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[Catholic Caucus] Pittsburgh diocese to regulate 'ad orientem' MassesThe Diocese of Pittsburgh is set to implement a new policy that will require priests to seek the bishop’s permission if they wish to celebrate the ordinary form of the Mass ad orientem. The policy, discussed during a Thursday meeting between Pittsburgh’s Bishop David Zubik and the diocesan presbyteral council, is expected to be implemented in the coming weeks. It will make Pittsburgh the latest U.S. diocese to regulate the ad orientem celebration of the Mass.The celebration of the Mass ad orientem is not regulated by Traditionis custodes, a 2021 policy promulgated...

Our readers will perhaps remember that in 2016, His Eminence Cardinal Robert Sarah, then Prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship, called upon the Church to return to its authentic custom of offering the Mass ad orientem, as a way of “putting God back at the center” of Christian worship. (Original interview in French here: https://www.famillechretienne.fr/vie-chretienne/liturgie/cardinal-sarah-comment-remettre-dieu-au-caeur-de-la-liturgie-194987.) They will also likely remember that was met with a swift Papal intervention on behalf of retaining the inauthentic custom of worshipping versus populum, which cannot perish soon or thoroughly enough. This controversy does not impinge solely on the Roman Rite. The Syro-Malabar Church...

Pope Benedict XVI has contributed to a book marking the Ecumenical Patriarch's 25th anniversary The Pope Emeritus has praised worship ad orientem in a book which celebrates the 25th anniversary of the election of Ecumenical PatriarchBartholomew of Constantinople. In his book extract, the retired Benedict XVI writes: “A shepherd of the flock of Jesus Christ is never oriented only to the circle of his own faithful. The community of the Church is universal, also in the sense that it includes all of reality.” He continues: “This is evident, for example, in the liturgy, which does not indicate only the commemoration...

This past weekend the Most Reverend Robert Morlino, Bishop of the Diocese of Madison, Wisconsin made an announcement of great liturgical importance. Going forward His Excellency will be offering all of his Masses at the Cathedral ad orientem. Make no mistake about it, this is a major development on the liturgical landscape of American Catholicism. While Bishop Morlino is a strong supporter of the Traditional Latin Mass, and has offered it publicly on numerous occasions, his recent announcement pertains to Masses offered in the Ordinary Form of the Roman Rite. This is the positive manifestation of Robert Cardinal Sarah’s call...

ROME, Italy, August 29, 2016 (LifeSiteNews) – Cardinal Raymond Burke has given a strong endorsement of Cardinal Robert Sarah’s recent encouragement for priests to begin celebrating Mass in accord with the ancient posture that recognizes God as the center of the liturgy. Cardinal Burke said he is in total agreement with Cardinal Sarah’s recent request for priests to celebrate Mass ad orientem, or facing the Lord, because when a priest celebrates Mass, he is acting in the person of Christ and the focus should be on God. Ad orientem, Latin for “to the East,” refers in liturgy to when the...

You might say—many commentators have said—that with the quick Vatican smackdown of Cardinal Sarah's proposal for ad orientem worship, Rome has spoken and the case is closed. I disagree. On the contrary, Cardinal Sarah has reopened a much-needed discussion about how to increase reverence in the liturgy. His address to a conference in London caused what that city's Catholic Herald is describing in this week's cover headline as A liturgical earthquake. Ten days ago no one was talking about celebrating Mass ad orientem. Now that option is being widely discussed, even in secular media outlets. Cardinal Sarah was not issuing...

Speaking at a conference on the liturgy in London yesterday, Cardinal Robert Sarah, the highest authority on the topic in the Catholic Church under Pope Francis, asked all bishops and priests to adopt the ancient posture in the Mass where the priest faces the tabernacle along with the congregation, rather than facing the people. He asked that the posture be adopted by Advent of this year, which begins November 27. During the same talk, Cardinal Sarah encouraged all Catholics to receive Communion kneeling. During the talk, the Vatican’s liturgy chief revealed that Pope Francis had asked him to “continue the...

Cardinal Robert Sarah made the comments in an exclusive interview with Famille ChrétienneThe Vatican’s liturgy chief has called on priests to celebrate Mass facing east. In an interview with the French Catholic magazine Famille Chrétienne, Cardinal Robert Sarah said that the Second Vatican Council did not require priests to celebrate Mass facing the people. This way of celebrating Mass, he said, was “a possibility, but not an obligation”. Readers and listeners should face each other during the Liturgy of the Word, he said. “But as soon as we reach the moment when one addresses God – from the Offertory onwards...

Ad Orientem and why we should go back to it  Ad Orientem is a liturgical orientation done by the priest since the Early Christian Church. It has held a historical and traditional way in which priests would celebrate Mass in the Roman Rite. This liturgical position and action are still celebrated in the Tridentine Latin Mass (Extraordinary Form), as well as in the Dominican and Norbertine Rites, as well as several others. It has however sadly lost practice and has been abandoned in most of the Novus Ordo (Ordinary Form)This article will help explain the historical, and theological significance, its...

UPDATED: see belowORIGINALLY POSTED on: Nov 21, 2014The late-great liturgist Klaus Gamber, who also influenced Joseph Ratzinger (also known by another name), said that turning around the altars was the single most damaging change that happened in the name of the Council, and it wasn’t even mandated by the Council.  There is no document that required tables be set up.But I digress.Great news from the Diocese of Lincoln!His Excellency Most Reverend James Conley has determined that Holy Mass in the Cathedral of Lincoln will be ad orientem. Bishop’s Column Looking to the east Friday, 21 November 2014 Jesus Christ will return in...

Bishop James Conley of Lincoln, Nebraska, has announced that Mass will be celebrated ad orientem in the diocsean cathedral during Advent, to remind the faithful of the symbolism of facing East. Explaining the move, Bishop Conley writes: But the symbolism of facing together, and awaiting Christ, is rich, time-honored and important. Especially during Advent, as we await the coming of the Lord, facing the east together—even symbolically facing Christ together at the altar and on the crucifix—is a powerful witness to Christ’s imminent return.

Tuesday, August 14, 2007 The Wait is Over... Finally. [8am: Updated with statements... scroll down.] Riffing off Sunday’s warning shot, a reader mused that “if it's [neither] the butcher or the candle-stick maker… IT MUST BE THE BAKER.” And it is – and, at long last, it’s official: at Roman Noon today, the Pope named Bishop Robert Baker of Charleston to the diocese of Birmingham, which covers northern Alabama. If you're surprised, you haven't been paying attention. Baker, 63, succeeds Bishop David Foley, who retired as Birmingham’s ordinary in May 2005. Foley, 77, has since served as diocesan administrator;...

Cardinal Schoenborn on "ad orientem" & "versus populum" From the good people of Kath.net, a great Austrian Catholic site comes this statement from Vienna's Cardinal Archbishop Schoenborn. The group "We are church" (roughly the equivalent of Call to Action, VOTF and such) had criticized the Archbishop's permission to the Viennese parish St. Rochus to use the original, Baroque, high altar instead of the "people's altar". The group said it meant making Mass using the high altar equal with Mass using the "people's altar" and called on Catholics to not attend Latin Masses because it constituted "a step backwards, to before...