Hands at the Our Father
Date: November 15, 2026
Author: Fr. Edward McNamara, LC
Question: In India, it is common to observe many of the faithful, and even concelebrating priests, extending their hands during the Our Father at Mass. However, it is my understanding that the gesture of extending hands (orans posture) is prescribed only for the principal celebrant, as indicated in the Missal: “He extends his hands and, together with the people, continues.” In this context, what is the appropriate posture or gesture for concelebrants and for the faithful during the Our Father? Furthermore, do bishops’ conferences or the local ordinary have the authority to determine or regulate such gestures? In the absence of explicit directives, is it permissible for the faithful to adopt gestures of their own choosing during this prayer? — G.C., Bengaluru, India
Question: Why is it that it is only about three or four years ago that we have been told that we should not extend our hands while praying together the Our Father? Our former parish priest used to invite us to "take each other by the hand," and we would pray like that as a family. — M.S.G., Puebla, Mexico
Answer: The Church's universal law says nothing with respect to the faithful adopting such postures during the Our Father. However, it is mandated in the rubrics that the priest and the concelebrants pray the Our Father "Hands extended.”
Therefore, our correspondent from India is mistaken in thinking that this gesture is not permitted to concelebrants; indeed, the opposite is true.
With respect to the faithful nothing is indicated. A sound interpretation of liturgical law would usually conclude that if nothing is indicated, nothing is foreseen, and hence it does not mean that any gesture may be introduced, but rather that no gesture is foreseen.
At the same time, the General Instruction of the Roman Missal does grant the national bishops' conference permission to propose adaptations in some cases:
“395. Finally, if the participation of the faithful and their spiritual welfare require variations and profounder adaptations in order for the sacred celebration to correspond with the culture and traditions of the different nations, then Conferences of Bishops may propose these to the Apostolic See in accordance with article 40 of the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy for introduction with the Apostolic See’s consent, especially in the case of nations to whom the Gospel has been more recently proclaimed. The special norms handed down by means of the Instruction on the Roman Liturgy and Inculturation should be attentively observed.
“As regards the procedures in this matter, these should be observed: Firstly, a detailed preliminary proposal should be set before the Apostolic See, so that, after the necessary faculty has been granted, the detailed working out of the individual points of adaptation may proceed. Once these proposals have been duly approved by the Apostolic See, experiments should be carried out for specified periods and at specified places. When the period of experimentation is concluded, the Conference of Bishops shall decide, if the case requires, upon pursuing the adaptations and shall submit a mature formulation of the matter to the judgment of the Apostolic See.
“396. However, before proceeding to new adaptations, especially profounder ones, great care shall be taken to promote due instruction of the clergy and the faithful in a wise and orderly manner, so as to take advantage of the faculties already foreseen and to apply fully the pastoral norms in keeping with the spirit of the celebration.”
In the light of these faculties, and before the introduction of the first Italian version of the new missal, the Italian bishops deliberated and voted to request from the Holy See the faculty to allow the people to adopt the orantes posture of hands extended during the Our Father. The Holy See granted the permission, which was thereby included in the norms of the missal as an optional gesture.
In 2002 the U.S. bishops' conference debated a proposal by some bishops to allow the use of the orantes posture while discussing the "American Adaptations to the General Instruction to the Roman Missal."
Some bishops even argued that it was the best way of ridding the country of the practice of holding hands which had begun to spread in some communities without any official approval. The proposal failed to garner the required two-thirds majority of votes, however, and was dropped from the agenda.
In 2023 the Philippine bishops issued a circular letter that permitted both raising the hands and holding hands where it was already an established custom. However, it did not encourage the introduction of either practice in other locations; as well the letter insisted that nobody should feel themselves forced to adopt these practices, which remain completely voluntary.
Unlike the Italian bishops, the Philippine prelates did not seek specific permission from the Holy See, perhaps reasoning that they were addressing and regulating a reality that already existed with at least 30 years of continual use rather than permitting a liturgical novelty as was the case in Italy.
When the Italian bishops voted to permit the orantes posture for the Our Father in the liturgy, they understood they were introducing something new to the liturgy. The reasoning behind this novelty could well be the perception that the Lord’s Prayer had assumed a new role within the liturgy as a prayer of the whole assembly.
The previous practice was that the priest would usually recite the Our Father alone in a low voice except for the last line, "And deliver us from evil." On some occasions the rubrics permitted to have it sung by the whole assembly in Latin, but these were not widely used.
I am unaware whether other bishops' conferences have adopted official positions on these two customs. But the practice, especially with respect to raising the hands, is very widespread all over the world.
As regards the orantes posture, that is, praying like the priest, with hands extended, during the Our Father, we offer the following considerations:
The Our Father is the prayer of the entire assembly and not a priestly or presidential prayer. In fact, it is perhaps the only case when the rubrics direct the priest to pray with arms extended in a prayer that he does not say alone or only with other priests. Therefore, in the case of the Our Father, the orantes posture expresses the prayer directed to God by his children. Consequentially, this gesture is not a case of the laity trying to usurp priestly functions.
We can also take into account that the orantes posture is as old as Christianity; it is depicted in the catacombs and has always been preserved in the Eastern rites. It was not reserved to the priest until after several centuries in the Latin rite — and even then, not everywhere.
Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, the future Pope Benedict XVI, in his book The Spirit of the Liturgy deemed this posture “the oldest gesture of prayer in Christendom.” He continues: “It is also a gesture of seeking and hoping. Man reaches out to the hidden God, stretches out toward him. Arms extended have been compared to wings: man seeks the heights, he wants to be, as it were, carried upward by God on the wings of payer. But for Christians, arms extended also have a Christological meaning. They remind us of the extended arms of Christ on the Cross.”
For this reason, I personally do not consider that the faithful being allowed to voluntarily adopt the orantes posture during the Our Father is particularly problematic.
I am less enthusiastic regarding the practice of holding hands.
One could argue that holding hands expresses the family union of the Church. But our singing or reciting the prayer in unison already expresses this element.
The use of this practice during the Our Father could detract and distract from the prayer's God-directed sense of adoration and petition, as explained in Nos. 2777-2865 of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, in favor of a more horizontal and merely human meaning.
In fact, the gesture might be seen as anticipating and, in some way, devaluating the Sign of Peace.
Indeed, in 1975 the Congregation for Divine Worship addressed this possibility in answering the following doubt:
“Whether the practice can be admitted which occurs here and there in which those participating at Mass, instead of expressing peace to each other at the invitation of the deacon, hold hands while the Lord’s Prayer is sung?
“R. Holding hands has for a long time been on its own a sign of communion rather than of peace. Moreover, it is a liturgical gesture introduced spontaneously, though on private initiative: It is not found in the rubrics. Nor can it be understood by what reason the gesture of peace at the invitation ‘let us offer each other the sign of peace’ should be suppressed, which has such great significance, grace and Christian character, in order that another sign of lesser significance may be introduced at another time during the Mass. For this reason, if it is a matter of substitution, this must simply be rejected. Notitiae 11 (1975) 226.”
We must also recall that the recitation of the Our Father and the display of the Sign of Peace are primarily orientated toward preparing for the reception of Communion. The peace we share is not principally the bonds of social harmony but the peace that we receive from sharing the fruit of the sacrifice of the altar. It is through Christ and his holy sacrifice that we become ever more able to address God as our common Father and are bound together in his family the Church.
Finally, after the Covid epidemic, everybody is much more aware of the dangers inherent in certain kinds of physical contact, especially in flu season.
Reasons like these are the probable motives why Church authorities have repeatedly stressed that nobody should ever feel obliged or forced to participate in this gesture. No one should have any qualms about not participating if disinclined to do so.
They will be simply following the universal customs of the Church and should not be accused of causing disharmony.
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