A Vatican group has produced a new document, with the Pope's backing which has urged those taking part in the hand shaking ritual to do so in a more 'sober manner'.
After nine years of study and consultation, the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Sacraments has told Latinrite bishops around the world that: "if it is foreseen that it will not take place properly, it can be omitted. But when it is used, it must be done with dignity and awareness".
The document says the ritual is "not a liturgical form of 'good morning', but a witness to the Christian belief that true peace is a gift of Christ's death and resurrection".
It's lost its way in recent years, according to Austen Ivereigh, Catholic Voices, speaking on Premier's News Hour, he said: "we've lost the sense of what it does mean, it's become too banal; people are treating it like an opportunity to offer each other a gesture of goodwill."
In 2005, members of the Synod of Bishops on the Eucharist adopted a formal proposition questioning whether the sign of peace might be better placed elsewhere in the Mass, for example at the end of the prayer of the faithful and before the offering of the gifts.
Austen Ivereigh, Catholic Voices: