When I was vocation director of our diocese from 1986 to 1998, I had a couple of seminarians on the college level at the Benedictine Saint Meinrad Seminary in Indiana. The Benedictines, notorious for liturgical renewal after Vatican II, had wreckovated their main abbey church in a despicable way. Since that time it has undergone some repair from the original debacle wreckovation, but still kind of bizarre given what it once was.
But there were smaller chapels and this is one used for the college seminarians which was wreckovated and the altar placed on a side wall rather than where it was in a traditional set-up:
But then, the other day, I saw this photo attached to a Crux article. I thought to myself, self, the photo of that chapel has a beautiful floor that indicates the orientation of the chapel’s altar has be returned to a traditional set-up. And sure enough I looked it up and you can see how the floor is designed to lead to the altar in its once new but now former location of a side wall of a once traditional chapel but now traditional once again. They have returned it to the traditional design but left the Uber-expensive floor from the original wreckovation which now looks strange. And is that an altar railing I see??????:
3 comments:
As a former member of St. Meinrad staff I am happy to report that the traditional reorientation of the St. Thomas Aquinas chapel at St. Meinrad took place approximately 12 years ago under the current rector Fr. Denis Robinson, OSB. The change was necessitated by the growing enrollment of the seminary and the inability of the “side wall” set up to physically accommodate the larger student body. Additionally, the restoration of the sanctuary also enabled the tabernacle to be returned to the sanctuary after several years of being in a small Blessed Sacrament Chapel separate from the seminary chapel. Happily, the rector undertook the beautification of the chapel as well by adding sacred images, etc. What may appear as an altar rail is really the long predieu which accommodates the kneeling of those who occupy the first row of chairs on both sides.
In 1968 the cossack and clerical garb was discarded at St. Meinrad. Shortly after his appointment as rector, Fr. Denis introduced a formal dress code. All deacons were to wear clerical garb. This year, for the first time since 1968, clerical garb is now required for all seminarians in theological formation. Many good things have happened at St. Meinrad.
That's wonderful news. I use to visit St. Meinrad regularly in the late 80's and well into the 90's as there was a vocation directors' conference each year there usually in February. It was a several day conference. I love that area and the community surrounding St. Meinrad's and the position of the monastery complex look like a Medieval town in Europe.
They apparently did the same to St John the Baptist Cathedral in Paterson NJ. Sanctuary was "sideswiped." Fortunately, due to needed roof repairs, the entire cathedral was renovated with appropriate appointments. Unfortunately, the decorative paint on the roof beams etc. seems to have been lost.
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