T h e Pl a c e o f C h r i s t the blessed sacr a ment chapel at st. benedict ’s abbey by Fr. Daniel McCarthy When you visit the Abbey Church you may be confused as you walk through the main doors and look for the tabernacle housing the reserved Blessed Sacrament or the red candle. These are not immediately visible from the main doors, but rather are located in a separate chapel set off to the right, at the side entrance to the church. Interestingly, this chapel was dedicated in 1959, well before the Second Vatican Council, with the Blessed Sacrament reserved in a chapel distinct from the main body of the church. It may surprise you further to learn that since 1600 the Roman church has preferred a separate chapel for the reservation of the Blessed Sacrament rather than on the altar where liturgy is celebrated. This is certainly not the common practice in our region where the tabernacle is typically placed front and center in the main hall of a church. How did this come to be? We’ll pick up the story when St. Charles Borromeo was working in Rome. Toward the end of the Council of Trent (1545-1563) his uncle was elected Pope Pius IV (1559-1565), who then appointed his nephew Charles Archbishop of Milan (1560-1584). St. Charles remained in Rome to serve his uncle as cardinal secretary of state and as archpriest of the basilica of St. Mary Major (dedicated in the year 434). Charles was sympathetic to the novel fashion already practiced in Sienna and Verona and so wanted to reserve the Blessed Sacrament in a tabernacle placed on the main altar of the Marian basilica. But before he could do so, he returned to Milan. His predecessor and successor were both from the Sforza family. The first began to build a chapel attached to the basilica which was finished by the second who had the tabernacle installed in their chapel, where Pope Sixtus V (1585-1590) has since been buried. There the tabernacle remains, held aloft on the arms of golden angels. Pope Pius IV gifted to his nephew a bronze tabernacle for the cathedral in Milan. Charles built a base to bear its weight and then inserted the free-standing altar into this base. He took a liking for the Roman way his uncle would sit in his cathedra (the chair of the bishop) at the head of the apse flanked by the clergy on both sides.
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Kansas Monks
Realizing the tabernacle would block his view, he instructed that it be raised and held aloft on the hands of angel statues (below, at left). This would allow him to look through the space between the altar and the tabernacle to see and be seen while sitting at his chair, the cathedra located in the head of the apse. Borromeo wrote instructions on arranging a church which became the standard thereafter, except for Rome. The church of Rome responded by publishing the first edition of the ceremonial of bishops in 1600. It argued that the Blessed Sacrament should be reserved in the most prominent place in a church, which would be front and center, but because we can never show sufficient honor to the reserved sacrament, we should also work to balance other important elements, such as the proper functioning of the solemn celebration of liturgy by the bishop. The proper celebration of solemn Mass or vespers requires certain actions such as sitting in the cathedra, wearing a miter, incensing the bishop, none of which would be appropriate to do before the reserved sacrament, which should receive full attention, honor, reverence. Thus, the Ceremonial of Bishops, following the Council of Trent, legislated that the Blessed Sacrament be reserved in a worthy place separate from the main body of the church. Indeed, if the bishop were to celebrate Mass on an altar where the Blessed Sacrament was reserved, the reserved sacrament had to be removed from the tabernacle and reserved in a different worthy place so that the proper reverences due to the Blessed Sacrament would not interfere with the solemn celebration of liturgy. A commentary of the ceremonial of bishops published in two-oversized illustrated volumes in 1860 says that the bishop should not celebrate Mass with his kidneys turned toward the Blessed Sacrament. (The reference to kidneys may be a euphemism, where we might say that one should not turn one’s back on the reserved sacrament.) The commentary cites an authority named Crassus who said that when the bishop is to celebrate Mass, the Blessed Sacrament is to be removed from the locale of the altar. It seems that two competing values were presented. In Milan they developed the primary place in the church for the reservation of the Blessed Sacrament, whereas in Rome they preserved the proper celebration of solemn liturgy by reserving the Blessed Sacrament in a separate chapel. None of the major basilicas of Rome to this day have the Blessed Sacrament reserved on the main altar, although lesser and later-built churches do.
