How to be a good EMHC

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Know how to respond if Eastern Catholics show up! šŸ˜ƒ

You can download the PDF from the St. Sophia parish website if thatā€™s helpful, but Iā€™ll include the information here for you and other ordinary and extraordinary ministers of Holy Communion.

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CDB1718 said:
Know how to respond if Eastern Catholics show up! šŸ˜ƒ
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It is the duty of the pastor to instruct or make sure that the EMHC have been instructed properly. I donā€™t think it is wise for an EMHC to follow the instruction that you provided without having first received instruction or approval from their pastor concerning giving Holy Communion to infants and small children.
 
zab said:
It is the duty of the pastor to instruct or make sure that the EMHC have been instructed properly. I donā€™t think it is wise for an EMHC to follow the instruction that you provided without having first received instruction or approval from their pastor concerning giving Holy Communion to infants and small children.
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An EMHC shouldnā€™t take it upon himself to arrange anything, but he should understand all of this so heā€™s ready to respond if called upon.

Any Eastern Catholic family with infants to be communed will be going to the priest. However, to get to the priest, they often have to ask someone to lead the way who asks why they need to talk to him before Mass. And then the child receives in the presence of the EMHCs who might be shocked if they donā€™t know whatā€™s going on. And sometimes the priest tells the person with a preschooler to sit wherever and present to any minister as the child is old enough to not need special accommodation, but the child is still young enough to make an uninformed EMHC confused.

The EMHCs should understand in advance that all this might happen and know how to respond if called upon. For example, if a priest decides to use intinction, he might tell an EHMC to stand beside him with the chalice. Or he might tell an EMHC to bring him a spoon or tube at an appointed time. Or he might announce that thereā€™s an Eastern Catholic family expected to show up and heā€™s told them to go to any minister. Whatever the circumstance, if the EMHC has read a short approved pamphlet in advance, heā€™s able to do his job as the priest directs.

I ask only for the EMHC to know the full range of responsibilities the priest might call upon him to do so heā€™s prepared if the situation presents itself.
 
Here is some food for thought:

Inaestimabile Donum

Instruction Concerning Worship of the Eucharistic Mystery
Sacred Congregation for the Sacraments and Divine Worship
Approved and Confirmed by His Holiness Pope John Paul II on April 17, 1980
Communion is a gift of the Lord, given to the faithful through the minister appointed for the purpose. It is not permitted that the faithful should themselves pick up the consecrated bread and the sacred chalice; still less that they should hand them from one to another. The faithful, whether religious or lay, who are authorized as extraordinary ministers of the Eucharist can distribute Communion only when there is no priest, deacon or acolyte, when the priest is impeded by illness or advanced age, or when the number of the faithful going to communion is so large as to make the celebration of Mass excessively long. Accordingly, a reprehensible attitude is shown by those priests who, though present at the celebration, refrain from distributing Communion and leave this task to the laity.
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You might also ask what you are to do when approached by someone, child or adult, who gives a very strong indication that they have no idea what they are doing and/or have never received before. The procedure can differ from parish to parish.
 
Netty1 said:
šŸ‘ Good suggestion.

I have sometimes had this problem when visiting other parishes, so now I usually join the line to go to the priest because of it. Sometimes EMHCs donā€™t seem to know about ā€œon the tongueā€.
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Do not forget about kneeling!
 
LouisvilleRC said:
So Iā€™ve decided to become an EMHC or ā€œEucharistic Ministerā€ as theyā€™re called at my parish. I wanted to ask if anyone had any tips or suggestions for being a good EMHC. I want to help people receive the Eucharist and want to do it well. I will be serving at a Saturday Evening Eucharist with about 350 attendees and 10-14 EMHCs. We are a parish where in the hand is the norm and kneeling is out of the question.
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Ummmā€¦who told you that? Did you Priest tell you that?
 
CDB1718 said:
Know how to respond if Eastern Catholics show up!
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I guess there arenā€™t many Eastern Catholics in the two dioceses Iā€™ve served as an EMHC. Never once was this brought up by a priest (or anyone) in EMHC training. Iā€™ve only known of two adult Eastern Catholics receiving the Eucharist in my parish. If there were any babies or young children, they never approached us, as far as I know.

But this is a good point, and something for pastors to consider.
 
LouisvilleRC said:
So Iā€™ve decided to become an EMHC or ā€œEucharistic Ministerā€ as theyā€™re called at my parish. I wanted to ask if anyone had any tips or suggestions for being a good EMHC. I want to help people receive the Eucharist and want to do it well. I will be serving at a Saturday Evening Eucharist with about 350 attendees and 10-14 EMHCs. We are a parish where in the hand is the norm and kneeling is out of the question.
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15 EMHC s, one Priest and maybe a Deacon. At least 16 people to distribute. 350 people, that works out to what, 28 29 people per minister? Well at least Holy Communion will be done quite quickly. Over almost before it begins I would say.šŸ‘
 
Mike30 said:
15 EMHC s, one Priest and maybe a Deacon. At least 16 people to distribute. 350 people, that works out to what, 28 29 people per minister? Well at least Holy Communion will be done quite quickly. Over almost before it begins I would say.šŸ‘
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If both the hosts and the Cup are being offered, then itā€™s two ministers per communicant. But that is quite a large group of EMHCs if they all serve at the same Mass!
 
I do not consider the pamphlet spam. In fact it is very useful and worth distributing widely. I believe that the restriction on posting articles stems from a concern for copyright, while the pamphlet has a Creative Commons permissive license that explicitly permits this kind of distribution.

I think Eastern Catholics have a particular need to stand up and speak out for their rights to the sacraments, because there is widespread ignorance of the law in this regard. I even saw a priest argue here that the law forbade him from communing infants in the Roman Rite.
 
Glad2behome said:
Ummmā€¦who told you that? Did you Priest tell you that?
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Well our priest does not like kneeling but even if you wanted to you would have to kneel on the floor because my church is in the round and doesnā€™t have altar rail (we do have knee letā€™s on our chairs but we donā€™t use them). I think it would be very hard to kneel and might hold up the line. Plus to be honest I really think if you wanted to go to a more traditional mass you wouldnā€™t be at my parish to begin with.
 
Elizium23 said:
I do not consider the pamphlet spam. In fact it is very useful and worth distributing widely. I believe that the restriction on posting articles stems from a concern for copyright, while the pamphlet has a Creative Commons permissive license that explicitly permits this kind of distribution.

I think Eastern Catholics have a particular need to stand up and speak out for their rights to the sacraments, because there is widespread ignorance of the law in this regard. I even saw a priest argue here that the law forbade him from communing infants in the Roman Rite.
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Iā€™ll let the moderator determine whether or not the posting of the full pamphlet is spam. It could eventually defeat the purpose of what the poster intended. As many times as this pamphlet has been posted and reposted and quoted from with it shown in the replied to post, it can get to be too much. The pamphlet is informative but I for one (and I have responded favorably to the pamphlet when I first saw it) would prefer not to see the whole thing posted repeatedly. It is getting to be annoying. Is this the result that the poster wants?
 
zab said:
Iā€™ll let the moderator determine whether or not the posting of the full pamphlet is spam. It could eventually defeat the purpose of what the poster intended. As many times as this pamphlet has been posted and reposted and quoted from with it shown in the replied to post, it can get to be too much. The pamphlet is informative but I for one (and I have responded favorably to the pamphlet when I first saw it) would prefer not to see the whole thing posted repeatedly. It is getting to be annoying. Is this the result that the poster wants?
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Iā€™m glad that youā€™ve seen and read it three times, but I posted for the original poster as it was a direct response to the question of how to be a good EMHC.

I responded that I believe one component of being a good EMHC is full knowledge of the practices and responsibilities of being a Latin Catholic minister of Holy Communion and I provided relevant information that is otherwise rarely shared in furtherance of the OPā€™s goal.

Just like the right to kneel to receive will be mentioned as long as others are unaware, the right of Eastern Catholics to receive should be mentioned as a component of EMHC formation.
 
thistle said:
On a separate issue EMHCā€™s are NOT Eucharistic Ministers. The priest is the Eucharistic Minister. A lay person cannot be that. You should point this out to whoever is calling them that at your parish Church.
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Our Bishop and Priest calls us Eucharistic Ministers! Even the notices we get from them are headed that way. I wouldnt tell them they are wrong!
 
LouisvilleRC said:
Well our priest does not like kneeling but even if you wanted to you would have to kneel on the floor because my church is in the round and doesnā€™t have altar rail (we do have knee letā€™s on our chairs but we donā€™t use them). I think it would be very hard to kneel and might hold up the line. Plus to be honest I really think if you wanted to go to a more traditional mass you wouldnā€™t be at my parish to begin with.
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a number of people at my parish kneel ,and it doesnā€™t hold up the line at all.and if it did for a few seconds,šŸ¤· and why arenā€™t the kneelers used ?
 
Greg_N said:
Here is some food for thought:

Inaestimabile Donum

**Instruction Concerning Worship of the Eucharistic Mystery
Sacred Congregation for the Sacraments and Divine Worship
Approved and Confirmed by His Holiness Pope John Paul II **on April 17, 1980
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I highly doubt that this persons priest is sitting it out. And yes, as an EMHC we never pick them up off the altar. They should be handed to us by the priest.
 
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