The Presence of Christ in the Gathered Assembly

(Paperback)

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The Dogmatic Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy of Vatican II reiterates the church's traditional teaching on the manifold presence of Christ in his church, especially in liturgical celebrations: in the priest, the consecrated bread and wine, the sacraments, and when the gathered church prays and sings. Nevertheless, there continues to exist in both scholarly writing and popular piety an almost exclusive focus on the presence of Christ in the eucharistic species. The purpose of this book is to examine the most elusive mode of the manifold presence of Christ mentioned above, that is, as it is symbolized within the assembly that gathers for worship. Using the resources of several contemporary philosophical aproaches, including semiotics, phenomenology, personalism, and existentialism, the book draws attention to the forgotten or or less understood aspects of the belief in the presence of Christ in the gathered assembly and explores the implications of this belief for participating in the liturgy and living the Christian life. While the book is scholarly in tone, it has extremelypractical ramifications for the ways in which the mass should be celebrated in millions of Catholic parishes around the world.

Reviews

"By drawing upon phenomenological and postmodern writers, as well as theologians of the 20th century, K. insightfully clarifies what sacramentality does and can mean for the liturgical assembly. Hers is a rich compilation of ideas...The practical implications for the Church are daunting, but with K.'s contribution to the sacramental sciences we have a profound resource for the discussion on the real "presence" of Christ within the liturgical community." -Terence Hogan, SL.D., Theological Studies, December 2008
This is a book that merits the attention of all liturgists regardless of ideology. It witnesses to a profound truth: Christ is present in the midst of the assembly, and the assembly itself is the ecclesial body of the risen Christ.' -- Ecclesiology
"At a time when there are both official and popular challenges to the Vatican II affirmation that the assembly is the primary subject of the liturgical action, Judith Kubicki's carefully researched and written book corrects the frequent but mistaken notion that the ordained priest is the only celebrant of the liturgy. This is an important book to offset the contemporary backsliding in matters of liturgical theology." R. Kevin Seasoltz, OSB, editor of Worship and author of A Sense of the Sacred * Blurb from reviewer *

Author Bio

Judith M. Kubicki, C.S.S.F., is assistant professor of theology at Fordham University. She is the author of Liturgical Music as Ritual Symbol: A Case Study of Jacques Berthier's Taize Music (Leuven, Belgium: Peeters, 1999).