Communion Service

[Safe_Eagle]

Hello everyone,

This morning the Priest couldn’t make it for mass and we had a communion service.

1st question: Who can preside in these services Lay/Deacon or both?

2nd question: Can a female preside?

Thanks in advance for your responses.

 

[Br.Rich_SFO]

Hello everyone,

This morning the Priest couldn’t make it for mass and we had a communion service.

1st question: Who can preside in these services Lay/Deacon or both?

2nd question: Can a female preside?

Thanks in advance for your responses.

A Deacon first if available and then a Male Religious or Female Religious, Male EMHC, Female EMHC.

(leaving out those who most likely are not in most parishes)

 

[G_S]

If a deacon is not available, a lay person may preside if properly trained. However, there are certain things they cannot do. e.g. Say “The Lord be with you” or give a blessing at the end. Also, they are enouraged to divide the parts of the service with another lay person. One lay person could do the readings, another the Communion rite, for example.

 

[John_Lilburne]

Hello everyone,

This morning the Priest couldn’t make it for mass and we had a communion service.

1st question: Who can preside in these services Lay/Deacon or both?

2nd question: Can a female preside?

Thanks in advance for your responses.

A lay person can lead a Communion Service if the lay person is an Extraordinary Minister of Holy Communion (EMHC).

The 2004 Instruction Redemptionis Sacramentum includes this challenging idea about Sunday Communion Services: “[165] … It will be preferable, moreover, when both a Priest and a Deacon are absent, that the various parts be distributed among several faithful rather than having a single lay member of the faithful direct the whole celebration alone. Nor is it ever appropriate to refer to any member of the lay faithful as “presiding” over the celebration.”

I find this challenging because there is no suggestion of this team approach in the liturgical book “Holy Communion and the Worship of the Eucharist Outside of Mass”. Nor was there a problem with the term “presiding” before this 2004 Instruction. The change seems to be motivated by an attempt to “avoid any sort of confusion between this type of gathering and the celebration of the Eucharist”.

The liturgical book has: “17. … It is the office of an acolyte who has been properly instituted to give communion as a special minister when the priest and deacon are absent or impeded by sickness, old age, or pastoral ministry or when the number of the faithful at the holy table is so great that the Mass or other service may be unreasonably protracted.
The local Ordinary may give other special ministers the faculty to give communion whenever it seems necessary for the pastoral benefit of the faithful and a priest, deacon, or acolyte is not available.” (Holy Communion and the Worship of the Eucharist Outside of Mass, published by E.J. Dwyer, Sydney, 1975, ISBN 0-85574-401-4, page 9.)

Only men can become instituted acolytes. A bishop can decide not to have other “special ministers” or what are now correctly termed “Extraordinary Ministers of Holy Communion”. So in some places females would not be permitted to distribute Holy Communion or lead a Communion Service.