Speaking on the Octave of Prayer for Christian Unity during his General Audience this Wednesday, Pope Benedict made a liturgical observation:
In the liturgy of the ancient Church, after the homily, the Bishop or the presider of the celebration, the main celebrant, said, "Conversi ad Dominum". Then he and all [others] stood up and turned towards the East. All wished to face towards Christ. Only if converted, only if in this conversion towards Christ, in this common facing of Christ, we may find the gift of unity.
Monsignor Klaus Gamber explained in detail how that ancient liturgical setting worked in his study "Conversi ad Dominum: The Turning Towards the East by the Priest and Faithful During the Celebration of the Mass During the 4th and 5th Centuries", and also in his classical work on the Reform of the Roman Rite:
What in the early Church and during the Middle Ages determined the position of the altar was that it faced East. To quote St. Augustine: "When we rise to pray, we turn East, where heaven begins. And we do this not because God is there, as if He had moved away from the other directions on earth..., but rather to help us remember to turn our mind towards a higher order, that is, to God." This quotation shows that the Christians of those early days, after listening to the homily, would rise for the prayer which followed, and turn towards the East. St. Augustine always refers to this turning to the East in prayer at the end of his homilies, using a set formula, Conversi ad Dominum ("turn to face the Lord")
(...)
As we have already observed, in this type of setting, the liturgy was celebrated from behind the altar in order to face East when offering the Sacrifice. But this did not represent, as might be implied, a celebration versus populum, since the faithful were facing East in prayer as well. Thus, even in the basilicas just described, the celebration of the Eucharist did not entail the priest and the faithful facing one another. During Mass, the faithful, men separated from women, were assembled in the two side naves, with curtains normally hanging between the columns. The center nave was used for the solemn entrance procession of the celebrant and his assistants to the altar, and the choir was situated there as well. Even if we take the hypothetical case that the early Christians in the old Roman basilicas did not face the entrance—that is, the East—during the Offertory prayer—i.e., that they really faced the altar—this still would not have meant that the priest and the faithful faced one another, because during the Eucharistic Prayer the altar was hidden behind curtains. (...)
... many are under the impression that this [from versus Dominum to versus populum] change simply represents the revival of an early Christian practice. But we can show with certainty that there has never been, neither in the Eastern nor the Western Church, a celebration versus populum (facing the people); rather, the direction of prayer has always been towards the East, conversi ad Dominum (turned toward the Lord).
The idea that the priest is to face the people during Mass has its origins with Martin Luther, in his little book, The German Mass and Order of Worship (1526).
Klaus Gamber
The Reform of the Roman Liturgy
(Die Reform der römischen Liturgie: Vorgeschichte und Problematik)
The Reform of the Roman Liturgy
(Die Reform der römischen Liturgie: Vorgeschichte und Problematik)
