Present Canonical Rules For The Latin Church
The Code of Canon Law dedicates a short chapter of five canons to altars for Mass. It distinguishes between fixed altars (those that adhere to the floor) and movable altars (those that in fact be moved around), and states: "It is desirable to have a fixed altar in every church, but a fixed or a movable altar in other places designated for sacred celebrations" (canon 1235 §2)
On the material to be used, it decrees:
- Canon 1236 §1. According to the traditional practice of the Church, the table of a fixed altar is to be of stone, and indeed of a single natural stone. Nevertheless, another worthy and solid material can also be used in the judgment of the conference of bishops. The supports or base, however, can be made of any material.
- §2. A movable altar can be constructed of any solid material suitable for liturgical use.
With regard to relics of saints, it says:
- Canon 1237 §2. The ancient tradition of placing relics of martyrs or other saints under a fixed altar is to be preserved, according to the norms given in the liturgical books.
The norms in question are as follows:
- It is fitting that the tradition of the Roman liturgy should be preserved of placing relics of martyrs or other saints beneath the altar. However, the following should be noted:
- a) Relics intended for deposition should be of such a size that they can be recognized as parts of human bodies. Hence excessively small relics of one or more saints must not be deposited.
- b) The greatest care must be taken to determine whether relics intended for deposition are authentic. It is better for an altar to be dedicated without relics than to have relics of doubtful credibility placed beneath it.
- c) A reliquary must not be placed on the altar or in the table of the altar but beneath the table of the altar, as the design of the altar may allow.
This last norm explicitly excludes the practice customary in recent centuries of inserting relics into a specially created cavity within the table (the mensa) of an altar or altar stone.
The Rite also makes explicit what is only implicit in the Code of Canon Law:
- It is not permissible to place the relics of saints in the base of a movable altar.
Read more about this topic: Altar Stone
Famous quotes containing the words present, canonical, rules, latin and/or church:
“... what is especially insufferable in a woman is a restless, bold, domineering manner, for this manner goes against nature.... [ellipsis in source] No matter what her worth, no matter that she never forgets that she could be a man by virtue of her superiority of mind and the force of her will, on the outside she must be a woman! She must present herself as that creature made to please, to love to seek support, that being who is inferior to man and who approaches the angels.”
—Elisabeth-Felicite Bayle-Mouillard (1796–1865)
“If God bestowed immortality on every man then when he made him, and he made many to whom he never purposed to give his saving grace, what did his Lordship think that God gave any man immortality with purpose only to make him capable of immortal torments? It is a hard saying, and I think cannot piously be believed. I am sure it can never be proved by the canonical Scripture.”
—Thomas Hobbes (1579–1688)
“Syntax and vocabulary are overwhelming constraints—the rules that run us. Language is using us to talk—we think we’re using the language, but language is doing the thinking, we’re its slavish agents.”
—Harry Mathews (b. 1930)
“Not only does the world scarcely know who the Latin American man is, the world has barely cared.”
—Georgie Anne Geyer (b. 1935)
“Exporting Church employees to Latin America masks a universal and unconscious fear of a new Church. North and South American authorities, differently motivated but equally fearful, become accomplices in maintaining a clerical and irrelevant Church. Sacralizing employees and property, this Church becomes progressively more blind to the possibilities of sacralizing person and community.”
—Ivan Illich (b. 1926)