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As parishes re-open to varying extents – and with a range of anti-viral measures from face-shields to people scattered by tape in near-empty benches, many clergy note that the numbers have not returned to the pre-COVID-19 level. The preferred explanation seems to be that now is still not ‘normality’ and that many are fearful about Read more
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Disruptive innovation is not a common term in theological and liturgical discussions. The term comes from Clayton Christensen’s 1997 book The Innovator’s Dilemma. Christensen explains that successful companies are those that can meet not only their customers’ current needs but anticipate their future ones too. Disruptive innovators – disruptors – are more likely to displace Read more
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Philosophers often point out that space is one of the basic prerequisites of human experience. We exist as spatial creatures – we have size and location and movement. We imagine ourselves ‘in space,’ we arrange things in space in relation to other items located around us. We constantly locate (i.e. put in a place in Read more
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It’s time to think big about the future of worship before the future passes us by. As this pandemic transforms faith communities, the national conversation among leaders has been too timid and tactical — focused mostly on the logistics of returning to our brick-and-mortar buildings: How soon can we get bodies back into the pews? Read more
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“We need to revisit the issue of ministry in the Church,” said Anne-Marie Pelletier in June 25 article in La Croix International. But what would such a revisiting look like? It raises several fundamental questions and might be far more undermining of the status quo than the few changes in the Code of Canon Law Read more
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Catholic liturgy has had its greatest social shock in generations. No one had seen churches locked before, few had ever thought of “streamed” liturgies and, across the world, there have been liturgical experiments that were unthinkable just weeks ago. Now the churches are opening up – slowly – but the legacy of the virus experience Read more
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One person recently said, the Virtual Mass was great. “We could lie in bed, go to Mass in London, Florence, Ireland and even Auckland. It would be great if we could keep it”. Another said, “The first week I stood when I should, the second week I felt comfortable knitting and in the third week Read more
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The coronavirus pandemic has seen a flurry of new activity in Catholic liturgy. Clergy are streaming live coverage of themselves celebrating the Eucharist and inviting others to join in by watching. As lockdown eases in some places, the latest desire is to have a system – similar to that used for social distancing in shops Read more
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COVID-19’s impact on liturgical praxis has left us reeling! Significant liturgical decisions have left the liturgical ministry by all the baptised out in the cold and refocused the Mass as a clerical experience. John N. Collins addresses the issues of priest and presbyter and as a factor in clericalised worship decision in ‘“Is it just Read more
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COVID-19 has done more to enliven the liturgical debate than anything else in the last decades. The vast amount of material produced in the run-up to Easter was astounding. It’s been a long time since I have seen so much that guided, challenged and questioned our liturgical response to lockdown. It was as if the Read more
Tony
Tony
Joan
David McCann
Gerard