Question One: On Adoration

S. Th. II-II, q. 84.

681. Adoration etymologically is the action of one moving his hand to his mouth, or kissing the hand, as a sign of reverence and worship (Job XXXI, 27; III Reg. XIX, 18), and therefore in a broad and less proper sense it is taken for the external act by which worship and honor is shown to any superior, angel, saint, or prince, in protestation of our submission (Jos. V, 15; Apoc. XIX, 10; XXII, 8; Gen. XVIII; IV Reg. II, 15; Gen. XLIII, 26; XXIII; III Reg. I, 16). - In the theological sense adoration {aanbidding} is the reverence to be rendered to God alone, and it is taken generally for every act of latria; and specially for the formal testification of the divine excellence and of our submission. This is an act of religion; the former is an act of dulia, namely, of reverence owed to an excellent creature; nevertheless it would be an act of latria if in an angel or saint someone adored God who appears or speaks in his person (a. 1).

682. Internal and external adoration. - Religious adoration is twofold: internal, which is made by the mental signification of submission, and is the same as devotion; this also is found in the angels; external, which is the external testification of submission to God through an act or movement of the body. This is adoration strictly so called (Esther XIII, 14; Lk. IV, 8). Moreover, it is made in various ways: by prostration, genuflection, inclination, joining or extending of the hands, lifting of the eyes, etc.

Internal adoration can exist without external, but not conversely, because God is not worshiped without the intention of worshiping; moreover, he does not intend to worship God who, internally unwilling to submit himself to God, externally feigns that he submits himself. Therefore external adoration 1. is a sign of the internal; 2. is its effect, because a fervent affection toward God spontaneously and naturally breaks forth into acts of external reverence; 3. is at the same time its cause, for external reverence provokes the internal and adds fervor to it (a. 2).

683. Internal adoration does not require a determinate place, but external adoration does: 1. on account of the consecration of the place, from which those praying conceive a special devotion so that they may be heard more; 2. on account of the sacred mysteries and other signs of sanctity which are contained there; 3. on account of the coming together of many adorers, from which we are incited to pray better, and prayer becomes more capable of being heard (a. 3).

684. The observance of feasts* contains several acts of religion; yet because it was instituted for the social exercise of religion, it pertains essentially to the worship of external adoration; moreover, the very cessation from bodily works is already a certain (negative) handing over of the body to divine things. Hence the consideration of the observance of feasts is rightly joined to the doctrine on adoration.