Ick. I hate it. Hippy-dippy, Plastic banana, Feel-good Kumbayah Catholicism. I never touch anyone’s appendages during worship.
Nor do I pray with arms upraised or joined hands.
No Protestant “Our Father”.
Catholic liturgy is a hot mess today.
I despise the “sign of peace” It always seems like the same guy you shok hands with in the next pew won’t let you out of the church parking lot afterward.
It asked bishops to study whether it might be time to find more appropriate gestures to replace a sign of peace using familiar and profane gestures of greeting.**
I so dislike it when people flash me the hippie "peace" sign. Profane in my estimation.
Our pastor in Minnesota used to start the mass with it, instead of inserting it AFTER the Consecration. I have refused to participate and simply keep my head bowed and my hands to myself. The Byzantine rite has an “agape” meal (noshes, really) after the Divine Liturgy as a “sign of peace,” so that there is no interruption of the flow of the Liturgy itself. (Besides, during flu season, it doesn’t make much sense to be clasping the hands of sneezing and coughing people.)
This and holding hands during the Our Father. Ugh.