The question of worship postures came up in conversation in our new members class recently. Why do we reverence the altar, the cross or the gospel book? Why do we cross ourselves or bow?
We do it because we are called to worship God in our bodies. To offer ourselves as a living sacrifice to God.
Genuflecting, bowing and crossing ourselves are all external manifestations of the sacrifice we owe to God in our bodies. They are not empty symbols but have deep spiritual meaning for us.
But why to objects such as altars, crosses and gospel books? It is not that we worship the items themselves, but rather who those items represent. St. Thomas Aquinas said that giving reverence to the cross is akin to giving reverence to a Kings cloths. The cross being our Lord's garment, and what we ourselves our clothed in by faith, is reverenced for this reason.
And therein lies the heart of the question. We live in modern times with no King to reverence, but we worship in the way of our fathers, who understood these thing more clearly. You might greet a president or a congressman with a firm handshake because he is not a King. But Kings are not greeted in this manner, because Kings rule by the grace of God, and are thusly his ministers upon the earth. To give a King reverence is to give God reverence.
So then how should we greet the King of Heaven? With a firm shake of the hand or with a greater reverence than what we would offer a temporal prince? The below link is from the Anglican divine Bishop Jeremy Taylor. He explains the reverence give the altar in Anglican worship.
It is important to remember that it is not the objects themselves that we reverence. That would be idolatry. But rather it is God who we worship and those symbols, like the photograph of a monarch, serve to direct our worship towards who they represent.
This of course will raise more questions. I'm here to answer them. Let me know what they are.
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