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By Simone Brosig  The ministry known and loved for many years as the Office of Worship in the Archdiocese of Adelaide has been renamed Community Life and Worship.
The support people in our parishes, schools and communities have been accustomed to receive will still be available. The difference is that we have an explicit mandate to integrate liturgy and community life. The Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy described the liturgy as the summit and font of the Church. There is a constant flow of nourishment and power moving from the liturgy to the life of the community and back again to the celebration of the Eucharist. Our newly expanded team aims to provide accessible training and resources that will help people to implement practices that strengthen this relationship of mutuality between worship and community life.
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By Lauren Bierer  The postures of participants in the assembly at Mass can feel routine for those who attend regularly: stand for the Alleluia and proclamation of the Gospel, sit for the homily and stand for the Creed, etc. On the other hand, if you’ve ever been to a Catholic wedding or funeral, you have most likely witnessed family and friends who are less familiar with the actions and responses, gathering uncomfortably in the pews, looking around the room for prompts from the regulars.
It is nerve-wracking to be a part of an unfamiliar ritual and not being sure of your role. Some may feel particularly uncomfortable when it comes time to kneel. It is a posture of vulnerability. A posture of penance, where we say ‘I’m sorry for my mistakes’, ‘I know I am an imperfect human’. If you’re a first-time church visitor and the presider says ‘please kneel’, it’s natural to decide ‘this bit isn’t for me, I’ll just watch’. By Dr. Jenny O'Brien  Easter is almost upon us. On April 14 we begin the Easter Triduum (pronounced trid-you-oom), the most important three days in the Church’s year, when we celebrate the mystery of Christ’s passion, death and resurrection. It is as if the three days are stitched together into a single ‘great’ liturgy as we journey with Jesus from the Last Supper in the upper room, to the cross on Calvary, to the mystery and joy of resurrection. What begins with the Entrance Procession on Holy Thursday night continues seamlessly through Good Friday, the Easter Vigil, Easter Sunday morning and only ends with Evening Prayer late on Easter Day. By Dr. Jenny O'Brien  The words ‘through Christ our Lord, Amen’ are familiar to us as the conclusion to many of the Church’s formal prayers.
During Mass they end the Prayer over the Offerings of bread and wine, and the Prayer after Communion. At the end of the Collect (Opening Prayer) they appear in the longer form: ‘Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God for ever and ever. Amen.’ And at the end of the great Eucharistic Prayer there is the even longer form: ‘Through him and with him and in him, O God almighty Father, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, all glory and honour is yours for ever and ever. Amen.’ You may be surprised to know that these simple phrases are extraordinarily rich in theological meaning. They help us to understand how we, the baptised faithful, relate to the risen Jesus and to the three divine persons of the Trinity: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Author: Jenny O'Brien The beautiful funeral liturgies that marked the passing to eternal life of Archbishop Leonard Faulkner demonstrated very clearly the important role that our Catholic rituals play within the faith community. The coming together of so many people from throughout our diocese and beyond was “cemented” by the prayers, the readings, the songs and hymns, the actions in which we all joined.
As we sang the antiphon of the Responsorial Psalm at both the Vigil service and the Mass of Christian Burial I was reminded of the power that these short but meaning-filled sentences carry. |
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Catholic Archdiocese of Adelaide
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