A Miserable Table

The final example I will give of a change not sanctioned by the Council, but now almost universal, is one I mentioned earlier-----that of the replacement of the altar by a "miserable table," and the celebration of the Mass facing the people. We are told that this is the restoration of an ancient custom of the Church. This is nonsense. It has always been the tradition of the Church that Mass should be celebrated facing the East, which is a symbol of the Resurrection. The sun rises in the East each day just as the Son of God rose from the dead. This is why the altar is normally at the East end of the Church. In a few exceptional cases the altar was at the West end, and where this was the case the priest stood on the west side of the altar so that he could celebrate Mass facing the East. This explains the arrangement in St. Peter's Basilica in Rome, which was designed to make possible Mass facing the East, not Mass facing the people. ¹⁰

What about the Last Supper? This is a question often put to traditionalists by self-styled liturgical experts whose knowledge of liturgical history seems to be as non-existent as my own understanding of the complex rules of American football. They tell us that at the Last Supper Our Lord did not turn His back upon the people. What a silly thing to say. At the Last Supper Our Lord most certainly did not face His Apostles across a table. They were all on the same side, facing Jerusalem, as the Jews still do when they pray.

Another reason Christians faced the East when they prayed was to emphasize the break with Judaism. The Jews faced Jerusalem when they worshipped, Christians faced the East-----symbol of the heavenly Jerusalem.

The Protestant Reformers rejected the tradition of celebrating the Eucharist facing the East due to its sacrificial connotation, which, from their standpoint, was entirely logical as their Eucharist was merely a commemorative meal, and the only sacrifice offered was one of praise and thanksgiving. They instituted the practice of the minister facing his congregation across a table to stress that their Communion Services were not Masses. Similarly, the replacement of altars by tables indicated that what was taking place was a meal, and no more than a meal. This was stressed in 1550 by Nicholas Ridley, the Protestant bishop of London. [Emphasis added by the Web Master.]


10) Pope Paul's New Mass, Chapter XIX, and the Angelus Press pamphlet, The Barbarians Have Taken Over. This pamphlet, based on a quotation by Archbishop R. J. Dwyer, provides documentation proving that no mandatory legislation requiring a single change in the sanctuary can be found in any document of Vatican II or in the post-conciliar liturgical legislation.