tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11037918.post113390281246425803..comments2023-10-15T09:50:10.691-05:00Comments on The Country Parson: Looking eastUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11037918.post-1134055280757010122005-12-08T10:21:00.000-05:002005-12-08T10:21:00.000-05:00You may not want to know what I think, Jeff. But y...You may not want to know what I think, Jeff. But you asked ...<BR/><BR/>While the original article is well-written and deals with some interesting historical and theological points, I think it's seductively subversive. We want to honor tradition, but we dishonor it by turning it into a weapon.<BR/><BR/>Look at the commentary over on Titusone:nine. For crying out loud, they are making a mountain out of a molehill. Or in the more expressive and appropriate German saying, a thunderclap out of a fart.<BR/><BR/>If we turn the direction our altars and priests face into another cause for schism, I'm leaving. ;-) And, in fact, if we feel the need to kneel "with [our] face to the rising sun," we will have to mount our churches on lazy susans. The sun rises in the EAST only for a short time each year. It varies all the way from pretty extreme northeast to pretty extreme southeast.<BR/><BR/>If that bunch of crazies (oops, judge not! that bunch of perhaps overly-traditional spiritual people) over on Titusone:nine can make theological hay out of statements like, "This has made worship man-centered rather than God-focussed. Celebrating coram populo is hardly an act of worship at all, but is more like a cooking demonstration or a magic show," then I can make my own theological hay.<BR/><BR/>God's revelation in creation that the origin of the rising sun is not strictly "East," is ample argument that we should be no more hide-bound in our orientation during Eucharist.<BR/><BR/>Several of the readers over on Titusone:nine did actually have a valid argument -- that our focus should be on God. God is omnipresent. I think that knocks the dogma of rigidly facing east into a cocked hat.<BR/><BR/>How's that for sophistry?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com