Do You Prefer Whole Wheat Hosts or White Hosts?

  • Thread starter Thread starter bben15
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
MorEphrem said:
I’ve seen several posters mention they prefer white hosts because they dissolve easily; aren’t hosts suppose to be chewed :confused:. Didn’t Christ give the directive to gnaw on his flesh? And I thought the host common to the post-conciliar Latin Church was larger for the purpose of encouraging people to chew it as opposed to just letting it melt and then be swallowed.
Click to expand...
It seems that many people were taught not to chew. And from I’ve gathered in this forum and elsewhere, the idea was strongly enforced. Why that is I’ve no idea. It certainly wasn’t my experience. 🤷

Anyway, yes, in the past 40-some years, the small host is usually slightly larger than before, but not substantially so. It’s also a bit thicker, so that they don’t dissolve quite so readily. But it will “melt” if left in the mouth unchewed. 😉
 
malphono said:
It seems that many people were taught not to chew. And from I’ve gathered in this forum and elsewhere, the idea was strongly enforced. Why that is I’ve no idea. It certainly wasn’t my experience. 🤷
Click to expand...
It wasn’t just the nuns either. I made my First Communion in the U.K. and it was enforced there even more than in the U.S.
 
I have no preference whatsoever what kind of wheat is used in the Blessed Sacrament. It is not a snack. It is the body, soul, and divinity of Jesus Christ Our Lord – and it should be treated with great reverence, not as a joke. Call me humorless.
 
njlisa said:
I have no preference whatsoever what kind of wheat is used in the Blessed Sacrament. It is not a snack. It is the body, soul, and divinity of Jesus Christ Our Lord – and it should be treated with great reverence, not as a joke. Call me humorless.
Click to expand...
I do not think the Eucharist is a joke, and I apologize if I implied otherwise. If you will examine post #56, you will know why I posted this poll. 🙂
 
Beryllos said:
Yeah, but I think whole wheat has more body. 😉
Click to expand...
LOL! I agree. I went to a different church for the Assumption last night, and was able to determine that they were using white hosts as opposed to what I believe to be whole wheat of some sort at my home parish.

I don’t know which I prefer - sometimes the whole wheat ones taste a little off, but that might have more to do with the humidity than the type of host.

That said, it doesn’t really matter. I think I do prefer the hosts that dissolve quicker because I don’t like it when I get some stuck to/in between my teeth - it just makes me uneasy. I feel like I have Jesus stuck between my teeth and it feels wrong. Then again, as someone mentioned about gnawing on the body of Christ …
 
bben15 said:
I do not think the Eucharist is a joke, and I apologize if I implied otherwise. If you will examine post #56, you will know why I posted this poll. 🙂
Click to expand...
I didn’t think you were making a joke of it. I’m sorry you thought I was accusing you.
 
It wouldn’t hurt to have a bit of fibre when receiving Jesus. After all, it’s important that we eat healthy, right? 😉
 
malphono said:
It seems that many people were taught not to chew. And from I’ve gathered in this forum and elsewhere, the idea was strongly enforced.
Click to expand...
Oh my yes. In fact, we were taught not to even let the host touch our teeth!
 
Urn said:
So there is no official rule? Kuzma was free to create such a rule when he was the bishop of the eparchy (I suppose) specifically for his eparchy, but not only is it no longer in effect (Phoenix has no such rule) he never had the authority to place such a rule on ALL Byzantine Catholics. Not by a long shot.
Click to expand...
Holy Tradition tells us we use only White Flour…no Whole Wheat…so now it is OK to throw out tradition. Nice.
 
The only question my Polish in-laws have is…
how much butter do you have?
 
MonkMoses said:
Holy Tradition tells us we use only White Flour…no Whole Wheat…so now it is OK to throw out tradition. Nice.
Click to expand...
:ehh: I find that tough to believe, solely because I suspect we had whole-wheat (or similar) long before people thought of bleaching flour.
 
Razanir said:
:ehh: I find that tough to believe, solely because I suspect we had whole-wheat (or similar) long before people thought of bleaching flour.
Click to expand...
Nobody is talking about bleached flour here, whole wheat flour has the bran left in it, white flour has it sifted out.

First, whole wheat flour was never used in the early Church. White flour was always used, since it was more expensive that the brown variety and the loaf was quite literally a sacrifice for those who provided it.
Second, whole wheat flour is merely the same grain as the white, except with the outer shell ground in with the kernel. While this has some nutritional value, you would have to eat a LOT of antidoron to get any value from it!
Third, whole wheat flour is harder to work with. It takes longer to rise and creates less regular bubbling.
Fourth, whole wheat flour makes a harder crust.

Holy tradition tells us to use WHITE flour, at least in the Byzantine Church…I believe this was always the case in the West as well, seems to me that the Whole Wheat hosts only came in during the 1970s.
 
MonkMoses said:
Nobody is talking about bleached flour here, whole wheat flour has the bran left in it, white flour has it sifted out.

First, whole wheat flour was never used in the early Church. White flour was always used, since it was more expensive that the brown variety and the loaf was quite literally a sacrifice for those who provided it.
Second, whole wheat flour is merely the same grain as the white, except with the outer shell ground in with the kernel. While this has some nutritional value, you would have to eat a LOT of antidoron to get any value from it!
Third, whole wheat flour is harder to work with. It takes longer to rise and creates less regular bubbling.
Fourth, whole wheat flour makes a harder crust.

Holy tradition tells us to use WHITE flour, at least in the Byzantine Church…I believe this was always the case in the West as well, seems to me that the Whole Wheat hosts only came in during the 1970s.
Click to expand...
Shows what I get for getting my information of Wikipedia 🤷 Wiki made it sound (to me) like bleached and white flour are the same thing… Mainly because it never actually said what white flour actually is.
 
MonkMoses said:
Third, whole wheat flour is harder to work with. It takes longer to rise and creates less regular bubbling.
Fourth, whole wheat flour makes a harder crust.
Click to expand...
All very true in the context of leavened altar bread. 😉

For Latin-style unleavened hosts, though, I don’t think it makes a lot of difference. Remember that even when it says “whole wheat” it’s usually about 70%-75% white flour, with remaining percentage being whole wheat flour mixed in for texture and color. The higher the percentage of whole wheat flour, the more difficult the dough is to work with (and that applies as well to leavened bread), and a higher percentage could cause technical problems in the baking process.

The Latins also sometimes do these thick, flat loaves that are basically all (or at least a minimum of 50%) whole wheat flour, and which are usually home-baked (literally). There have been a few threads around this forum over the years about this type of thing, but the short story is it’s dreadful. Since it’s unleavened, the texture is unbelievably crumbly, (as in when it’s broken there are crumbs everywhere, similar to what often happens with a bran muffin), and it invariably has a raw taste. Often times it also has alien ingredients, such as honey or molasses or corn syrup, in an attempt to improve the texture. Yeah, it improves the texture, (marginally), but the down side is that it renders the finished product even more unfit for use at the altar. Unfortunately, there are priests who do use it. 🤷
MonkMoses said:
Holy tradition tells us to use WHITE flour, at least in the Byzantine Church…I believe this was always the case in the West as well, seems to me that the Whole Wheat hosts only came in during the 1970s.
Click to expand...
Well, actually it started around 1967, when what I can “son of interim Missal” (aka the pre-Novus Ordo) was introduced.
 
I really don’t care, but if I have to choose I guess the whole wheat since that gives me the chance to gnaw.
 
I can’t vote in the poll, but I prefer altar breads made with bleached, finely-ground wheat. The finely-ground part means that 1) it crumbles less easily than coarser wheats; and 2) I think they dissolve in the mouth faster (I don’t chew the host, and when I receive communion at some parishes I have trouble swallowing the Host because the Host is still fairly stiff like a cracker).

I also like the way bleached altar breads look. Like another poster said, it reminds me of Christ’s divinity/purity/holiness because they are white.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top