Why are altars covered with a giant cloth but then when the consecration happens, the bread and wine, which become the Body and Blood of Christ, sit on another smaller cloth the priest unfolds before the consecration?
– Erin in Taylorville
Hi, Erin. This is an excellent question because it highlights the importance of the physical objects we use in worship, which all have practical, spiritual, and theological significance. The first type of cloth you reference can simply be called the altar cloth. The General Instruction of the Roman Missal, which is the guide book detailing every aspect of how the Mass is to be celebrated, says this about the cloth covering the altar: “Out of reverence for the celebration of the memorial of the Lord and for the banquet in which the Body and Blood of the Lord are offered, there should be, on an altar where this is celebrated, at least one cloth, white in color, whose shape, size, and decoration are in keeping with the altar’s structure. When, in the dioceses of the United States of America, other cloths are used in addition to the altar cloth, then those cloths may be of other colors possessing Christian honorific or festive significance according to longstanding local usage, provided that the uppermost cloth covering the mensa (i.e., the altar cloth itself) is always white in color” (GIRM 304).
The second cloth you mention is called the corporal. The word “corporal” comes from the Latin word corpus which just means “body.” The purpose of this cloth is to catch any particles of Jesus’s eucharistic body which might fall on the altar during Mass, even just the tiny fragments on the priest’s fingers after the consecration. Because the Eucharist is truly the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of Jesus, we want to do everything we can to make sure we capture any fragments and nothing ends up on the floor.
Your question also alludes to the importance of the altar upon which the cloths and other linens are placed. The altar represents Christ Himself. He is the true, high priest who offered the perfect sacrifice on the cross. He is also the sacrificial victim who was offered, and His body functioned as the altar in which that sacrifice was made. This is why many older altars have five crosses engraved on them to represent the five wounds of Christ and to recall His passion. This symbolism also accounts for why altars are reverenced with bows, kisses, and incense, and why they are solemnly dedicated by being consecrated by a bishop with chrism or at least simply blessed before being used for Mass.
Altar cloths might add ornamentation and dignity to the Mass, but there is a much deeper reality at work. If the altar symbolizes Christ, then the altar cloths used in the Mass represent the linen cloths which wrapped Jesus’s body after He was taken down from the cross and buried in the tomb as we see in John 19:40 and a little later in John 20:5-7. Because these simple cloths bear so much importance, it is also proper to have them blessed before being used in the Mass.
Father Troy Niemerg, S.T.L. CHAPLAIN, is Chaplain, Director of Campus Ministry, and Adjunct Instructor of Theology, Quincy University, Quincy, Illinois, with residence at St. Francis Solanus Parish; and Associate Vocation Director, Quincy Deanery