Church: A Place Where Mystery Happens - #14

The new document on church art, environment, and architecture, Built on Living Stone, devotes considerable space to the placement of the tabernacle. In fact, it devotes much less space to equally important, less controversial items such as the placement of the baptismal font or the chapel for the sacrament of reconciliation. Why is this the case? The placement of the tabernacle, a seemingly mild issue, leads Catholics into another terrain. This is the turf of unresolved church wars.

Back in the good old 1970s and the 1980s there were exciting church wars that pitted the liberals against the conservatives. The former wanted change. The latter fought change, especially liturgical change. Depending on your position, one side wore the good-guy hats and the other side was the dreaded enemy. These labels do not really characterize the present church wars. The current combatants dig in their heels around the placement of the tabernacle. When the tabernacle is placed tells you where the person stands in terms of current liturgical and church renewal.

On one side are those who want the tabernacle in the center of the sanctuary. Placing the tabernacle there, they say, will restore a sense of reverence to our churches and keep the congregation focused on the Eucharistic presence of the Lord. People in this camp want to rid the church of the irreverent chumminess that now goes on as people assemble for Sunday worship. They want the pastor, the pastoral staff, and the people of the parish to commit to Eucharistic adoration.. Some parishes have inaugurated perpetual adoration. Their hope is that this practice of piety and devotion will make the Eucharist central to the life of the parish at Mass and outside of the liturgy. Some of these folks lament the casualness that Catholics have sometimes fallen into. They also see adoration as a way into contemplative prayer and a way of doing penance, making reparation, and atoning for the sinfulness of our society and the moral decay in America. In particular, they tie Eucharistic adoration to reparation for the sin of abortion in our nation and they contend that parishes that have perpetual adoration are better at getting vocations to the priesthood. They feel that the liturgists have gone too far. They accuse them of demolishing the affective warmth that they say once characterized Catholic Church buildings. They seek to restore and revive a devotional Catholicism so that young and old will be nourished at the font of popular piety and devotion.

Militants in this camp tend to be watchful for signs of orthodoxy in preaching, liturgical posture, and the performance of the liturgy. They receive a lot of support for their cause from articles in a variety of new magazines, TV programs, and a nucleus of intellectuals at influential Catholic universities. In short, the placement of the tabernacle unveils a deeper Catholic cold war that is simmering under the surface.