Dear Father Rutler,
I don’t like giving the Sign of the Peace at Mass. It seems to me like a needless distraction. I can glad-hand Mrs Smith any time I want. On Sundays, I’m there to see Jesus. Is this uncharitable or disobedient?
Kelsey J from Grand Rapids, MI
The Sign of Peace is a distraction where it is presently situated in the Liturgy, especially if effervescent personalities wave and chat. A patrician friend of mine, when I said Mass as he was dying, asked me to omit the Peace because it made his butler uncomfortable. I have used that as a sufficient excuse ever since, regardless of domestic arrangements. If done at all, it should be liturgical: greeting just the person next to you with a formal gesture. Influenza has a salutary effect because in flu season the Peace is often suspended. The real fault with it is that it is cloyingly bourgeois. If someone intrudes upon you with an unwelcome smile, just say politely: “Noli me tangere”. Our Lord said that to the Magdalene, and if it was good enough for him it should be good enough for us.
