Communion on hand

[JKirkLVNV]

As this is the common practice in our parish and the Eucharist is downplayed at RCIA, as well as in religious education classes, this is pretty much the more common view you will see in my area.

Experience enough of this, talk to enough sisters without habits and dissidents teachings and you will see a common push for communion in the hand as the push for women priests.
-We are all priests and should all be on the altar.-

Spend some time in some of the “Catholic communities” and you will see a whole different understanding that what you are stating as the liberty of receiving in the hand.

If we don’t properly form conciences, then we concede them to the dissident theology which has no problem deforming conciences. If we don’t overly stress truth, lies will prevail.

This is how important it is as we have been way too lax on modernism and the Church has suffered because of it.

In Christ
Scylla

**But a properly formed conscience would never say that a discipline permitted by the Church is evil (you didn’t say that, fine, but someone else in the thread DID). Communion in the hand isn’t a “lie” or a “deception” from Satan. It’s an ancient practice of the Church, like the lay reception of the Chalice. Neither are evil and neither are irreverent. **

**And if a bad “community” or a bad nun or goup thereof receives communion in the hand OR from the Chalice, that doesn’t mean that the orthodox have to refrain from doing so. **

**Also, neither are “modernism!” This is why I urge people to read up on what modernism ACTUALLY IS! **

 

[scylla]

So what is the proper understanding of modernism?
Maybe I have an improper understanding, has the understanding of modernism changed from this?
newadvent.org/cathen/10415a.htm
Please provide a link.

A person who cares about truth tries to best represent it in his or her actions. This is reflected in the actions of those who dissent from Catholic belief and from those who adhere.

Anyone who receives in the hand and has the proper understanding can certainly recieve so without profaning the faith. Unfortunately in parishes such as mine, this also enforces the thinking of those who dissent from the faith and encourages practice that reflects their hijacking of the Catholic faith.

So when people in RCIA at my Church learn that there is a symbolic Jesus in the Eucharist, we are all priests; that is why we can all receive in the hand. This helps them continue this heterodox belief.

This would not be a problem if we weren’t infected with this type thinking, and we probably wouldn’t be having this discussion.

In Christ
Scylla

 

[MrS]

Firstly because touch (of the hand specifically) is an incredibly important sense ( true… yet even St Thomas prefered to utter My Lord and My God instead of touching his Master) and an important way of communicating intimately with someone. Would you be nearly as close to your spouse, parents, friends, siblings or children if you never held their hand, stroked their hair or patted them on the head or the back?

Secondly because gifts are normally received in the hand - and with good reason! With receiving on the tongue the contact is immediate but also brief, like being given an unwrapped and already opened present. (the Gift of all Gifts… compared to a present…??:banghead: ) Receiving in the hand is like the excitement of getting to open the wrapping and the container and THEN savour the gift.

gee… I almost expect you to be one of those who hold the Host up themselves, and perhaps want to take Him back to the pew for awhile.

If someone invites you to a thanksgiving dinner, be sure to use your hands to accept their gift of dinner. :banghead:

Why opt for less reverence, when you can opt for more ??

 

[JKirkLVNV]

So what is the proper understanding of modernism?
Maybe I have an improper understanding, has the understanding of modernism changed from this?
newadvent.org/cathen/10415a.htm
Please provide a link.

A person who cares about truth tries to best represent it in his or her actions. This is reflected in the actions of those who dissent from Catholic belief and from those who adhere.

Anyone who receives in the hand and has the proper understanding can certainly recieve so without profaning the faith. Unfortunately in parishes such as mine, this also enforces the thinking of those who dissent from the faith and encourages practice that reflects their hijacking of the Catholic faith.

So when people in RCIA at my Church learn that there is a symbolic Jesus in the Eucharist, we are all priests; that is why we can all receive in the hand. This helps them continue this heterodox belief.

This would not be a problem if we weren’t infected with this type thinking, and we probably wouldn’t be having this discussion.

In Christ
Scylla

That’s the link I normally provide.

The people in your parish need better chatechesis, because what they are being taught is heresy. That has nothing to do with reception in the hand, however, it’s an entirely seperate issue.

 

[JKirkLVNV]

gee… I almost expect you to be one of those who hold the Host up themselves, and perhaps want to take Him back to the pew for awhile.

If someone invites you to a thanksgiving dinner, be sure to use your hands to accept their gift of dinner. :banghead:

Why opt for less reverence, when you can opt for more ??

That’s a subjective opinion. Reception in the hand is not objectively less reverent than reception on the tongue. And AGAIN, why don’t we show the MAXIMUM of reverence and go down the aisle to Communion on our knees. People cross the entire plaze before the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe on their knees.

 

[scylla]

People cross the entire plaze before the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe on their knees.

Most Catholics in the United States would never do that as it would hurt and possible get their clothes dirty. Besides sin has been downplayed so people don’t understand the gravity of their sins these days.

Reception in the hand has a huge amount to do with catechesis as improper catechesis combined with a visual reinforcement leads to propagation of the heretical beliefs. If the actions don’t match the heretical catechesis then there would be a conflict and it would raise questions about what is really true.

In Christ
Scylla

 

[MusicMan]

I think with the way some of us post on CAF, my point may have been proven.

 

[maryalene]

I have GENUINELY tried, as a result of these forums, to receive Holy Communion in a recollected fashion on the tongue. For me, it is an exercise in utter self-consciousness; that is to say, when I receive this way, I’m only conscious of HOW I’m receiving, ie, “am I doing it right” and “I feel odd with my tongue sticking out and my eyes closed,” etc. When I receive in the hand, I’m just focused on WHO I’m receiving. I don’t universalize this by saying that everyone must feel and therefore do as I do, but I’m grateful for the choice.
.

This is why I no longer receive on the tongue either. I did for a while when my kids were younger, and I had to hold them. I tried to continue as they got older. But I found that about half way through Mass, I would begin to get nervous about Communion - going over and over in my mind exactly what to do. It became such a distraction that I decided it was better to be focused on Jesus and receive in the hand. Maybe if I can ever get my anxiety under control, I’ll try reception on the tongue again.

 

[kleary]

You’ve basically violated a provision of the Council of Trent that anathematizes anyone who says that the Church can propose to the faithful any discipline that would lead the faithful into impiety.

Trent was talking about the Tridentine Mass here, not the Novus Ordo and all the changes in rubrics, etc. done after 1965. It still amazes me that some people refer back to what Trent said and apply it even to Communion in the hand and ext. ministers of Holy Communion, something those council fathers would have thought to be high sacrelidge.

If you are going to use that decree as such you can also use the ones that condemns Mass in the vernacular, praying the Roman Canon aloud, and communion under both kinds as well

Ken

 

[kleary]

That would probably be true for about the 60%+ of Catholics who don’t believe in the Real Presence anyway.

60 percent is an innacurate number. The number of Catholics who ATTEND MASS REGULARLY who do not believe in “Transubstantiation” is at a whopping 90 percent.

**90 percent - According to EWTN and Mother Angelica. **I remember that show.

If that number is to change our rubrics have to return to the past to where there WAS NO ROOM FOR DOUBT, no room for a different interpretation. We must bring back kneeling for Holy Communion and on the tongue only with no lay people distributing.

When the Tridentine Mass is free and people will inadvertantly stumble into it some Sundays and be made to kneel and “on the tongue only” and one kind only then maybe doctrine will sink in.

Ken

 

[LilyM]

gee… I almost expect you to be one of those who hold the Host up themselves, and perhaps want to take Him back to the pew for awhile.

Get a grip, I’m not talking about anything of the sort. As for St Thomas - Jesus MADE Thomas touch him, and stick his hands right in those wounds, did he not, to strengthen his belief? And ate with the Apostles and the disciples on the road to Emmaus to reassure them that he was really present (no pun intended)?

If someone invites you to a thanksgiving dinner, be sure to use your hands to accept their gift of dinner. :banghead:

As opposed to you who would expect to be handfed every morsel. And go around the room with a microscope and a suction vacuum afterwards.

God forbid that you should ever leave even microscopic particles anywhere no matter that it’s FOOD and they will happen NO MATTER what you do to try and avoid it :bigyikes:

Why opt for less reverence, when you can opt for more ??

You want maximum reverence, as I said in my previous post, then crawl up the aisle on your hands and knees and never receive more than the once a year you’re required to. That’s the best way to avoid possibly profaning the sacrament.

People used to you know - in fact that once a year had to be mandated because some people literally wouldn’t receive more than once in their lives. Why do you think St Pius X had to do so much to encourage reception of the Eucharist? Christ, through him and his successors, has encouraged frequent reception of the Eucharist because he WANTS to be intimately part of us rather than only adored from a distance like a china doll.

Being part of us, sadly but true, involves sometimes putting up with less than angelic treatment from us. As happened during his earthly life and death too. He’s strong enough to put up with us

 

[LilyM]

60 percent is an innacurate number. The number of Catholics who ATTEND MASS REGULARLY who do not believe in “Transubstantiation” is at a whopping 90 percent.

**90 percent - According to EWTN and Mother Angelica. **I remember that show.

If that number is to change our rubrics have to return to the past to where there WAS NO ROOM FOR DOUBT, no room for a different interpretation. We must bring back kneeling for Holy Communion and on the tongue only with no lay people distributing.

When the Tridentine Mass is free and people will inadvertantly stumble into it some Sundays and be made to kneel and “on the tongue only” and one kind only then maybe doctrine will sink in.

Ken

Do you know for a fact that the number was much different in pre-Vatican 2 days? There have probably been Popes who didn’t believe in the Real Presence, you know, or at least not in transubstantiation. It’s not an easy doctrine and I think plenty of Catholics at all points of history haven’t accepted it.

 

[Gottle_of_Geer]

Well for one they didn’t have nice neatly cut round wafers of bread back then. Maybe they all had to come to a more fuller understanding of things. We see definite progress in the early Church to get away from the in the hand practice. And I do find condemnation of the practice in the early church.

Communion in the hand was never a universal custom or practice in the history of the Church.

But it was still allowed​

Popes St. Sixtus (115-165 A.D.) and St. Euchtyian (275-283 A.D.) both forbade the faithful from receiving communion in the hand;

Those references are historically worthless, since both prohibitions were fathered on them by later writers.​

St. Basil (330-379 A.D.) permitted this practice only in times of persecution; St Leo the Great teaches, “one receives in the mouth what one believes by faith.” Eventually, communion in the hand was forbidden universally because, as Paul VI states, “with the passage of time as the truth of the eucharistic mystery, its power, and Christ’s presence in it were more deeply understood the usage adopted was that the minister himself placed the particle of the consecrated bread on the tongue of the communicant” Memoriale Domini, 8].

Ken

Nonetheless, he allowed communion in the hand. If St. Thomas could be invited to touch the body of Christ - we can touch His Body too. For we are also His Body, & are anointed with His own Spirit. It would be weird if we could not touch that of which we are parts.​

Besides, there is a powerful case *against *receiving on the tongue - see James 3 .

No one is compelling you to receive in the hand - please allow other Catholics the same freedom they do not deny you. There is nothing irreverent in doing so - irreverence is in the heart, before ever it is in our acts. So there is no way to know that those who receive on the tongue are not committing all manner of evils. So perhaps those who are busy looking at what their neighbours do, should attend to their own preparation instead. ##

 

[tassitus]

I am rather new to this forum, and just back into the Church after many, many years away. I am not now able to receive communion, and cherish my one hour a week of Eucharistic Adoration. So perhaps I have a different perspective from those of you able to receive our Lord, daily if you so wish (do you realize what I blessing this is?). What I want to ask all of you is whether THIS TYPE OF BICKERING IS REALLY THE WAY YOU GOOD PEOPLE INTEND TO SPEND YOUR TIME?

Read again the sixth chapter of the gospel of St. John, and then come back here and argue with one another about “tongue” versus “hand”. As if the God-made flesh of our hands is in any way different from the God-made flesh of our tongues! Please accept your preference as just that, your personal preference. And leave others theirs, taking this bit of sage advice:

This is old hash. Please folks be civil and God Bless us

I mean have you ever considered what becomes of the host after even the “most reverent” reception on the tongue? One hour after communion, two hours, three? If this hand/tongue issue was as important as these posts make it out to be, surely we would have had more instruction than that given in 1 Corinthians 11:27-34 (all I could find for now).

And regarding any possible crumbs of the host that are not consumed, Does their existence in any way take away from the glory of our God? Do you imagine our Lord feeling spited, aghast at the fact that particles of Him are loose in the world, HIS WORLD? Who’s to say it is not a joy for Him to be physically present among us, on our hands, our clothing, on the pews of his churches, in the carpeting, the soil outside the Church, carried into our daily lives (and perhaps tracked into the Protestant churches!). If this occurs, in what way does this take away from Him?

May the world be filled with Him, I say. And let’s focus on the issues that matter.

Thanks for letting me rant, and

Peace all.

 

[palmas85]

Do you know for a fact that the number was much different in pre-Vatican 2 days? There have probably been Popes who didn’t believe in the Real Presence, you know, or at least not in transubstantiation. It’s not an easy doctrine and I think plenty of Catholics at all points of history haven’t accepted it.

Heck millions of people didn’t believe in the real presence over the past 2,000 years. Heck maybe hundreds of millions. In fact just about everyone outside of the Catholic and Orthodox faiths didn’t and still doesn’t. The problem is that now we have Catholics that don’t and have no qualms about sayin that they don’t…

Did we always have Catholics that did not, probably. Were they in the numbers they are now, I doubt it. I mean, I never personally knew any until the last 30 years or so, then I started meeting more and more that didn’t and that seemed surprised that I did. You see, many of our post Vatican II catechal programs don’t emphasize that aspect of our faith very much. Why, I don’t know, maybe because it as a doctrine is offensive to our separated brethren and we want to avoid offending them at all costs don’t we?

 

[palmas85]

I am rather new to this forum, and just back into the Church after many, many years away. I am not now able to receive communion, and cherish my one hour a week of Eucharistic Adoration. So perhaps I have a different perspective from those of you able to receive our Lord, daily if you so wish (do you realize what I blessing this is?). What I want to ask all of you is whether THIS TYPE OF BICKERING IS REALLY THE WAY YOU GOOD PEOPLE INTEND TO SPEND YOUR TIME?

Read again the sixth chapter of the gospel of St. John, and then come back here and argue with one another about “tongue” versus “hand”. As if the God-made flesh of our hands is in any way different from the God-made flesh of our tongues! Please accept your preference as just that, your personal preference. And leave others theirs, taking this bit of sage advice:

I mean have you ever considered what becomes of the host after even the “most reverent” reception on the tongue? One hour after communion, two hours, three? If this hand/tongue issue was as important as these posts make it out to be, surely we would have had more instruction than that given in 1 Corinthians 11:27-34 (all I could find for now).

And regarding any possible crumbs of the host that are not consumed, Does their existence in any way take away from the glory of our God? Do you imagine our Lord feeling spited, aghast at the fact that particles of Him are loose in the world, HIS WORLD? Who’s to say it is not a joy for Him to be physically present among us, on our hands, our clothing, on the pews of his churches, in the carpeting, the soil outside the Church, carried into our daily lives (and perhaps tracked into the Protestant churches!). If this occurs, in what way does this take away from Him?

May the world be filled with Him, I say. And let’s focus on the issues that matter.

Thanks for letting me rant, and

Peace all.

Do you feel that a Priest by virtue of the sacrament of Holy Orders is any different than we as the laity? Or is he just another guy? And do you feel that the real presence of the Lord is present in the Eucharist.? Anxiously awaiting your reply.

 

[UKcatholicGuy]

OK, so just when did they become Bishops? At Pentecost? At the Last Supper? Before or after Jesus consecrated the first Eucharist? If they weren’t yet ordained Bishops at the Last Supper, and they received on the hand, then they were lay people handling the Sacrament. And the first one at that.

When did Jesus make them Bishops? If the Church was born on Pentecost, doesn’t it stand to reason that they were ordained at Pentecost?

The Church has always taught that Christ ordained the Apostles at the last supper, when He commanded them to “Do this in memory of Me.” So, that was before they received.

 

[JKirkLVNV]

Trent was talking about the Tridentine Mass here, not the Novus Ordo and all the changes in rubrics, etc. done after 1965. It still amazes me that some people refer back to what Trent said and apply it even to Communion in the hand and ext. ministers of Holy Communion, something those council fathers would have thought to be high sacrelidge.

If you are going to use that decree as such you can also use the ones that condemns Mass in the vernacular, praying the Roman Canon aloud, and communion under both kinds as well

Ken

ABSOLUTELY incorrect! Go back and read the document. You are either not aware of what Trent actually said or you’re deliberately attempting to mislead the faithful.

Trent DIDN’T say that Mass couldn’t be in the vernacular, it condemned the notion that it HAD to be in the vernacular. The Church approved the use of the vernacular in certain locales LONG before Vatican II. Same with the silent canon: Trent didn’t say it COULDN’T be prayed aloud, but rather it condemned the notion that it HAD to be prayed aloud (a discipline the Church is free to modify). It didn’t condemn the notion of Communion in both kinds, but rather that Communion HAD to be in both kinds (all in answer to the Protestants who insisted that it HAD to be that way, which no one here is suggesting).

It’s fine if you wish to believe radical traditionalist fairy tales, but don’t try to pass them off as the teaching of any council of the Church or as truth!

 

[LilyM]

Did we always have Catholics that did not, probably. Were they in the numbers they are now, I doubt it. I mean, I never personally knew any until the last 30 years or so, then I started meeting more and more that didn’t and that seemed surprised that I did. You see, many of our post Vatican II catechal programs don’t emphasize that aspect of our faith very much. Why, I don’t know, maybe because it as a doctrine is offensive to our separated brethren and we want to avoid offending them at all costs don’t we?

You can teach someone and give them a thorough understanding of the Catholic beliefs of Real Presence and transubstantiation - and I have no doubt pre-Vatican 2 they were a lot better schooled.

Does that mean the vast majority or all of them believed what they were taught? My personal experience and what educated guesswork I can do tells me no. Would it stop them receiving without believing in the Real Presence? Again, personal experience and guesswork suggests no.

 

[JKirkLVNV]

The Church has always taught that Christ ordained the Apostles at the last supper, when He commanded them to “Do this in memory of Me.” So, that was before they received.

That still begs the question, if they alone were allowed to hand the Sacred Species, then why was communion in the hand a practice of the early Church? Why did these Apostles, knowing better, allow the laity to receive in the hand?

It’s history that at a certain point in time, the laity began receiving on the tongue. But it wasn’t in apostolic times. It was done by the authority of the Church to govern her sacraments, the same authority that allows her to permit it now.