Reactions to the Vatican’s new guidelines on the appropriate way of offering the sign of peace during Mass suggest that the real significance of the document has been misunderstood In a letter dated 12 July 2014, signed by Antonio Cañizares Llovera, the Spanish cardinal who is prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments (CDW) introduced a circular letter to bishops’ conferences entitled “The Ritual Expression of the Gift of Peace at Mass”. According to the letter, this “didactic instruction” was the response to a request by Benedict XVI for a study of the place of the exchange of the sign of peace at Mass – “with a view to improving the understanding and carrying out of this gesture”. Ben