Turning Toward the Lord: Orientation in Liturgical PrayerIntroduction by Joseph Ratzinger (Pope Benedict XVI) Turning towards the Lord presents an historical and theological argument for the traditional, common direction of liturgical prayer, known as "facing east", and is meant as a contribution to the contemporary debate about the Catholic liturgy. Lang, a member of the London Oratory, studies the direction of liturgical prayer from an historical, theological, and pastoral point of view. At a propitious moment, this book resumes a debate that, despite appearances to the contrary, has never really gone away, not even after the Second Vatican Council. Historical research has made the controversy less partisan, and among the faithful there is an increasing sense of the problems inherent in an arrangement that hardly shows the liturgy to be open to the things that are above and to the world to come. In this situation, Lang's delightfully objective and wholly unpolemical book is a valuable guide. Without claiming to offer major new insights, Lang carefully presents the results of recent research and provides the material necessary for making an informed judgment. It is from such historical evidence that the author elicits the theological answers that he proposes. |
From inside the book
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... Altar 21 II Direction of Prayer, Liturgy, and Church Architecture in the Early Church 35 1. Facing East: The Christian Direction of Prayer 35 2. The Direction of Prayer and the Position of the Celebrant at the Altar 61 3. Liturgy and ...
... altars towards the people. Those who read the relevant texts will be astonished to learn that neither is in fact found ... altar and celebrate facing the people (versus populum).' The General Instruction of the Missal issued in 2002 re ...
... of Buch-Kunstverlag Ettal, Yale University Art Gallery, Librairie Orientaliste Paul Geuth- ner, Sible de Blaauw, and Institut d'Études Augustiniennes. INTRODUCTION The position of the altar and the direction taken 13 Acknowledgments.
... Altar und Kirchenbau'.1 The intellectual and spiritual climate appears favourable to a recovery of the sacred direction in Christianity; this is clearly shown by recent studies on the subject which have been received with considerable ...
... altar is felt to be more appropriate than the turning towards the east. The latter is often perceived as merely artificial, though 'objectively speaking', no less 'right'.4 In response to this criticism, I should like to note first that ...