H
honeyspeak
Guest
While I have already read the posts about fasting before communion in the past few hours, I want to share something that happened to me recently (I have deliberately changed some setting details, but the essentials remain intact).
A few weeks ago, I participated in a chess tournament on Sunday in a Northern city. The rounds for the chess tournament were 9AM and 3PM, and each of these two rounds could have theoretically lasted six hours. I did careful research on Catholic parishes near the tournament site (since I do not drive), and I found a parish within blocks of the hotel that offered a 7:30AM Mass. I wanted to attend Mass first and foremost on Sunday—I did not want to reduce my chances of attending Sunday Mass to a “lucky break” (i.e. the 9AM chess game only lasting fifteen minutes, enabling me to go to Mass and then come back for the 3PM round).
Since my non-believing parents never stop pestering me about my fasting habits, I decided to have breakfast before Mass—a relatively commonplace occurrence for me because I always “do it right” (timing everything safely). I finished breakfast at 7:12AM, and in my churches in my home state, Sunday Masses are always an hour, and I receive communion 55-65 minutes after Mass begins, so 7:30AM Mass plus 55 minutes is 8:25AM. I thought I was in the clear.
What happened next was nothing short of shocking. No songs were sung during the 7:30AM Mass. Non-sung parts to the end of the homily finished by 7:38AM (and the Mass started late). The Mass also omitted the shaking hands part—my first mass ever without shaking hands. And even though I strategically placed myself in the back, I found myself on line at 8:03AM to receive communion. In my home state, daily masses last 20-30 minutes…but the Sunday Mass is never this short!
Now before I go on, I want to share a few words about what I knew of the fasting regulations. Before consulting the posts tonight, everything I know of the fasting regulations comes from “Today’s Missal,” the newspaper-paper paperback book. The inside cover explicitly says (paraphrase) that “a person conscious of grave (mortal) sin is not to receive holy communion.” I understood that. But the inside cover only says that “to be properly disposed…one normally should have fasted for one hour.” The inside cover never explicitly says that it is a mortal sin to partake in communion if you had a fast of under an hour. A Catholic with no other knowledge about fasting regulations (me, in this case, on the aforementioned day) could never surmise it a sin to partake in communion less than an hour after fasting—based on reading Today’s Missal alone.
But in my mind at the time, I was basically thinking that I had to partake of communion (again, at the time, I did not know that while Mass is mandatory for Catholics, partaking in communion is not so, and one can simply receive a blessing). And I knew that if I didn’t partake of communion at the 7:30AM Mass, I would not be able to return to church later in the day because of the abovementioned tournament.
So I took communion, thinking that although this was not ideal, I had no intention of deliberately profaning the Eucharist, and I could very well not be back in church that day. The sticking point is that I did not know it was a sin—mortal or venial—to break the fast in such a way—albeit this was truly accidental and happened outside my control.
After Mass, I wanted to ask the priest a question about this. I was hoping for an assuring answer that I had already formed in my mind—that this happened for reasons outside my control, and that God’s mercy, through grace, triumphs over our weaknesses.
But the priest, clearly in a rush (perhaps because he was holding a heavy bag of tithes), simply motioned me over and laid penance on me—when I was only asking a question, and had no intention whatsoever of confessing a sin. Of course I did not argue with him, but I was flustered when he ran off from me.
Since a sacrament functions ex opere operato, then his application of absolution remains valid—whether he was busy or not paying attention to me. And I have received absolutions from priests during confessions in which I did not confess any sins.
But I was very much concerned over what had taken place. So I called a seminary with my (now multiplied) concerns. The priest at the other end seemed to tell me that intentionally desecrating the host is a sin, but a circumstance like mine was beyond my control and I should just forget the matter entirely.
This is the intended content of my confession on Monday morning when I go to church—as an issue, but not a sin. And when I give the number of days since my last confession, I will count back to a confession that happened seven days before this Sunday Mass.
Prayerfully hoping for (name removed by moderator)ut and looking forward to listening to others…
A few weeks ago, I participated in a chess tournament on Sunday in a Northern city. The rounds for the chess tournament were 9AM and 3PM, and each of these two rounds could have theoretically lasted six hours. I did careful research on Catholic parishes near the tournament site (since I do not drive), and I found a parish within blocks of the hotel that offered a 7:30AM Mass. I wanted to attend Mass first and foremost on Sunday—I did not want to reduce my chances of attending Sunday Mass to a “lucky break” (i.e. the 9AM chess game only lasting fifteen minutes, enabling me to go to Mass and then come back for the 3PM round).
Since my non-believing parents never stop pestering me about my fasting habits, I decided to have breakfast before Mass—a relatively commonplace occurrence for me because I always “do it right” (timing everything safely). I finished breakfast at 7:12AM, and in my churches in my home state, Sunday Masses are always an hour, and I receive communion 55-65 minutes after Mass begins, so 7:30AM Mass plus 55 minutes is 8:25AM. I thought I was in the clear.
What happened next was nothing short of shocking. No songs were sung during the 7:30AM Mass. Non-sung parts to the end of the homily finished by 7:38AM (and the Mass started late). The Mass also omitted the shaking hands part—my first mass ever without shaking hands. And even though I strategically placed myself in the back, I found myself on line at 8:03AM to receive communion. In my home state, daily masses last 20-30 minutes…but the Sunday Mass is never this short!
Now before I go on, I want to share a few words about what I knew of the fasting regulations. Before consulting the posts tonight, everything I know of the fasting regulations comes from “Today’s Missal,” the newspaper-paper paperback book. The inside cover explicitly says (paraphrase) that “a person conscious of grave (mortal) sin is not to receive holy communion.” I understood that. But the inside cover only says that “to be properly disposed…one normally should have fasted for one hour.” The inside cover never explicitly says that it is a mortal sin to partake in communion if you had a fast of under an hour. A Catholic with no other knowledge about fasting regulations (me, in this case, on the aforementioned day) could never surmise it a sin to partake in communion less than an hour after fasting—based on reading Today’s Missal alone.
But in my mind at the time, I was basically thinking that I had to partake of communion (again, at the time, I did not know that while Mass is mandatory for Catholics, partaking in communion is not so, and one can simply receive a blessing). And I knew that if I didn’t partake of communion at the 7:30AM Mass, I would not be able to return to church later in the day because of the abovementioned tournament.
So I took communion, thinking that although this was not ideal, I had no intention of deliberately profaning the Eucharist, and I could very well not be back in church that day. The sticking point is that I did not know it was a sin—mortal or venial—to break the fast in such a way—albeit this was truly accidental and happened outside my control.
After Mass, I wanted to ask the priest a question about this. I was hoping for an assuring answer that I had already formed in my mind—that this happened for reasons outside my control, and that God’s mercy, through grace, triumphs over our weaknesses.
But the priest, clearly in a rush (perhaps because he was holding a heavy bag of tithes), simply motioned me over and laid penance on me—when I was only asking a question, and had no intention whatsoever of confessing a sin. Of course I did not argue with him, but I was flustered when he ran off from me.
Since a sacrament functions ex opere operato, then his application of absolution remains valid—whether he was busy or not paying attention to me. And I have received absolutions from priests during confessions in which I did not confess any sins.
But I was very much concerned over what had taken place. So I called a seminary with my (now multiplied) concerns. The priest at the other end seemed to tell me that intentionally desecrating the host is a sin, but a circumstance like mine was beyond my control and I should just forget the matter entirely.
This is the intended content of my confession on Monday morning when I go to church—as an issue, but not a sin. And when I give the number of days since my last confession, I will count back to a confession that happened seven days before this Sunday Mass.
Prayerfully hoping for (name removed by moderator)ut and looking forward to listening to others…
