In the time it takes to ceremoniously distribute both species to all the EMHC's..

[Mrs_Sally]

Easy solution, fewer Masses.

So people have to stand all through Mass? I think that we should trust our pastors to know what works best in their parish. Especially since there is a huge variation in parish size, layout, number of priests, even limits on traffic/parking imposed by the city, etc

 

[Annabelle_Marie]

No need to rush mass. No need to rush what happens before, during or after mass. Soak it all in and enjoy the moment.

Easy solution, fewer Masses.

Easily handled by proper scheduling of mass times.

So…which is it? Fewer Masses? Don’t rush Mass? Proper scheduling? We have three Sunday Masses that run until 1:30…so we need to space them out even more? Seriously! I think our ONE priest can decide the best way to run the parish more than Joe Pewsitter or people on CAF.

It’s interesting that we trust our priest with the concencration of the Eucharist but don’t trust them with pastoral decisions…

 

[Armor_of_Light]

I actually think it’s a worthwhile study. Maybe not by you. I don’t know you.

But parishes do all kinds of studies like that. How many hosts are needed? Do we have enough ushers to seat people and manage the collection baskets? How many bulletins do we need?

You wouldn’t need to be at Mass to come up with a formula for estimating time.

I’m an engineer and do studies all the time. Now you know…

 

[Kevin812]

Right… that will encourage more people to come to Church

More Mass times does not equal greater attendance. Catholics need no such encouragement to attend to their obligations and duties.

 

[Kevin812]

EMHC’s are essential at our church.
We have 10 Masses every Sunday accommodating (in total) around 10,000 people on Sundays. There is no way that could be handled by the priest alone.
Our priests (3) even have a dispensation to be able to receive more than 2 times on Sundays otherwise we would need more priests as well.

Red is mine.

When has the Church ever said this?

 

[MrTheosis]

…Father and a Deacon could use that 7 minutes to distribute to the entire congregation.

Just an observation to get the discussion started. I hope this goes well…

Back in the ‘70’s we had no EMHC’s and more people and got through every Sunday no problem. I really question the ‘need’ for the EMHC’s. If we eliminated the redundancy of ’ both species’…that’d help, right? Oh…except for the people who suffer from celiac disease. Mea culpa.

There is distinct benefit from distributing communion when possible under both kinds.

 

[Armor_of_Light]

There is distinct benefit from distributing communion when possible under both kinds.

Why? More Jesus?

 

[clem456]

I understand the large parishes, but honestly in many places this has come to be seen as a recently discovered “right” of the lay faithful to full participation. We have two morning Masses with no more than 50 people and always 3 or 4 emhc’s are used to distribute both species. 1 assistant would be more than enough. On Sundays it would take another 5 minutes to distribute if the emhc’s stayed put.
But, the pastor, the bishop…this issue is their business, not mine. I have no anxiety over this issue whatsoever.

 

[hilde_the_dog]

Seriously if it take seven (7) minutes to distribute communion to the EMHC’s by the priest there is a problem. 1) priest and/or deacon are moving way to slow. or 2) You really do need to distribute one species only.

I am not fast but it takes about 5-8 seconds per communicant receiving the body of Christ. some of our priest can roll through it at a pace a communicant every 3-5 seconds.

That means even at a super slow pace we are talking you have about 25- 50 EMHC’s. That would seem excessive.

 

[GangGreen]

If you have 500 people and each person takes 5 seconds, then each priest would be able to do 12 people per minute. For one priest it would take about 42 minutes to do the whole church (if every single person receives). In a group like that you could easily have 4 priests/deacons doing the whole church even if it takes 10 minutes (cut the homily a bit!).

More than that and I could agree with using EMHC’s if there aren’t enough priests or deacons available.

My church as 3 priests and usually a deacon (we have 2 part-time deacons) and yet we have 4 EMHC in every mass (at least on weekends). I’m not sure how many people the church holds but I doubt it’s more than 500.

 

[Daizies]

At a typical Sunday Mass we usually have 10+ EMHC’s and often we get completely through all 3 or 4 verses of the first Communion hymn before they finishing distributing to all the EMHC’s. Now the parish is very large, and I do understand the priest cannot always do everything himself, but I do have to admit it does irk me a little when there are 4 priests at Mass, and 3 of them are sitting while the EMHC’s distribute Communion. (I try to be charitable and assume the best, but it does still bug me)

 

[Armor_of_Light]

Thanks everyone for the information on your experiences.

Let me give you something else to consider here…

What would your response would be to the thread topic:

“Mass takes too long…we have to wait too long for communion!”

I know what I’d say to that one.

 

[Annabelle_Marie]

Thanks everyone for the information on your experiences.

Let me give you something else to consider here…

What would your response would be to the thread topic:

“Mass takes too long…we have to wait too long for communion!”

I know what I’d say to that one.

Depends…during the weekday I’d have to say goodbye to daily Mass:sad_bye:…as it is I can just fit it in right under my lunch hour.

During the weekend…I don’t mind the longer masses although there are issues for other people such as the elderly, young kids, etc. Also there are logistics to consider such as the other mass times coming in, In your solution, you would quite possibly have our ONE priest saying mass from 8 until 3pm… I also know some of the country parishes share a priest…so longer mass times would make that a problem.

It seems like you don’t really want to consider any of that…or that our priests might know what they are doing.

I get it…in a perfect world it would be nice to not have any EMHC’s -that’s why I pray for more vocations…and I serve as an EMHC myself. But we don’t live in a perfect world do we?

 

[Mike30]

These EMHC threads always amuse me greatly. On the one hand you have the pro EHMC group saying that their Sunday Parish Masses routinely have one to several thousand people at each and every Sunday Mass and distribution could not be done without the use of many, many EHMCs… Maybe.

I will take that with a grain of salt however.

If that is the case they must have some incredibly devout parishners, especially when most Parishes themselves report that they seldom have more than 25-30% of the registered Parish members even show up for Mass. And that is the total of ALL Masses celebrated that week.

Must be some mega mega Parishes for sure.

On the other hand the anti EMHC crowd always comes in with the observation that during weekday Masses with lets say thirty or less people there are always four to six EHMC present and distributing. Just think of it, they get all dressed up, go up to the Altar, receive before everybody else except the Priests and then and go down and distribute to one or two people.

They must have some bored and sad EMHCs in those places:crying:

In the end result I think that both sides are exagerrating, embroidering the truth, shall we say,:tsktsk: just a bit to make their own cause look a little better.

Or maybe not, who knows?

Sure seems that way to me though.

Oh and for those new to these threads, they almost always go in the same direction and end the same way. Nothing and I do mean nothing new ever gets said.

They are fun to read though:thumbsup:

 

[thistle]

Red is mine.

When has the Church ever said this?

Can’t you read? I said (not the Church) EMHC’s are essential at our Church or are you suggesting 10,000 people each Sunday be forbidden to receive Communion even though the Church specifically strongly recommends that the faithful regularly and as often as possible receive Communion.

 

[Cojuanco]

I think there’s variation by parish to parish. In a dwindling New England parish, I agree you won’t need an EMHC. But in a large parish in southern California, with a thousand or two at each Mass at least, most of whom, rightly or wrongly, go up for Communion? Unless you want the Communion line to be twice the length of the homily, even two priests are gonna need some help.

 

[ajecphotos]

Mass shouldn’t be timed! I for one don’t mind how long it takes. It is a special celebration and shouldn’t be rushed!

 

[CradleJourney]

They are fun to read though:thumbsup:

I know I’m enjoying reading this thread because it exposes me to a wider view of our Church.

Except for a confirmation mass with the archbishop, I’ve never been to a mass with more than one priest present that I remember. Did have one or two times when there was a seminarian visiting, and in those instances he took the place of one of our EM’s. But the idea of having multiple priests at a mass on a regular basis is outside my experience, just as the idea of having several hundred people at a regular Sunday mass is.

So I will continue to read and learn.

My best estimate for our parish is 2 minutes to distribute both species to the 8 EM’s, 3 lines (aisles) of communion, total time 5 to 10 minutes (depends on what’s happening that weekend - here we get a lot of shift between the 2 masses depending on activities, sporting events, weather, etc.)

 

[Cojuanco]

Mass shouldn’t be timed! I for one don’t mind how long it takes. It is a special celebration and shouldn’t be rushed!

Not easy to do when you have barely enough Masses to accomodate every Sunday Massgoer. It’s not a Papal coronation.

 

[hilde_the_dog]

Ya you betcha ajeckphotos. So let’s see ignore the time and the 7:30am blends into the 9am, the 11am, the 1pm and the 5pm. Maybe it could be just come and go as you please and make the Mass last all day.

That sounds more like perpetual adoration. Or Heaven.