. Sunday Mass is not merely an obligation or a social gathering; it is the privileged moment in which the Church is formed by the mystery it celebrates.

Finally, the letter matters because the liturgy itself matters. As Leo has repeatedly taught, the liturgy is where the work of redemption is accomplished sacramentally. It is where the Church receives her life from Christ. A Church that neglects the quality, fidelity, and formative power of its worship risks becoming spiritually anemic. A Church that invests in formation, reverence, and communion in the liturgy is better equipped for mission, evangelization, and the service of the world.

 Indications That Pope Leo XIV Is Serious About the Liturgy

Several features of the letter and of Leo’s broader activity demonstrate that this is not a peripheral interest but a genuine priority of the pontificate.

1. Sustained Catechesis: Launching an extended series of general audience addresses specifically on Sacrosanctum Concilium is itself a significant investment of papal time and teaching authority. Week after week, the Pope has returned to the theology of the liturgy, the relationship of tradition and progress, the presence of Christ, the formative character of the rites, and the call to respect the reformed liturgy. The letter to Roche is the practical fruit of that teaching.

2. Explicit Continuity with Conciliar and Post-Conciliar Magisterium: By naming the rites of Paul VI and John Paul II and by grounding his exhortation in Sacrosanctum Concilium and Desiderio Desideravi, Leo shows that he regards the liturgical reform as a settled achievement of the Church that still requires deeper reception and better celebration. He is not treating the liturgy as an open question to be re-litigated but as a living reality to be entered more fully.

3. Focus on Formation Rather Than Merely Regulation: While fidelity to norms is clearly affirmed, the primary accent is positive and formative. Leo wants Catholics formed for the liturgy and by the liturgy. This is a deeper and more demanding project than simply policing abuses. It requires education, mystagogy, and a renewed spiritual culture.

4. Integration of Clergy and Laity: The insistence that formation is an inner disposition of the whole People of God, while giving priority to the formation of priests as mystagogues, reflects a balanced ecclesiology. The liturgy is the action of the whole Church, hierarchical and charismatic, ordained and baptized.

5. Pastoral Realism: By locating the primary opportunity for formation in ordinary Sunday Mass, Leo shows practical wisdom. Grand conferences and specialized programs have their place, but the weekly gathering of the faithful is where most Catholics actually encounter the liturgy. Making those celebrations more formative is the most effective long-term strategy.

6. Tone of Humility and Communion: The repeated insistence that respect for the rites must spring from openness, trust in God, humility, and fidelity to ecclesial communion sets a spiritual rather than ideological tone. Seriousness about the liturgy, in Leo’s vision, is inseparable from seriousness about the Church as communion.

Taken together, these elements indicate a Pope who understands that the liturgy is not one issue among many but the privileged place where the Church is continually reconstituted by the Paschal Mystery. His willingness to devote sustained teaching time to it, to link that teaching to concrete initiatives such as the Mount Angel conference, and to speak clearly about both formation and fidelity shows that he intends the liturgy to remain a central concern of his pontificate.

 Looking Ahead

Pope Leo XIV’s letter of June 29, 2026, is modest in length but substantial in implication. It does not introduce new legislation or dramatic policy shifts. Instead, it consolidates and applies existing magisterial teaching in a moment when the Church needs clarity, encouragement, and practical direction. By calling for ongoing formation of the whole People of God, by identifying Sunday Mass as the primary school of the ars celebrandi, and by insisting on respectful fidelity to the rites of the reformed liturgy, Leo reaffirms that the sacred liturgy stands at the heart of the Church’s life and mission.

For priests, the letter is a reminder that their presidency of the assembly requires both technical fidelity and a profound interior disposition of humility and trust. For bishops and those responsible for formation, it is an invitation to develop concrete programs that reach every level of the Church. For the laity, it is an encouragement to approach Sunday Mass not as spectators but as active participants who are being formed by the mystery they celebrate. For the whole Church, it is a call to allow the liturgy to do what it is meant to do: immerse us in the Paschal Mystery of Christ, renew us in faith and mission, and build us up as a people of communion.

In an age of distraction, polarization, and spiritual superficiality, Pope Leo XIV’s quiet insistence on the centrality of the liturgy is itself a form of leadership. By returning again and again to the sources—the Council, the reformed rites, the living tradition—and by urging the Church to enter them more deeply through formation and fidelity, he shows that he is serious about the liturgy because he is serious about the Church and about Christ, who continues to act in the sacred mysteries for the life of the world.

The letter ends with an invocation of Mary, Seat of Wisdom, and a blessing of wisdom and peace. Those gifts remain the Church’s deepest need as she continues the never-finished work of allowing the liturgy to form her, sustain her, and send her forth.

Bishop of Pittsburgh Limits Extraordinary Form Masses: A Call to Unity in the Liturgy

Bishop of Pittsburgh Limits Extraordinary Form Masses: A Call to Unity in the Liturgy

In a letter dated August 7, 2026, Bishop Mark A. Eckman of the Diocese of Pittsburgh announced that he would not seek renewal of permission for celebrations of the Mass according to the 1962 Roman Missal at Saint Titus Church of Mary, Queen of Saints Parish in Aliquippa. The final such Mass there will take place on Friday, September 4, 2026.

The letter, read from the pulpit after the First Friday Extraordinary From Latin Mass, explains the background. Pope Francis’s 2021 Apostolic Letter Traditionis Custodes governs use of the 1962 Missal and requires Holy See permission for it in parish churches. Bishop Eckman’s predecessor, Bishop David A. Zubik, had obtained permission in 2022 for limited celebrations at St. Titus (third Sundays of the month, excluding Easter, Christmas, and Pentecost, plus First Fridays). That permission was temporary—initially for two years—and later extended for another two years through 2026.

Bishop Eckman notes that in granting the permissions, the Dicastery for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments reminded the diocese that the current Roman Missal, promulgated by Popes St. Paul VI and St. John Paul II, is the unique expression of the lex orandi (law of prayer) of the Roman Rite. The faithful are therefore to grow in their appreciation of it. Permission for the older ritual in a parish church “was only ever meant to be temporary.” The expectation of the Holy See has been that the need for such permission would eventually end and that the faithful would be brought toward the celebration of the post-conciliar ritual.

After consultation with experts and time spent in prayer and discernment, Bishop Eckman decided not to request another renewal. He invites those who still desire the 1962 form to attend Most Precious Blood of Jesus Parish, where the Institute of Christ the King Sovereign Priest offers it daily in full conformity with Church norms. He acknowledges the decision may be difficult for some who have found spiritual nourishment in the celebrations at St. Titus, expresses gratitude for their love of the Eucharist and devotion to the Church, and assures them of his prayers as all continue to walk together in communion, growing in faith, charity, and unity.

We must respect the bishop’s decisions. He is the pastor, the shepherd of the diocese. The Ordinary Form of the Mass is the sole unique expression of the Roman Liturgy. In other words, Catholics must stay with the times and follow through with Vatican II. We must all be on one page. The liturgy is not our personal buffet where we pick and choose what pleases us. It is the worship of God, and the Church decides this, not us. The Extraordinary Form is not being banned or suppressed, just limited in a way that will bring all Catholics to be on the same page regarding the Liturgy.

Video: Laywoman Reposing Eucharist in Tabernacle

A Video from heretical website and account Novus Ordo Watch, a Woman Reposing the Blessed Sacrament, and What Church Law Actually Says

Novus Ordo Watch recently posted a short clip taken from a livestream of a Mass at Christ the King-St. Stephen Parish in the Diocese of Oakland, California (July 22, 2026). In the video, a woman—evidently an extraordinary minister of Holy Communion—takes the remaining consecrated hosts after Communion, carries them to the tabernacle, places them inside, closes the door, and genuflects. The site’s caption simply declared: “Everything about this is cringe.”

The post quickly circulated among traditionalist Catholics. Reactions ranged from mild disapproval to strong assertions that no lay person, and especially no woman, should ever touch the tabernacle or handle the reserved Eucharist. Some viewers treated the brief moment as further evidence of the supposed corruption of the post-conciliar liturgy. Others focused on the visual itself: a woman performing an action they associate exclusively with priests or deacons.

The concern for reverence toward the Blessed Sacrament is legitimate and necessary. The Eucharist is not a symbol or a commodity; it is the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of Jesus Christ. Any handling of the reserved Sacrament must be marked by faith, care, and obedience to the Church’s norms. At the same time, accuracy matters. Labeling a permitted action “cringe” or treating it as an inherent abuse risks confusing the faithful and directing unnecessary hostility toward a particular laywoman performing a role the Church has regulated.

 What the Church Actually Permits

Church law distinguishes between the ordinary ministers of exposition and benediction (a priest or deacon) and the possibility, in special circumstances, of lay persons performing the more limited acts of exposition and deposition (reposing the Sacrament).

Canon 943 of the Code of Canon Law states:

“The minister of exposition of the Most Blessed Sacrament and of eucharistic benediction is a priest or deacon; in special circumstances, the minister of exposition and reposition alone without benediction is the acolyte, extraordinary minister of holy communion, or someone else designated by the local ordinary; the prescripts of the diocesan bishop are to be observed.”

“Reposition” (or “deposition”) is the technical term for returning the Blessed Sacrament to the tabernacle. The canon explicitly contemplates that an extraordinary minister of Holy Communion, or another person deputed by the local ordinary, may perform this action under the conditions set by the diocesan bishop. The ordinary ministers remain clergy; the lay role is extraordinary and limited. No blessing or benediction is given by the lay person.

The same principle appears in the Roman Ritual Holy Communion and Worship of the Eucharist Outside Mass. In the absence of a priest or deacon, or when they are lawfully impeded, an acolyte, an extraordinary minister of Communion, or another person appointed by the local Ordinary may publicly expose the Eucharist and later repose it. They may open the tabernacle, place the ciborium or host as needed, and return the Sacrament to the tabernacle. They may not impart the blessing.

These provisions primarily address situations outside Mass—adoration, Communion services, or times when no cleric is available. They exist precisely so that the reserved Sacrament can be handled with order and reverence when clergy are absent.

 The Context of Mass and the General Instruction of the Roman Missal

During Mass the norms are more restrictive in emphasis. The General Instruction of the Roman Missal (GIRM) 163 directs that after the distribution of Communion the priest himself consumes any remaining Precious Blood and either consumes remaining hosts at the altar or carries them to the place of reservation. When a deacon is present, he assists. The ideal is that the ordinary ministers handle the vessels and the reservation of remaining hosts.

In many parishes, extraordinary ministers assist with distribution and then return the ciboria to the priest or deacon, who takes them to the tabernacle. That practice is cleaner and more consistent with the GIRM’s description. Some diocesan guidelines discourage extraordinary ministers from approaching the tabernacle during Mass when a priest is present and able to do so.

Nevertheless, the GIRM does not create an absolute prohibition that renders any lay reposing of the Sacrament during Mass illicit. The primary concern of the liturgical books is the secure and reverent reservation of the Eucharist, not a rigid assignment of every gesture exclusively to clergy in every circumstance. When remaining hosts must be reserved, the action is performed without ceremonial emphasis so that attention remains on thanksgiving after Communion.

In the Oakland video the woman is an extraordinary minister. She genuflects. There is no indication of irreverence, casualness, or attempt to usurp a priestly role. Whether the local practice ideally assigns that final step to the priest is a legitimate question of better liturgical discipline. It is not evidence of sacrilege or of a woman “playing priest.”

 Distinguishing Legitimate Preference from False Accusation

Traditionalist concern for the exclusive competence of the ordained in matters closely tied to the Eucharist is understandable. The ministerial priesthood is not interchangeable with the common priesthood of the faithful. The Church herself maintains that distinction carefully. Extraordinary ministers exist for necessity, not convenience or ideology. Overuse of extraordinary ministers, or any blurring of roles that diminishes the unique place of the priest, is a real pastoral problem in some places.

That legitimate preference, however, does not transform every instance of a permitted action into an abuse. Canon 943 and the Roman Ritual exist. They are not modernist inventions designed to erode reverence; they are the Church’s own norms for concrete pastoral situations. Calling a woman “cringe” for following local practice within those norms, or treating her genuflection as somehow deficient because of her sex, adds heat without light.

The same principle applies that applied to the earlier video of lay women at a Communion service: incomplete visual information plus strong prior assumptions produces overreach. The woman in the Oakland clip is not consecrating. She is not giving Benediction. She is reposing already-consecrated hosts—an action the law contemplates for extraordinary ministers under the conditions set by the bishop.

 Reverence, Clarity, and Charity

The proper response is neither indifference to liturgical order nor reflexive condemnation. Parishes should form extraordinary ministers carefully, limit their use to genuine need, and prefer that the priest or deacon handle reservation of the Sacrament after Mass when possible. Diocesan guidelines should be clear and consistent. Faithful who notice irregularities have the right—and sometimes the duty—to raise them through proper channels with the pastor or bishop.

Public mockery of a particular laywoman performing a regulated function, or the implication that her presence near the tabernacle is itself scandalous, does not serve reverence for the Eucharist. It risks turning a legitimate question of liturgical discipline into personal attack. The Blessed Sacrament deserves better than that, and so do the people who serve It under the Church’s norms.

Novus Ordo Watch and those who shared the clip are free to prefer stricter practice. Preference is not the same as declaring that the Church’s own legislation has been violated. In this case the legislation is clear: under specified conditions, an extraordinary minister may repose the Blessed Sacrament. The video shows a woman doing so with an outward sign of reverence. That is the factual starting point. Everything else—ideal practice, local custom, the frequency of extraordinary ministers—can be discussed without the language of “cringe” or the assumption of malice.

The Eucharist is the source and summit of the Christian life. Guarding its dignity requires both fidelity to the Church’s law and the charity that refuses to turn every imperfect or unfamiliar practice into an occasion for scorn.

 References

- Code of Canon Law (1983), can. 943.

- Holy Communion and Worship of the Eucharist Outside Mass (Roman Ritual), especially the norms on exposition and reposition.

- General Instruction of the Roman Missal, no. 163 (and related paragraphs on the distribution and reservation of Communion).

- Related canons on extraordinary ministers of Holy Communion (can. 910 §2; can. 230 §3).

- Diocesan and conference guidelines implementing these universal norms.

Does Video Show Women Consecrating Bread?

 

A Video, a Misunderstanding, and the Church’s Provision for Sunday Worship Without a Priest

A short video has been circulating among Catholic traditionalist circles. It shows two lay women near the altar in what appears to be a church setting. One holds a host. Viewers, many of them English-speaking and predominantly Caucasian traditionalists, have concluded that the women are simulating the consecration, acting as if they were priests, and thus engaging in a grave liturgical abuse or worse. Comments have ranged from shocked condemnation to personal attacks on the women involved. The audio is in Brazilian Portuguese. That linguistic barrier helps explain the leap to the wrong conclusion, but it does not excuse the rush to judgment or the harsh rhetoric directed at the women.

What the video actually depicts is a recognized and regulated form of Catholic worship: a Sunday celebration in the absence of a priest, often called a Communion service or a Liturgy of the Word with distribution of Holy Communion. The hosts have already been consecrated by a priest at a previous Mass. There is no consecration taking place. The women are not pretending to be priests. They are fulfilling a role the Church herself has authorized under specific conditions when no priest is available.

This post explains the background of the misunderstanding, the nature of these celebrations, the order of the rite, who may lead them, the official permissions and norms that govern them, and why charity remains required even when liturgical practice differs from one’s own experience or preference.

 The Viral Video and the Jump to Conclusions

In regions with severe shortages of priests—common in parts of Latin America, including Brazil—communities regularly gather on Sunday even when a priest cannot reach them. The Church has long recognized this pastoral reality. Rather than leave the faithful without any communal celebration of the Lord’s Day, it provides structured ways for them to assemble, hear the Word of God, pray, and, when reserved hosts are available, receive Holy Communion.

The video shows two women performing functions within such a service. One appears to be holding or presenting a host in the context of distribution or a related moment. To someone unfamiliar with the rite and unable to understand the Portuguese explanations or prayers, the visual can look startling. Traditionalists who emphasize the exclusive role of the ordained priest in the Eucharist understandably react strongly when they believe that role is being usurped. The problem is that the belief is incorrect.

The language barrier is real. Brazilian Portuguese contains liturgical phrasing and pastoral explanations that do not match the visual assumptions of an English-speaking viewer. What may sound or look like a Eucharistic Prayer or words of institution is, in context, something else entirely—prayers of preparation, an invitation to Communion from the reserved Sacrament, or simple instructions. Jumping from an incomplete visual and untranslated audio to accusations of sacrilege or feminist infiltration is understandable as a first reaction; it is not justifiable as a sustained or public judgment.

The women themselves are not public figures seeking controversy. They are local Catholics responding to the needs of their community under the guidance of their local Church. Attacking them personally, questioning their faith, or treating them as enemies of orthodoxy goes beyond legitimate concern for liturgical integrity. Charity and accuracy both demand better.

 What a Sunday Celebration in the Absence of a Priest Actually Is

The full celebration of Sunday for Catholics is the Mass: the Liturgy of the Word joined to the Liturgy of the Eucharist, in which the priest, acting in the person of Christ, confects the Sacrament and offers the Sacrifice. Nothing replaces the Mass. The Church repeatedly insists on this.

Yet the Church also recognizes that circumstances sometimes make Mass impossible for a given community on a given Sunday. Canon law itself addresses the point. Canon 1248 §2 of the Code of Canon Law states: “If participation in the eucharistic celebration becomes impossible because of the absence of a sacred minister or for another grave cause, it is strongly recommended that the faithful take part in a liturgy of the Word if there be such in the parish church or some other sacred place, which is celebrated in accordance with the provisions laid down by the diocesan bishop; or to spend an appropriate time in prayer, whether personally or as a family or, as occasion presents, in a group of families.”

The principal official document elaborating this is the Directory for Sunday Celebrations in the Absence of a Priest, issued by the Congregation for Divine Worship on 2 June 1988 and approved by Pope John Paul II. The Directory does not invent a new form of worship or encourage the absence of priests. It responds to an existing pastoral necessity so that the Christian meaning of Sunday is not lost.

These celebrations are extraordinary, not ordinary. They are not to become a convenient substitute for Mass when a priest could reasonably be obtained. They should foster, not diminish, hunger for the Eucharist. They must carefully avoid any confusion with the Mass itself.

In practice, the preferred form in many places is a Liturgy of the Word with Holy Communion from hosts previously consecrated by a priest and reserved in the tabernacle. Alternatives include a Liturgy of the Word alone or Morning or Evening Prayer from the Liturgy of the Hours, sometimes with Communion.

 The Structure of the Rite

The order carefully distinguishes the service from the Mass. Nothing proper to the Mass—especially the preparation of the gifts in the sacrificial sense or the Eucharistic Prayer—is inserted.

Typical elements include:

- Introductory rites: Gathering, sign of the cross, greeting (adapted so that a lay leader does not use the presidential formulas proper to a priest), introduction explaining that Mass cannot be celebrated today and that the community gathers to hear the Word and (if applicable) receive Communion from the reserved Sacrament, penitential act, and collect or opening prayer.

- Liturgy of the Word: The same readings as those appointed for the Sunday Mass, including the Gospel. A responsorial psalm. A period of silence or a reflection (not a formal homily by a lay person unless specifically authorized; deacons may preach). Profession of faith. General intercessions.

- Communion rite (when reserved hosts are available): The leader goes to the place of reservation, brings the ciborium or pyx to the altar (the altar is approached only at this point in many guidelines, precisely to avoid the appearance of a Mass), leads the Lord’s Prayer, the invitation to Communion (“Behold the Lamb of God…”), and distributes Holy Communion. A prayer after Communion follows. The remaining hosts are returned to the tabernacle.

- Concluding rite: Blessing (in a form appropriate to a lay leader or deacon) and dismissal.

Key visual and rubrical safeguards exist precisely to prevent the misunderstanding seen in the circulating video. The presidential chair is normally not used by a lay leader; the leader often stands among the assembly or at a different place. Vesture, if any, is distinct from priestly vestments. The language used makes clear that this is not the Mass. The Directory and subsequent national and diocesan adaptations stress that the celebration must never look or sound like a simulated Mass.

The host held by one of the women in the video is almost certainly a previously consecrated host being prepared for distribution or shown in the invitation to Communion. No words of consecration are spoken by the laity; none can be effective if spoken by them. The Sacrament remains what a priest has already made it.

 Who May Lead These Celebrations

Preference is always given to a deacon when one is available. A deacon can lead the service, proclaim the Gospel, preach, and distribute Communion as an ordinary minister.

When no deacon is present, the diocesan bishop may appoint suitable lay persons—men or women—as leaders of prayer for these celebrations. Appointment is not a casual local decision; it falls under the bishop’s authority. Leaders are to receive proper formation. The Directory and later documents such as Redemptionis Sacramentum (2004) emphasize that it is preferable to distribute the various roles among several members of the faithful rather than have one lay person appear to “preside” in the manner of a priest. No lay person is ever to be referred to as “presiding” over the celebration in the same sense.

Women have long served in these roles in mission territories and in areas of priest shortage, including parts of Brazil, Portugal, Africa, and elsewhere. This is not a novelty of recent decades or an innovation driven by ideology; it is a practical application of the Church’s norms in concrete circumstances. The same norms apply regardless of the sex of the appointed leader.

Extraordinary ministers of Holy Communion may assist with distribution under the usual conditions. The hosts remain those consecrated by a priest.

 Official Permissions, Laws, and Rubrics

The foundational texts are clear:

- Code of Canon Law, can. 1248 §2 (quoted above).

- Directory for Sunday Celebrations in the Absence of a Priest (Congregation for Divine Worship, 2 June 1988). It outlines the conditions under which such celebrations may be authorized, the theological importance of Sunday, the need to avoid confusion with the Mass, the preference for deacons, the possibility of appointed lay leaders, and the basic structure of the celebration of the Word with Communion.

- Redemptionis Sacramentum (Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, 25 March 2004), especially nos. 162–167 on particular celebrations in the absence of a priest. These paragraphs reaffirm that such celebrations are extraordinary, that confusion with the Mass must be avoided, that the diocesan bishop regulates them, that Communion may be distributed according to his prudent judgment, and that roles should be shared among the faithful when no priest or deacon is present. They also insist that those leading keep alive a true hunger for the Eucharist.

National bishops’ conferences and individual dioceses issue more detailed directives adapting the Directory to local circumstances. In Brazil and other Portuguese-speaking regions, corresponding guidelines exist and have been in use for years. The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops has published ritual editions of Sunday Celebrations in the Absence of a Priest. Similar provisions appear in Australia, England and Wales, and many other places.

These are not loopholes or progressive experiments. They are the Church’s own response to the scarcity of priests while safeguarding the unique character of the Mass and the ministerial priesthood.

 Charity, Accuracy, and the Larger Context

Priest shortages are a real and growing pastoral challenge in many parts of the world. Blaming the women in the video for responding to that challenge under the Church’s norms solves nothing. Misidentifying a Communion service as a simulated consecration spreads confusion rather than clarity. Public attacks that treat the women as ideological actors rather than local Catholics doing what their bishop and the universal norms allow are unjust.

Traditionalists rightly defend the centrality of the Mass, the exclusive power of the ordained priest to confect the Eucharist, and the need for reverence and clarity in liturgy. Those concerns are valid. They are best served by accurate knowledge of what the Church actually permits and by restraint in judgment when evidence is incomplete, especially when a language barrier is involved.

The women in the video are not the enemy of orthodoxy. In the concrete circumstances of their community, they are helping the faithful keep Sunday as the Lord’s Day to the extent possible until a priest can be present. That is the purpose the Directory itself assigns to these celebrations.

Understanding the rite, the norms that authorize it, and the difference between reserved Communion and consecration removes the basis for the false accusation. Charity then requires that we stop treating the women as if they had committed the offense that was mistakenly attributed to them.

Sunday remains the day of the Resurrection. The Mass remains its fullest celebration. When the Mass cannot be had, the Church still provides a way for the community to gather around the Word and the reserved Sacrament. That provision is not a threat to the priesthood; it is a pastoral response that assumes the priesthood’s irreplaceable role.

The circulating video does not show women pretending to be priests. It shows a permitted form of Sunday worship under the norms of the Catholic Church. Accurate knowledge and Christian charity are the proper responses.

 References

- Code of Canon Law (1983), can. 1248 §2.

- Congregation for Divine Worship, Directory for Sunday Celebrations in the Absence of a Priest (2 June 1988).

- Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, Redemptionis Sacramentum (25 March 2004), especially nos. 162–167.

- Sacrosanctum Concilium (Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy), art. 106 (on the importance of Sunday).

- United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, Sunday Celebrations in the Absence of a Priest (ritual editions, various revisions conforming to the third edition of the Roman Missal).

- Diocesan and national guidelines implementing the 1988 Directory (examples available from various bishops’ conferences, including those in Portuguese-speaking regions).

- Related texts: Holy Communion and Worship of the Eucharist Outside Mass (ritual), and relevant canons on extraordinary ministers of Holy Communion (can. 910, 230 §3).

Ductus, Ictus Oh My! Swinging the Thurible

Swinging the Thurible in the Roman Rite: Rules, Customs, and the Triple Swings of Benediction

Incense has long been a vivid part of Catholic worship. The rising smoke of the thurible (or censer) visually expresses the Church’s prayer ascending to God, drawing on imagery from Psalm 141 and the Book of Revelation. 

In the Roman Rite, the careful swinging of the thurible follows clear norms while also allowing room for longstanding local customs—especially when the Blessed Sacrament is exposed at Benediction.

 When Incense May Be Used

According to the General Instruction of the Roman Missal (GIRM 276), incense may be used optionally in any form of Mass at these moments:

- During the entrance procession

- At the beginning of Mass, to incense the cross and the altar

- At the Gospel procession and proclamation

- After the gifts are placed on the altar (offerings, cross, altar, priest, and people)

- At the elevation of the host and chalice after the consecration

The priest places incense in the thurible and blesses it with the Sign of the Cross in silence. A profound bow is made before and after most incensations (except for the altar and the offerings themselves).

 How Many Swings?

GIRM 277 provides the basic numbers:

- Three double (ductus) swings for the Most Blessed Sacrament, a relic of the Holy Cross, images of the Lord, the offerings, the altar cross, the Book of the Gospels, the Paschal Candle, the priest, and the people.

- Two double (ductus) swings for relics and images of the saints (usually only at the beginning of the celebration, after the altar).

- Single swings (ictus) for the altar itself (walking around a freestanding altar, or right then left if it is against the wall).

In practice, each of the “three swings” is commonly performed as a double swing (a ductus): the thurible is raised, swung outward twice toward the person or object, then lowered. This interpretation is widespread and is reflected in standard ceremonial guides.

The priest may incense the offerings either with three swings or by tracing the Sign of the Cross over them with the thurible.

 The Technique

The thurifer or celebrant holds the upper chains (and disk) in the left hand against the chest. The right hand controls the lower chains so the bowl can swing smoothly from the wrist. Movements should be measured and dignified—never jerky. Chains are held shorter when censing persons and somewhat longer when censing the altar.

Practical Technique (Common Custom)

• Hold the top of the chains (with the disk) in the left hand near the chest. Control the bowl with the right hand (chains passing between fingers, secured by the thumb).  
• Swing from the wrist with a smooth, measured motion—do not jerk or let the bowl strike the chains loudly.  
• For persons: Hold chains shorter (~8 inches/20 cm from the bowl). For the altar/cross: longer (~12 inches/30 cm).  
• Thurifer (server carrying the thurible) swings it gently at full length in procession. 

Key Moments of Incensation in Mass

• Entrance procession (optional).  
• Beginning of Mass: Altar and cross.  
• Gospel: Before and during the proclamation.  
• Offertory: Offerings, cross, altar, then priest and people.  
• Consecration/Elevation (optional): Host and chalice.

 Why Some Use “Three Triple Swings” at Benediction

At Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament (or sometimes at the elevation in Mass), many communities still employ three triple swings—nine swings in total. This is more elaborate than the ordinary three double swings prescribed in the GIRM.

This practice is a retained custom from the pre-conciliar (Vatican II) liturgy. Before the reforms of the 1960s, more complex patterns of swinging were common for objects of the highest veneration. After the introduction of the modern Roman Missal, some bishops’ conferences and local traditions sought and received permission (or simply continued by legitimate custom) to keep the more solemn form when the Eucharist is exposed in the monstrance. It is particularly noted in places such as Ireland.

The extra motion is not required by current universal law, yet it is widely regarded as a legitimate expression of greater reverence for Christ truly present. It does not contradict the GIRM; rather, it amplifies the basic three-swing rule out of traditional piety. Commentators such as Fr. Edward McNamara have observed that authentic custom remains a source of liturgical law in such matters, and the triple form continues to appear even in papal celebrations in some contexts.

Why This Practice?

• Greater solemnity for the Eucharist — The Blessed Sacrament receives the highest level of honor. Using a more elaborate triple motion per swing (or three full sets) underscores this supreme dignity, distinguishing it even from other "three-swing" items like the altar cross, Gospel Book, or priest.
• Continuity with tradition — It was widespread before the reforms. Some bishops’ conferences or local customs sought and obtained permissions to continue it, especially during Benediction (where the Sacrament is exposed in the monstrance) or at the Elevation in Mass.
  ewtn.com
• Symbolic emphasis — Some interpret the repeated threes as evoking the Trinity, though this is more devotional than strictly rubrical. The core symbolism of incense remains prayers rising to God, amplified by the more prominent action.

This is not universally required or even the most common practice today—many places use the simpler three double swings—but it is legitimate where it is the established custom. Liturgical documents like the Ceremonial of Bishops and commentaries (e.g., by Msgr. Peter Elliott) generally describe three double swings as the norm, while acknowledging authentic local variations.

ewtn.com

In short, it’s a way of “pulling out all the stops” to honor Christ truly present in the Eucharist during Benediction. If you’ve seen it in a particular parish or diocese, it’s likely part of their received tradition.

 A Living Tradition

The Roman Rite balances clarity of norm with respect for organic custom. Whether a community uses three double swings or the fuller three triple swings at Benediction, the underlying meaning is the same: the Church’s prayer, offered through the fragrant smoke, rises before the throne of God. The careful, reverent swinging of the thurible helps the faithful enter more deeply into that prayer.

---

References / Sources

- General Instruction of the Roman Missal (GIRM), nos. 276–277. Vatican website and official English editions (United States Conference of Catholic Bishops).

- Fr. Edward McNamara, LC, “Swings of the Thurible,” Zenit / EWTN, 10 April 2018 (and follow-up). Available at ewtn.com.

- Fr. Edward McNamara, LC, “Incensing at Mass,” ePriest / Zenit, December 2025.

- Ceremonial of Bishops (Caeremoniale Episcoporum), relevant sections on incense (especially nos. 84–98 and related footnotes).

- Msgr. Peter J. Elliott, Ceremonies of the Modern Roman Rite (Ignatius Press), descriptions of thurible technique and customary swings.

- Traditional commentaries (e.g., Fortescue-O’Connell) for pre-conciliar practice, cited in modern discussions of continuity.

Fifteen Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year A)- The Sower

A Reflection for the Fifteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year A)

The readings for this Sunday weave a beautiful tapestry around one central image: the power of God’s Word and our response to it. Like rain nourishing the earth or seed falling on different soils, God’s Word is sent with purpose and generosity. The question these Scriptures invite us to ponder is: What kind of soil is my heart?

 First Reading: Isaiah 55:10-11

God compares His Word to the rain and snow that descend from heaven. They do not return without effect—they water the earth, make it fertile, provide seed for the sower, and bread for the eater. In the same way, God’s Word “shall not return to me void, but shall do my will, achieving the end for which I sent it.”

This is a profound assurance. God’s Word is never wasted. Even when it seems to disappear into the hardness of human hearts or the noise of daily life, it carries divine power and will accomplish its mission.

 Responsorial Psalm: Psalm 65

The psalm echoes this imagery of abundance: God visits the land, waters its furrows, softens it with showers, and crowns the year with bounty. The refrain ties it directly to the Gospel: “The seed that falls on good ground will yield a fruitful harvest.”

Creation itself sings of God’s generous care. The earth responds joyfully to the gift of rain—how much more should we respond to the gift of God’s living Word?

 Second Reading: Romans 8:18-23

St. Paul lifts our eyes beyond the present moment. The sufferings of this time are as nothing compared to the glory to be revealed. All creation groans in labor pains, awaiting the full redemption of God’s children. We who have the firstfruits of the Spirit also groan inwardly as we await the redemption of our bodies.

This reading reminds us that the “fruitfulness” we are called to is not just personal holiness but participation in the cosmic renewal that Christ has begun. The seed of God’s Word is working toward the liberation of all creation.

 Gospel: Matthew 13:1-23 (Parable of the Sower)

Jesus tells the parable of the sower who scatters seed lavishly—some on the path (eaten by birds), some on rocky ground (springs up quickly but withers), some among thorns (choked by worries and riches), and some on rich soil (yielding a hundred-, sixty-, or thirtyfold).

Jesus later explains the parable to His disciples. The seed is the Word of the Kingdom. The different soils represent different ways people receive it:

- The path — hearts so hardened or distracted that the evil one steals the Word away.

- Rocky ground — initial enthusiasm without deep roots, so it fades under trial.

- Thorny ground — the Word is received but choked by anxiety, wealth, or worldly cares.

- Rich soil — those who hear, understand, and bear abundant fruit.

Notice the generosity of the sower: Jesus does not sow only in perfect soil. He scatters the Word widely, hoping for any receptivity. The astonishing yield (up to a hundredfold) shows what God can do when the heart is open.

 Living the Word Today

These readings challenge us to examine the condition of our “soil.” In a world full of noise, distractions, worries, and instant gratifications, it is easy for the seed to fall on less-than-ideal ground. Yet God’s Word is powerful and persistent. Even poor soil can be transformed—through prayer, the sacraments, Scripture study, community, and perseverance.

The parable invites honest self-reflection:

- What “rocks” (superficiality, fear of commitment) or “thorns” (anxiety, materialism) hinder God’s Word in my life?

- How can I prepare the soil of my heart—through regular confession, quiet time with Scripture, or acts of charity—so that the Word can take deep root?

As disciples, we are also called to be sowers. Like Jesus, we are invited to share the Gospel generously, without calculating the odds of success. Some seed may seem lost, but we trust in the power of the Word itself.

May we, with all creation, groan in hopeful expectation. May we become rich soil, yielding fruit that lasts for the Kingdom. And may the Lord who sends His Word accomplish in us what He desires.

Prayer  

Lord, You scatter Your Word with divine generosity. Soften the soil of our hearts. Remove the rocks of hardness and the thorns of distraction. Let Your Word take deep root in us, so that we may bear fruit—a hundredfold—for Your glory and the good of the world. We ask this through Christ our Lord. Amen.