Adoration

In the strict sense, an act of religion offered to God in acknowledgment of His

supreme perfection and dominion, and of the creature's dependence upon Him; in

a looser sense, the reverence shown to any person or object possessing,

inherently or by association, a sacred character or a high degree of moral

excellence. The rational creature, looking up to God, whom reason and revelation

show to be infinitely perfect, cannot in right and justice maintain an attitude of

indifference. That perfection which is infinite in itself and the source and fulfilment

of all the good that we possess or shall possess, we must worship,

acknowledging its immensity, and submiting to its supremacy. This worship

called forth by God, and given exclusively to Him as God, is designated by the

Greek name latreia (latinized, latria), for which the best translation that our

language affords is the word Adoration. Adoration differs from other acts of

worship, such as supplication, confession of sin, etc., inasmuch as it formally

consists in self-abasement before the Infinite, and in devout recognition of His

transcendent excellence. An admirable example of adoration is given in the

Apocalypse vii 11, 12: "And all the angels stood rouud about the throne, and

about the ancients, and about the living creatures; and they fell before the throne

upon their faces, and adored God, saying: Amen. Beneditiction and glory, and

wisdom, and thanksgiving, honour, and power, and strength to our God. forever

and ever. Amen." The revealed precept to adore god was spoken to Moses upon

Sinai and reaffirmed in the words of Christ: "The Lord thy God thou shalt adore,

and Him only shalt thou serve" (Matt, iv, 10).

The primary and fundamental element in adoration is an interioract of mind and

will; the mind perceiving that God's perfection is infinite, the will bidding us to

extol and worship this perfection. Without some measure of this interior adoration

"ion spirit and in truth" it is evident that anyt outward show of divine worship

would be mear pnatomime and falsehood. But equally evident is that the

adoration felt within will seek outward expression. Human nature demands

physical utterance of some sort for its spiritual and emotional moods; and it is to

this instinct for self-expression that our whole apparatus of speech and gesture is

due. To Suppress this instinct in religion would be as unreasonable as to repress

it in any other province of our experience. Moreover, it would do religious grievous

harm to check its tendency to outward manifestation, since the external

expression reacts upon the interior sentiment, quickening, strengthening, and

sustaining it. As St Thomas teaches: "it is connatural for us to pass from the

physical signs to the spiritual basis upon which they rest" (Summa II-II:48:2). It is

to be expected, then, that men should have agreed upon certain conventional

actions as expressing adoration of the Supreme Being. Of these actions, one

has pre-eminently and exclusivly signified adoration, and that is sacrifice. Other

acts have been widely used for the same purpose, but most of of them --

sacrifice always excepted -- have not been exclusively reserved for Divine

worship; they have also been employed to manifest friendship, or reverence for

high personages. Thus Abram "fell flat on his face" before the Lord (Gen, xvii, 3).

This was clearly an act of adoration in its highest sense; yet that it could have

other meaning, we know from, e. g., I Kings, xx, 41, which says that David

adored "falling on his face to the ground" before Jonathan, who had come to warn

him of Saul's hatred. In like manner Gen xxxi;; 3 narrates tbat Jacob, on meeting

his brother Esau "bowed down with he face to the ground seven times". We read

of other forms of adoration among the Hebrews, such as taking off the shoes

(Exod. iii, 5), bowing (Gen. xxiv, 26), and we are told that the contrite publican

stood when he prayed, and that St Paul knelt when he worshipped with the

elders of Ephesus. Among the early Christians it was common to adore God,

standing with outstretched arms and facing the east. Finally, we ought perhaps

to mention the act of pagan adoration which seems to contain the etymological

explanation of our word adoration. The word adoratio very probably originated

from the phrase (manum) ad os (mittere), which designated the act of kissing the

hand to the statue of the god one wished to honour. Concerning the verbal

manifestation of adoration -- that is, the prayer of praise - explanation is not

necessary. The connection between our inner feelings and their articulate

utterance is obvious.

Thus far we have spoken of the worship given directly to God as the infinitely

perfect Being. It is clear that adoration in this sense can be offered to no finite

object. Still, the impulse that leads us to worship God's perfection in itself will

move us also to venerate the traces and bestowals of that perfection as it

appears conspicuously in saintly men and women. Even to inanimate objects,

which for one reason or another strikingly recall the excellence, majesty, love, or

mercy of God, we naturally pay some measure of reverence. The goodness

which these creatures possess by participation or association is a reflection of

God's goodness; by honouring them in the proper way we offer tribute to the

Giver of all good. He is the ultimate end of our worship in such cases as He is

the source of the derived perfection which called it forth. But, as was intimated

above, whenever the immediate object of our veneration is a creature of this sort,

the mode of worship which we exhibit towards it is fundamentally different from

the worship which belongs to God alone. Latria, as we have already said, is the

name of this latter worship; and for the secondary kind, evoked by saints or

angels, we use the term dulia. The Blessed Virgin, as manifesting in a sublimer

manner than any other creature the goodness of God, deserves from us a higher

recognition and deeper veneration than any other of the saints; and this peculiar

cultus due to her because of her unique position in the Divine economy, is

designated in theology hyperdulia, that is dulia in an eminent degree. It is

unfortunate that neither our own language nor the Latin possesses in its

terminology the precision of the Greek. The word latria is never applied in any

other sense than that of the incommunicable adoration which is due to God

alone. But in English the words adore and worship are still sometimes used, and

in the past were commonly so used, to mean also inferior species of religious

veneration and even to express admiration or affection for persons living upon the

earth. So David "adored" Jonathan. In like manner Miphiboseth "fell on his face

and worshipped" David (II Kings, ix, 6). Tennyson says that Enid in her true

heart, adored the queen. Those who perforce adopted these modes of expression

understood perfectly well what was meant by them and were in no danger of

thereby encroaching upon the rights of the Divinity. It is hardly needful to remark

that Catholics, too, even the most unlearned, are in no peril of confounding the

adoration due to God with the religious honour given to any finite creature even

when the word worship, owing to the poverty of our language, is applied to both.

The Seventh General Council, in 757, puts the natter in a few words when it says

that "true latria is to be given to God alone"; and the Council of Trent (Sess. XXV)

makes clear the difference between invocation of saints and idolatry.

A few words may be added in conclusion on the offences which conflict with the

adoration of God. They may be summed up under three categories:

worship offered to false gods;

worship offered to the true God, but in a false, unworthy and scandalous

manner; and

blasphemy.

The first class comprises sins of idolatry. The second class embraces sins of

superstition. These may take manifold forms, to be treated under separate titles.

Suffice it to say that vain observances which neglect the essential thing in the

worship of God and make much of purely accidental features or which bring it

into contempt through fantastic and puerile excesses, are emphatically

repudiated in Catholic theology. Honouring, or pretending to honour, God by

mystic numbers or magical phrases, as though adoration consisted chiefly in the

number or the physical utterance of the phrases, belongs to the Jewish Cabbala

or pagan mythology, not to the worship of the Most High. (see BLASPHEMY;

IDOLATRY; MARY; SAINTS; WORSHIP.)

William Sullivan

Transcribed by Michael C. Tinkler

The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume I

Nihil Obstat, March 1, 1907. Remy Lafort, S.T.D., Censor

Imprimatur. +John Cardinal Farley, Archbishop of New York

The Catholic Encyclopedia: NewAdvent.org