Liturgy General

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Religious services in the Middle Ages were held quietly and in Latin. A Middle Age mass differed from today’s in its language, approach and the relationship between the priest and the congregation.
People stood or moved around, while the priest conducted the liturgy alone, without acolytes or sermons and without Communion. He stood with his back to the congregation, facing the main altar at a distance from the faithful. The sermon was held quite apart from the mass in keeping with a special rite and in between services of worship. Holy Communion (the Eucharist) was available to the common folk only at Christmas and Easter.
The inaccessibility of the sacred ritual, along with disgust at the state of the Church, later led to the revolutionary Hussite reform movement, which opened up both the mass and the Eucharist rites to the wider populace.

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