Monday, October 19, 2009

MORE KNEELERS IN ROME CHURCHES



Churches in Rome are using kneelers in the centre aisle for distributing Communion. The priest stands behind the kneeler, and places the Eucharist on the tongue of the communicant.



The Franciscan Conventual Church, San Salvatore in Laurea, near Castel San Angelo has a kneeler placed for the Mass in Italian. Some people prefer to receive the Eucharist kneeling. Others receive it standing in front of the kneeler.


At Churches where there is no kneeler you can see people suddenly drop to the floor kneeling and wait for the Eucharist to be placed on their tongue.



At the Church of San Andrea Della Fratte they have a altar railing at the Altar of the Miracle.So people can comfortably kneel and receive the Eucharist there for the 7 a.m Mass celebrated by the Minim Father.


At the Church of the Annunciata near the Vatican they do not have a railing and so for the 10.30a.m  Sunday Mass in Latin they use a kneeler. Everyone uses it for receiving the Eucharist.


The Holy Father Pope Benedict XVI has been giving the Eucharist to communicants-kneeling.


Young people receive the Eucharist with more respect and reverence when they kneel then when they casually receive it in their hand and then place it their mouth.


The priests in Rome have been telling parishioners to consume the Eucharist as soon as they receive it standing and not to walk with the Eucharist in their hand. This was an announcement at the Church of St. Francis Xavier in Garbatella.There a lady would also attend  Mass in Italian in the mornings with a veil .I asked her the reason. She said that she belonged to a Marian group. In other churches too one notices veils at the Italian Novus Ordo Mass.


Recently at the Church of the Sacred Heart in Prati, the ‘Purgatory Church’, there was a young lady wearing a veil.


Those attending the Tridentine Rite Mass in Rome, at a few churches, all kneel and receive the Eucharist and most of them if not all, wear a veil at Mass.