Does the celebrant in your church face the people (ad populum) or face East or towards the church (ad orientem) for the majority of the time?
I'll share my church's story on this because it's kind of funny. We began worshiping versus populum as the vast majority of contemporary Anglican churches do in the US. Then one day our treasurer upgraded our altar cross from a tiny 6 inch tall pewter affair to a two-foot-tall gold-colored table cross. When placed on the table it was about the same height as our interim vicar's face, so he shoved the table against the wall and celebrated ad orientem from then on. When I was ordained, I happily continued that practice, and have enjoyed it ever since. I'm pretty sure ours is the only church in our diocese that regularly worships this way (apart from side-chapel weekday services here and there), and I've come to appreciate it greatly. All it took was a cross too big, a thirty-second explanation from the priest, and everyone went with it. No complaints, no scandal, no big deal! So if you're in a versus populum church and want to try another orientation, just try it! Chances are it won't be a big deal to anyone.
I don't mind ad populum, or as it referred to in these parts - the westward position - and in some sense it does speak of the gathering around the table of the Lord. There are however times when ad orientem - the eastward position - has a beauty and a dignity and one of the things I especially like about it is priest and people are looking in the same direction. In the end I favour a bit of each, for one clearly underlines the transcendence of God and the other the immanence, and in the end I believe it is important for us to retain both, and perhaps in the words of Sir Basil Spence, something of the dialogue between transcendence and immanence.
I was trained to celebrate Ad Orientem, which is the norm in the diocese. One interesting tell-tale sign of practice and churchmanship is whether a parish has an altar or communion table. Those who have a communion table will tend to face the people and those with an altar will tend to face East. Although, in my area, a number of old TEC parishes (and we have many of them) have taken an old altar, torn off the retable, and set it up functionally as a communion table.
I believe it is one of those things that has gone back and forth with time, as so much of Anglican ceremonial has. And, there was a third option for a long time: the table would be turned 90 degrees, moved out into the choir as I understand it, and the celebrant would say Holy Communion from the "North End." This was always an indication of a particular form of low churchmanship. Also, Holy Communion was quite infrequent, particularly in country churches for much of the history of Anglicanism. It was probably something most people did not think much about, as I suspect the average congregant still does not.
I don't think there has ever been a documented case of An Anglican liturgy being done "versus populum", until the 1960s. It simply goes against every intuition of the Anglican ceremonial. I do know the Puritans strongly tried to push for the introduction of Versus Populum, first in the ritual controversy of the 1570s and then at the Hampton Court in 1604, but the Anglican establishment quite univocally rejected these heinous proposals. Of course now it's crept in quite a bit. The biggest enemy for the Anglican ceremonial was not the push from within, but the gargantuan impact from the Roman church after Vatican 2. When they went full-hog on embracing Versus Populum in the 1960s, and pretty much universally enforced it across their what, 500 million (now 1+ billion) church members, the impression was so strong, that it infected the Anglican ceremonial, and we have not recovered since then.
I did some research on "North end" celebration at one point and even though it was not versus populum as we envision it now, the effect of the classic manner of conducting that celebration was the same, in that the people were able to see what the priest was doing the whole time. Here's a bare-bones overview: https://theoldhighchurchman.blogspot.com/2016/02/the-view-from-north-end.html http://anglicanhistory.org/grafton/plain/plain6.html It didn't occur to me earlier but the Orthodox and various Eastern rites of Catholicism celebrate facing East at free standing altars. I find this to be an interesting point to add to the conversation. A westerner, upon seeing a free standing altar, would typically expect a versus populum celebration.
In the CofE, facing east (ad orientam) to celebrate HC was one of the major complaints raised against the Ritualists in the latter part of the 19th century - it concealed the manual acts. The 1662 Prayer Book rubrics say that at the time of HC the Table may stand in the body of the church or in the chancel. The curate in my neighbouring parish (until recently moved) used to North End at mid week HC's wearing cassock, surplice and tippett. Sundays would be versus populum and wearing Eucharistic Vestments.
I know the north and the east end went back and forth in some circles. I'm talking about versus populum, which was never accepted or allowed. That's a surprisingly secular attitude. The point of ad orientem was not, and is never supposed to be about hiding anything from the people. The whole point is about access and mediation to God, on the part of the people. In the north and the east, the priest mediates through the altar and the liturgy. And on the behalf of the priest, it is a question of leadership. Does the priest lead the people to an invisible reality all together, or is there no invisible reality and everyone is just facing each other. The very reason that the north facing was instituted was to minimize the resistance of the the radical puritans, while not giving in to them that the priest could be allowed to face them. It is a HUGE difference. By reducing it to hiding or not hiding from the people you're taking an oddly secular viewpoint.
OK. Let me just blurt this out. I have never liked North End Celebrations. It seems to suggest the Eucharistic action is the Churches sideshow, not the main attraction. I have always thought it was basically just a bit odd. Ad Populum has become very popular since the 2nd vatican council. Whilst it ostensibly conveys the notion of immanence and the community of faith gathered, it can be poorly executed. On the one hand one can be left with the feeling that it is a performance, and on the other hand it can be used to (from an Anglican perspective) overstate the sense of the priest as in persona Christi. I heard of one priest complaining that the people didn't look at him when he was celebrating. Ad Orientem can be tizzy and distracting, however I really appreciate the idea of priest and people being united in focus on that which is beyond and breaks through into our midst. There is the sense in which we are all called together to look to calvary and beyond, and to encounter the one who said 'do this as my anamnesis'. I personally think there is some value in both orientations and really so no problem with being prepared to engage in the liturgy both ways (though not at the same time!).
Answer to the post question: = Both. Our chancel altar has enough space behind it for the priest to face west. Our Lady Chapel altar has no space behind it and little in front between it and the altar rail, so the priest has no option but to face east. .
Ad orientem; not about the Priest, it's about Christ. He is part of the congregation, just acting on its behalf. He ought stand with them, not against them, and also face East.
There's no 'ought to' about this though, because direction of facing by the priest can be interpreted in a multitude of ways, decided by whoever you like. Facing east could be seen as the priest representing an officer at the head of his troop facing senior officers on the dais on parade before God. But in reality a 'Priest' does not function as military officer in command of troops, and a worshipping community of believers are not 'fighting' against flesh and blood, but against the spiritual powers of this present age, using spiritual gifts, and the grace of God. Facing west can be seen as being one of the congregation sharing communion round the table, as at the last supper. Christ did not have his back to everybody else when he said, "This is my body". "This is my blood". It was at a low table, for sharing a meal, facing those who he addressed, not at an altar for killing a victim as an offering to God, with his back to the entrance of the sanctuary and the people outside, that these words were spoken. These are the reasons that there IS no right or wrong way of facing or not facing, in any particular direction. Whichever way the priest faces can be made to be representative of SOMETHING in SOMEONE'S mind, so there can be no way which would be either RIGHT or WRONG. It's all just 'ceremonial' convention, not right or wrong praxis. Either way's perfectly OK. Perhaps we should do it turn and turn about each week or even include celebrating from the North side sometimes with the TABLE in the aisle, to try to satisfy EVERBODY's quirky superstitious demands. .
Facing the people. (Which way are the people)? OR Facing God? Q. Which WAY do you actually think GOD is then? Since God is actually omnipresent the thread question is actually nonsensical, isn't it? .
You do not seem to like Mediaeval practice very much. I'm a Mediaevalist and I believe the Church is contingent upon prior practice. There are 'oughts' unless you dislike doctrine.
I can't think how anyone who knows what doctrine is could think the direction that a priest should face when HE says certain words, could be in any way, a matter of 'DOCTRINE'. Could you give me a theological reason, based upon what is contained anywhere in the scriptures, why a priest should face in a certain direction or particular point of the compass, when reciting the prayer of consecration? You could astonish me if you are able to. Can you offer any satisfactory reason why it might be thought essential that a priest should face in the direction that most did in Medieval times in order to be doing it all 'correctly' ? They did a lot of things back then thinking it was essentially the right thing to do, just because someomeone senior to them had told them they must do it that way, but in fact did it merely out of tradition habit or ignorance rather than out of a better understanding of theology and worshipful praxis, than has the 21st century church. What would be the correct direction of facing in a completely circular building with the Lord's Table at the centre? Church buildings can be any shape. Correctly facing as one ought to, to achieve what? If a priest is not correctly oriented, what might have failed to be achieved. What, in your estimation, might result, from a priest in the Church of England failing to face East when reciting 1 Cor.11:23-25, from the scriptures? Which way was Jesus Christ facing, when HE said those words, just before his death? If we actually knew, would it matter? .