It also facilitates the distribution of communion.
Indeed; I certainly remember a time back in the Latin Mass prior to the Novus Ordo kneeling at the Communion/Altar Rail with the larger Corporal type draped cloth held by the laity and assisted by the Acolytes/Altar boys so that any unseen consecrated crumbs or hosts falling off the Altar boy’s Communion Paten would be safely and reverently caught.
Altar Rail newadvent.org/cathen/01356c.htm
Some in the Church believe that many of the liturgical “reforms” following the Second Vatican Council were invented, rather than decreed and are therefore were not in keeping with the intention of the Council Fathers or the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy “Sacrosanctum Concilium”. It is also believed that they detract from the sacred and supernatural nature of the Ordinary Form of the Roman Rite. One of these novelties has been to remove altar rails from churches and insist that the faithful receive the Most Blessed Sacrament while standing. In concert with the other novelties of receiving Holy Communion in the hand and the use of extraordinary ministers of the Eucharist where no pastoral reason exists, an unintentional lessening of respect and reverence towards the Holy Eucharist has developed. Conversely by reintroducing the use of altar rails, and with good catechesis, these unfortunate circumstances may be reversed.
The Communion Altar Rail developed from chancel screens which would screen the view of the sanctuary and also the wall dividing the choir area in basilicas from the rest of the nave. These barriers go back to the earliest times of the Church. They were intended to separate the space of the clergy from that of the laity, to mark better the place of the most holy part of the action and, as a practical issue, probably help to to keep critters (not just the congregation) from wandering into the sanctuary at the wrong time.
For example, in 5th c. N. Africa St. Augustine speaks in a sermon about a railing or barrier in a church in Carthage. Read s. 359B. It would be really something to get a snapshot of a day in ancient Carthage. The 5th c. historian Theodoret in his Ecclesiastical History describes how St. Ambrose forbade the Emperor Theodosius form entering the sanctuary past the rail.
The barrier which fittingly – and with deep symbolic meaning – separates the sanctuary (the place of the priests and of sacrifice) and the nave (the place of the congregation) would come together under the weight of that greater understanding of the nature of the Eucharist which lead to more careful and reverent reception of Holy Communion. It is both practical and symbolic.
The Altar or Communion rail was not merely to facilitate the reception of Holy Communion to keeling communicants (which is a practice devoutly to be wished and, please God, will return), but it has the symbolic meaning. I think most if not all people who are against altar rails, if they are not just ignorant, are really just not very clear about the different roles of clergy and laity in the liturgical action.
I am not sure if there was ever a decree of, for example, the Sacred Congregation for Rites which required in churches the construction of altar rails. That said, it strikes me as significant that virtually ever Roman Catholic church built everywhere for centuries had altar rails. Is that by coincidence and custom merely or was their also legislation?
Given the fact that Communion on the tongue of a kneeling communicant is returning to greater prevalence – and I think will become more and more prevalent, it strikes me as highly imprudent and divisive to remove existing altar rails.
