A Lutheran explains the importance of preaching the reality of Christ at Mass

If you haven’t got the faith, it doesn’t mean a thing.

[W]hen Christ is not proclaimed as the One who sits on the altar—whose true body and blood that were offered to God for the sin of the world are given to the Church for the remission of sins—when this reality is not understood or clearly confessed, then there is nothing left but window dressing and show.

Why concern yourself with paraments and vestments, or with liturgical propriety and rubrics, if the reason for all this is missing? Gottesdienst [a Lutheran movement and
organization] aims to provide a defense for the liturgy by confessing in no uncertain terms what the liturgy is for.

We don’t genuflect, or make the sign of the cross, or bow, just because it’s the faddish thing to do, or because we happen to think it would be stylish to look Catholic. We do…