Catholics,
it would appear — both Traditional and Post-Vatican-II —
no longer have any idea about what to do with those awkward appendages
called their hands during Mass. Any attempt to arrive at an
understanding of the apparent absence of ritual uniformity
in the outward expression of prayer as a manifestation of
inward spirituality has doggedly eluded me. Our knees seem
to instinctively know what to do in the way of kneeling and genuflection,
but apart from haphazardly blessing ourselves, we seem to have no
idea what to do with our hands during Mass, especially during
prayer at Mass. Indeed, how is a Catholic supposed to hold
his hands during prayer? Is there an agreed upon form? And what
is more, does it matter?
This confusion did not exist prior to much of the other confusion
engendered by so many competing and corrupt “interpretations” of
the Second Vatican Council and that ever-elusive and damnable
“spirit of the Council” that often egregiously flies
in the face of genuine Catholic theology, doctrine and dogma through
the overly profuse, contradictory, and often involuted documents
that emerged from it. If anything was absolutely certain
it was equally absolutely tentative. Hence the confusion
that still has us scratching our heads fifty years later, terribly
unsure about what authentically constitutes a Catholic in light
of this overwhelming and often illogical exegesis. Even the simplest
things have become cause of contention, doubt, and uncertainty.
Like a man doubting
his own identity who reaches out to others who really do not know
him to confirm it, the Council reached out in the broadest “inclusive”
terms, to strangers who did not know the Church, and even detested
Her, to reassure Her that she was not necessarily who She long thought
Herself to be, but who She ought to be — on terms of their
own making. “Do you not know, yourselves?”, they asked incredulously.
“Then surely we will tell you. Us: all-inclusive;
a marvelous dialectic finally sublating all erstwhile and bitterly
contested contradictions into the undifferentiated and much lauded
“People of God” — and we all are ... despite differences
and contradictions in doctrine, dogma, and even religion itself!”
This was the clarion, the evangel, that became the “Spirit of Vatican
II”. No one left out in cold — no matter what Christ told
us!
Our prayers became
the prayers of others (“for Thine is the Kingdom and the power
...” uttered only by Protestants prior to Vatican II),
and we even greeted one another, and our own priests greeted us,
in Yiddish with “Shalom!”. We sang their songs, who did not
sing ours ... Martin Luther but not Saint Gregory. We prayed their
vernacular who did not pray in our Latin. We stripped our churches
in an ecumenical impulse to shared sterility. We de-canonized our
saints while adulating their Fanfare for the Common Man.
They gained paradise, one and all, and we lost Hell. They attained
to effortless and egalitarian sanctity while we relinquished
the notion of sin. It is odd. We became like unto them who
disdained to become like to us — who had become like to them! All
things uniquely Catholic were deconstructed, de-emphasized, demoted,
demolished or abolished. Entire devotions and Solidarities vanished
as inimical to ecumenism. Confessionals disappeared or became therapy
rooms (by appointment). Our priests faced the people like our formerly
“separated brethren”, and turned their backs to God. The “People
of God” metamorphosed into God Himself — to whom was
lifted the Sacrifice and Oblation that had anciently been lifted
up to God!
Is it really any wonder
that we have even forgotten how to pray as Catholics? It is this,
and not all the incalculable devastation of the “spirit” of the
Second Vatican Council that we wish to address now. Perhaps it is
this collective amnesia that has become the last vestige of
a unique and once universal culture that we called Catholicism.
Something simple and utterly Catholic — in how we pray as
Catholics.
Praying 101
How do Catholics pray?
It is a modest and simple beginning to recovering what was lost.
Something small and apprehensible, as a mustard seed. The Teaching
Sisters taught us that we held our hands in the form of a steeple,
palms pressed together, fingers pointed up to God, and the right
thumb over the left forming a Cross (We were also taught, incidentally,
to bow our heads at the Sacred Name of Jesus — always and everywhere,
without exception — but this, too, quickly disappeared after 1962
... Saint Paul notwithstanding. 1 ) Utterly simple
before the ensuing confusion over (3) different “Forms of Greeting”,
(3) different “Forms of the Penitential Act”, the (4) different
“Eucharistic Prayers” and the (4) “Forms of Dismissal.”
Out of breath, yet?
No one wishes to be conspicuous, or to presume to set themselves
apart from others in a way that would invite their being deemed
affectatious or hypocritically holy. Since the emphasis on minimizing
ritual at large (when was the last time you knelt, let alone bowed
as indicated in the missal upon reciting the words in the Nicene
Creed “And the Word was made flesh and dwelt
among us” since the Novus Ordo of the Second Vatican
Council? We have never once — repeat, not once — observed this in
any Novus Ordo Mass anywhere in the world, even while
the missal explicitly directs both priest and congregation to
bow upon enunciating these words.) — since this repudiation of ritual
at large, a dichotomy, a kind of sundering of sorts, has resulted
between posture and intention, a disjunction between the body and
the soul. We refuse to allow our body to conform to our soul; what
our bodies display and signify is not in accord with what is in
our hearts; we are divided within ourselves; our minds, our hearts,
pray, say, fervently believe, one thing — but in our bodies there
is nothing indicative of it, nothing in union with, expressive of,
what is in our minds. As it were, our minds worship, bend before
the will of God ... but our bodies do not. “That is my own affair”,
you say. “What I pray and how fervently I believe is my business
alone; it is between God and me.”
This is true. That
is to say, it is true of private prayer — but not of public worship,
in which we act as one body and in which our unity with our neighbor
as members of the one Body in Christ is signified, enacted, through
a common ritual that is a collective statement of otherwise utterly
unique parts in that One Body. What we express with our bodies,
our postures, our verbal prayers is a communion in that One Body
that we cannot express, attain to, through our private prayers.
There is a difference between how we pray privately and publicly.
We do not bring our own private idiosyncrasies to Mass. We worship,
pray, not simply as ourselves, but as the Communion of Saints (you
will pardon me if I defer from using the much abused “People of
God”), as a spiritual body larger than our own physical bodies.
We pray as a Church, together, united in one belief, one creed,
commonly, and such common worship can only be coherently united
through ritual, through a shared ritual that expresses the unity
of our belief. Through the active participation in ritual we become
visibly one; before God and to each other! Do you not see it?
Rituals are Enacted by Bodies
At our homes, behind
closed doors, we can and should pray as God inspires us and teaches
us. The ways are myriad. But at the Most Holy Sacrifice of the Mass
we pray not only with our individual assent and fervor, but as a
body of believers greater than the particular bodies that our individual
souls inhabit. What unites this mass of individuals with different
aspirations but the same object of worship? Ritual! What we do in
common; what is a visible, almost sacramental reality, is our collective
affirmation of what we believe though the common form of shared
ritual. Rituals are enacted by bodies, not minds, even as
they are a visible manifestation of the invisible mind. Rituals
present shared, that is to say, commonly (as “in common”) accepted
realities to the mind through the bodies of others, specifically
through the visible acts of the bodies of others.
So, what to do about those awkward hands that appear so vexsome
during Mass? Where do we put them? The Caeremoniale Episcoporum
(1985) in the paragraph De manibus iunctis
is clear about the Catholic posture concerning the folding of the
hands during Mass and prayer:
“When it says with hands folded, it is
to be understood in this way: palms extended
and joined together in front of the breast,
with the right thumb over the left in the form
of a cross" (#107, n.80)”
Another form, long
in tradition, and also reverent while standing (pressed gently against
the waist), as well as in kneeling, is hands clasped
in prayer with thumbs forming a Cross ... although we hasten to
add that this form is not uniquely Catholic:
Now, as to whether
it really matters or not. Surely God hears our earnest prayers no
matter how we fold our hands in prayer, or even if we fold them
at all. However, we do know that people who do not know God or love
Him do not do this. I personally have never observed an atheist,
skeptic, or agnostic pray at all. I have no evidence of it. There
is nothing in either their posture or their words to convey to me
not just an attitude of prayer, but the actuality of prayer. In
a word, there are gestures and postures, that we assume as Catholics
that others do not. They are signs distinctly, uniquely — and historically
— associated with Catholics. It is what Catholics do. It is part
of our identity of being a Catholic. We have Crucifixes with the
Corpus Figure of Christ on them, rather than plain Crosses.
We have Rosaries. Up to 40 years ago we bowed our heads whenever
the sacred Name of Jesus was uttered. We struck our breasts in reciting
the Confiteor, made the Sign of the Cross before we went into the
water or upon any undertaking. These things do not necessarily identify
us as Catholics, but they are unmistakably signs of Catholics.
What is more, because we are Catholics we do, in fact —or ought
to — behave differently at Mass than we do at home, or in a pub.
We do not (or ought not) cross our legs, lean back over the pew
behind us, or wear gym suits or baseball hats. Reverence precludes
this. Or are we lacking in due reverence to God and Church? Our
voices are decidedly more subdued at the local bank, and our actions
much more restrained than they typically are in Novus Ordo
Churches. I urge you to go to a Tridentine (Latin) Mass to experience
the stunning difference. And yet, oddly enough, the problem of those
vexingly awkward hands persists in both. Why?
Disdain for Ritual
It is likely that
the ritual and custom has been forgotten altogether in the passing
of two generations alone. We see the proper posture of prayer illustrated
in all our religious statues (those that still remain) and sacred
art. But somehow we are obtuse to the inspiration that such statuary
and art is intended to invoke. We have somehow come to believe that
such postures of prayer are, in fact, factitious, strained, unreal
— that the people — of whom the statues are likenesses only — prayed
differently than portrayed by the artist or sculptor. Perhaps only
Saints prayed that way. But are we not all called to emulate the
saints? Why are we so afraid of the odor of sanctity? Is there anything
more beautiful than a Catholic conformed to Christ, to the Saints
who were conformed to Christ? We fear being seen as Pharisees, hypocrites.
Are there some? Yes, some. Are there Catholics possessed of sanctity
conferred upon them by God? Yes, some. Perhaps many. But we are
so afraid of the judgment of the world (which should mean nothing
to us)! Even of the judgment of our own brothers and sisters in
Christ. Rather than being pleasing in the sight of God and Holy
Church, we would please men?! Saint Paul is absolutely clear about
this: “For do I now persuade men, or God?
Or do I seek to please men? If I yet pleased men, I should not be
the servant of Christ.” 2
What,
then, should be our posture of prayer at Mass — and is it really
important?
While standing we
see hands hanging limply, stuffed into pockets, clasped behind backs,
leaning, palms down, upon the back of the next pew. While sitting
they are stretched out on the pew behind them in a grand and expansive
gesture of detached (and irreverent) relaxation, or caressing and
massaging the backs or necks of their spouses, girlfriends or boyfriends,
folded across their chests as if in deliberation or impatience,
or as objects of sudden and peculiar interest to them as they almost
clinically examine their cuticles and fingernails. While kneeling,
the uncertainty of what to do with their hands is particularly acute
and most obvious. They are either limply hung over the backrest
of the pew in front of them, unjoined, crossed at the wrists as
if relaxed, or loosely clasped in a manner reminiscent of piety,
but diligently casual enough not to openly express it.
Going to Holy Communion they are at one’s sides, behind one’s back,
swinging in a natural gait, and, of course, casually folded, usually
to the maximum extent allowed by the length of one’s arms. Are we
embarrassed to hold our hands properly in prayer? Are we afraid
to be thought sanctimonious, putting our devotion on display? We
all kneel the same way: on our knees. Why cannot we hold our hands
the same way — expressing unity in all things in worship,
instead of the strident cry for diversity in all things?
Look at our children at their First Holy Communion. See how their
hands are folded as an example to us! Is that our way, then?
Teach our children one thing, and do another? Do only statues, following
our First Holy Communion, give us this example? And what is the
value of a statue if it does not inspire us and call us to emulate
Mary and the Saints? Do you not know that you are called to be a
saint, too?
Diversity
engenders division!
Do not be your “own
individual” at Mass. The Mass is not about “you” —
it is about Christ — and also about unity through
Him, with Him, and in Him! “Ut unum sint”
… Christ prayed, “That they may be one”.
3 Have we not had enough of “diversity” at Mass, and
for far too long? Diversity engenders division! The very etymology
of the word derives from the Latin diversitatem, or “contrariety,
contradiction, disagreement”. “Diversity” has been the unrelenting
mantra of the “spirit” of the Second Vatican Council ... as
it has been implemented — and to what grievous an aftermath! The
“unity” so sought after became “diversity” and diversity became
division in every parish. No?
There IS Beauty in
Uniformity
Contrary to the prevailing
mind-set, there is beauty in oneness in purpose and expression.
Can you imagine a stadium filled with people, each singing their
own version of the National Anthem — and each a different
tune? What is Dvorak’s New World Symphony if every symphony orchestra
played it, not according to the composer’s notation, but to their
own improvised notation? Whatever cacophony it becomes, it
does not remain, and will not be recognized, as the New World
Symphony composed by Dvorak. There is beauty, clarity, and united
purpose in harmony, in union, in oneness — when everyone is on the
same page and not on a page of their own choosing. Do you not see
this?
The Japanese use an
aphorism that is particularly apropos of this discussion: “The
nail that sticks out gets hammered down.” What is incongruous
and not in harmony is discouraged. The trumpet player who plays
too loudly when his part is to be subdued, is corrected. The cellist
who spontaneously enters into a rhapsodic frenzy independent of
the composition and notation — ignoring the conductor — is scolded.
The desire to “stick out”, to “be observed”, to call attention to
oneself by not comporting oneself in harmony with all those around,
is nothing less than vanity and self-aggrandizement.
The absence of folded hands in prayer (and especially going to Holy
Communion — which, of course, the entire congregation does since
none are sinners any longer, or at least after Vatican II) is the
absence of reverence before the holy. Would you so insolently stride
up to Christ Himself (which you do) with hands carelessly hanging
like limp appendages at your sides, or stuffed into your pockets?
This speaks much about your faith — or lack of it. We would not
so casually greet a president or prime minister. Why? It would be
presumptuous and insolent —and you know it! But our Blessed Lord
...?
The Speed-Blessing
While we are at it,
and as an aside, but not without relevance, when you bless yourself,
realize in Whose Name you bless yourself: The Name of the Father,
and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. In the name of God Himself!
Why do you make the Sign of the Cross so hastily and often so sloppily?
Think of what you are doing! Of Whom you are invoking! Priests are
often as guilty of this as laymen. The SIGN OF THE CROSS
(before which the devil flees and under which Constantine conquered)
you do as if it had no meaning, no significance. The Sign of
the Cross should be made slowly, reverently, purposefully, thoughtfully
— in recognition of Him Who in that act anoints you! Why the
speed-blessing? Is the Name of God, the Sign of the Cross through
which you have been purchased and redeemed at so incalculable a
cost … so trite? One observer of Saint Bernadette was deeply struck
by the way she made the Sign of the Cross while praying before Mary
at Lourdes. It was slow, each name uttered with love, and totally,
surpassingly, reverent! Should our signing ourselves with the Cross
be less reverent?
Not just what you pray, but how you pray, will be a witness
to the reality of God to others, not because you wish it to be,
but simply because it is so. In this sense you yourself, unknowingly,
become something of a sacramental.
OTHER FORMS
OF HOLDING ONES HANDS IN PRAYER
Given
what we have just said, it is nevertheless the case that some people
(since Vatican II) choose to hold their hands in prayer in
an idiosyncratic expression of their own personal and peculiar
iteration. Let us look at two physical attitudes of prayer that
we are likely to encounter at the Novus Ordo Mass:
-
The Orans
(literally, “praying” in Latin) posture.
Here the supplicant holds one hands extended upward in imitation
of the priest at the Altar who does this according to
the rubrics in his Sacramental and priestly faculty in
representing the congregation. This has largely,
and illegitimately, come into practice through
so-called “Charismatic Catholics”, or the “Charismatic
Renewal” (yet another faction and another “renewal” in the Church,
and which provides “workshops” for learning glossolalia,
or “speaking in tongues” — the not-so-spontaneous
(because it is taught, studied, learned, and practiced
in these “workshops”) uttering of verbal nonsense — indecipherable
even to other “Charistmatics”, but presumably understandable
by God before Whom they hold themselves to spontaneously
aspire ... in what has in fact been taught, studied,
learned, and practiced!).
It is noteworthy that concelebrants of the Mass
(other priests) and deacons refrain — in
compliance with the rubrics of the Mass — from using the orans
posture; only the main celebrant is instructed to do so who,
once again, in himself represents all those present at
the Mass. This quasi-priestly orans gesture is yet another
instance of the increasing permeability between the Sanctuary
and the pews: we commonly see this when the priest illicitly
leaves the Sanctuary to be democratically immersed in the pews
as just “one of the guys” rather than an alter Christus
set apart, and the laity (mostly women) swarm the Sanctuary
in every “Ministry” (hence having “Ministers”) fabricated since
Vatican II. Prior to Vatican II Catholics had Priests
and Protestant had Ministers. We now have both, and many
more “Ministers” than Priests.
Is the orans posture uniquely Catholic? No! Until
the “Charismatic Renewal” that renewed nothing, it was confined
to emotionally-imbued Protestant revivalist meetings, American
Pentecostalists, and Evangelicals. Yes, there are some ancient
Catholic murals depicting people praying in the orans
posture — just as it is found in pre-Christian pagan illustrations
and engravings in Egypt and Mesopotamia. In a word there is
nothing at all distinctively Catholic in this posture of prayer.
Is it bad? No. No form of genuine prayer is bad. Is it liturgically
correct? No. It is the the proverbial
“Deru kugi wa utareru”,
the nail sticking up calling for attention (St. Matthew
6.5), when our attention should be directed to God Alone in
the Most Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.
-
Hands Cupped.
We are uncertain of the origin of this posture of prayer which
most likely derives from the Muslim tradition of the 19th
Rakat of the Salat in private prayer:
“Say personal prayers with hands cupped and palms up at chest
level.” 4 There is no precedent in Catholicism
—or Christianity — for holding ones hands in this manner during
prayer. Presumably it is an attitude of receptiveness to God's
blessings as a cup receives water. This is a charitable interpretation.
According to AllExperts, in Buddhism, “hands are a
little cupped rather than strictly palm-to-palm, because they
are supposed to represent a lotus bud — that pure, beautiful
flower that grows up out of the mud!” 5 Once
again, there is not only nothing distinctly Catholic in this
attitude of prayer, apart from the idiosyncrasy of the one praying,
but no apparent association with Christianity at all. Once again
it is
“Deru kugi wa utareru.”
Ut unum sint!
“That they may be one.”
Such a beautiful — and since Vatican II — elusive desideration!
__________________________
1
Philippians 2:10
2 Gal. 1.10
3 St. John 17:21
4 http://sufism.org/foundations/salaat/salaat-2
5
http://en.allexperts.com/q/Buddhists-948/2008/4/Prayer-Hands.htm
Editor
Boston Catholic Journal
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