Archdiocese Portland

Portland, Oregon welcomes the Lord Jesus Christ, truly present in the Holy Eucharist.

On the Feast of Corpus Christi, over 5,000 Catholics joined Archbishop Alexander Sample, Bishop Peter Smith, and more than 50 priests and deacons in honoring and adoring the Lord Jesus Christ through the streets of Portland, publicly proclaiming the Church’s perennial faith in His Real Presence.

Eamon Duffy’s The Stripping of the Altars, published in 1992, radically reshaped historians’ understanding of the English Reformation. Before Duffy’s landmark study, the prevailing academic consensus held that the late medieval Catholic Church in England was corrupt, spiritually dry, and in terminal decline.

Drawing on parish records, wills and church art, Duffy portrays a vibrant Catholic culture that royal policies dismantled: monasteries suppressed, altars and religious images removed, and church interiors whitewashed...

Read more in the November 2026 issue of our Divine Worship Newsletter: archdpdx.org/news/reassessm…

Please join us in wishing Archbishop Alexander Sample a happy birthday!

Today we give thanks to God for the gift of his life, his faithful leadership, and pastoral care of our local Catholic Church. Please offer a prayer today for our dear Archbishop’s intentions!

Our Office of Divine Worship explains why the faithful should refrain from extending their hands during the Our Father at Mass:

"Further, the Second Vatican Council’s Constitution on Sacred Liturgy, Sacrosanctum Concilium, states that “no other person, even if he be a priest, may add, remove, or change anything in the liturgy on his own authority.” (SC 22.3) Since the GIRM is very specific that the priest is instructed by the GIRM (152) to extend his hands when he prays the Lord’s Prayer, for the deacons or the laity to extend their hands would be adding to the liturgy. Therefore, the practice of the lay faithful extending their hands (or holding hands) during the Our Father should not be done."

Read more: archdpdx.org/news/divine-wo…