Why is CIH so popular?

[ElToro]

I used to try to wipe my fingers secretly on my jacket, and then I got squeamish (and a bit resentful) about having to wash the spit off my jacket later.

So now I change hands and use my ‘wrong’ hand for a while until my fingers have dried off and I can pick up a Host without it sticking to my fingers.
I sometimes think it would be useful if everyone had a go at giving COTT (but with unconsecrated altar-breads, obviously! ) to show how difficult some people make it for the EMHC/priest.

NOT a bad idea. I need to remember that…

 

[Lancer]

“We should not forget that not only our hands are impure but also our tongue and also our heart and that we often sin more with the tongue than with the hands.** God takes an enormous risk…in allowing not only our hand and our tongue but even our heart to come into contact with him.”**

The writer?

Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger (God is Near Us, pp 69-71)

wdtprs.com/blog/2011/05/a-look-at-the-posture-and-manner-of-receiving-holy-communion/

Pax Christi

 

[KarenElissa]

I think most Catholics don’t think about this issue nearly as much as we do.

I think for most CIH seems logistically easier (both distributing and receiving). Other than that, I doubt many give it much thought. It’s just a go with the flow kind of thing.

I agree that this is the biggest reason. I know, personally, I don’t see either one as intrinsically more or less reverent and COTH is just simpler, so that is how I receive.

In my RCIA kids class I will generally mention that you can receive either way, but usually go over how to receive in the hand more thoroughly simply because realistically, that is how most will receive.

 

[ConstantineTG]

Oh shuks. Now I’m going to start obsessing about how wide I open my mouth when the time comes.

Same issue in the Byzantine Rite. Though our priest and bishop is pretty good with the spoon, some priests just whack you in the teeth. Good thing I don’t have to deal with that often.

In the Latin Rite, just stick your tongue out. I think sometimes the problem is some priests or EMHCs try to put the host in your mouth rather than on the tongue.

I have very steady hands but sometimes communicants jerk their heads (often it seems in an attempt to accelerate the process of communion) which often results in contact with the tongue and/or lips.

I always question whether I should wipe my finger(s) before the next communicant?

I’ve seen priests with a purificator draped on their wrist so they can wipe off their fingers after each communicant.

 

[FAB]

Being able to recieve communion in the hand has profound Theolgical meaning. Our God who became man ate with us, touched us, and we touched him. He put his arms around us and we put our arms around Him.
To recieve Hm in the hand is once again allowing us to have that person contact. Even though we are unworthy, He still comes us. It is not our exterior filth that we should be concerned, but our interior. Receiving on the tongue does not cahnge that.

 

[At_Trent]

Last Sunday at Mass someone was saying to me that based on the Pope’s personal preferences CIH will one day be abolished. I disagreed and said the great popularity of CIH would most likely preclude it from being abolished anytime soon – it ever.

That set them off and they asked me why I felt CIH was so popular? I said in my own opinion it was a number of things – some people ashamed at the condition of their mouths, the dislike of opening their mouths and sticking out their tongues to others (even priests), having the insides of their mouths touched by others’ fingers, elderly clergy who don’t have steady enough hands to “hit the mark”, etc. I like some also prefer the more ancient means of receiving Holy Communion.

The person freaked-out and said it was because COT was (or is) discouraged in some places by catechists. I looked around at that Mass and couldn’t see anyone less than 50 years old except myself so I found their comment ridiculous.

What do you think?

I hear you.

The argument about unclean mouths or tongues is ridiculous. The host always winds up on our tongues. The rest of the bolded part reads " it’s all about me and what I want"

It’s so funny that we dip our fingers in the holy water with our right hands, the same water others dip their fingers into, we lower and raise the kneelers with our hands… and some actually do it with their feet. We handle Hymnals that others have handled. We shake hands at the Sign of Peace. We drink from the Cup after others. All of that, and some worry about germs if they receive on the tongue ?

But yet, somehow our hands are magically clean by the time the Host is placed in our hands ?

The Church says it’s ok at this time to receive CITH, and that’s fine. But please spare us the silliness in these discussions. Just state that you are aware it is permitted, you choose to receive that way, and leave it at that. Because really, that’s all you got.

 

[At_Trent]

Being able to recieve communion in the hand has profound Theolgical meaning. Our God who became man ate with us, touched us, and we touched him. He put his arms around us and we put our arms around Him.
To recieve Hm in the hand is once again allowing us to have that person contact. Even though we are unworthy, He still comes us. It is not our exterior filth that we should be concerned, but our interior. Receiving on the tongue does not cahnge that.

Problem is, the Host always winds up on the tongue. And, the Church did not consider all you say here. Those who introduced the practice may have agreed with you if they were here, but they are the ones who decided CITH was a good idea. It was not introduced into the Liturgy by Rome. It’s introduction was by those at the bottom of the ladder . That’s not the way it’s done.

Again, today, it is permitted. Just remember that when one starts defending it, one is defending a practice with a very shady history of introduction into the Liturgy. First novelty, and then disobedience is part of that history.

 

[ElToro]

Same issue in the Byzantine Rite. Though our priest and bishop is pretty good with the spoon, some priests just whack you in the teeth. Good thing I don’t have to deal with that often.

In the Latin Rite, just stick your tongue out. I think sometimes the problem is some priests or EMHCs try to put the host in your mouth rather than on the tongue.

I’ve seen priests with a purificator draped on their wrist so they can wipe off their fingers after each communicant.

That really is a great idea.

 

[ElToro]

I hear you.

The argument about unclean mouths or tongues is ridiculous. The host always winds up on our tongues. The rest of the bolded part reads " it’s all about me and what I want"

It’s so funny that we dip our fingers in the holy water with our right hands, the same water others dip their fingers into, we lower and raise the kneelers with our hands… and some actually do it with their feet. We handle Hymnals that others have handled. We shake hands at the Sign of Peace. We drink from the Cup after others. All of that, and some worry about germs if they receive on the tongue ?

But yet, somehow our hands are magically clean by the time the Host is placed in our hands ?

The Church says it’s ok at this time to receive CITH, and that’s fine. But please spare us the silliness in these discussions. Just state that you are aware it is permitted, you choose to receive that way, and leave it at that. Because really, that’s all you got.

Nothing “silly” about having someone’s saliva on one’s fingers as they reach for the next consecrated host. That is a world way from what we expose our hands to when lowering or raising a kneeler.

 

[ElToro]

Problem is, the Host always winds up on the tongue. And, the Church did not consider all you say here. Those who introduced the practice may have agreed with you if they were here, but they are the ones who decided CITH was a good idea. It was not introduced into the Liturgy by Rome. It’s introduction was by those at the bottom of the ladder . That’s not the way it’s done.

Again, today, it is permitted. Just remember that when one starts defending it, one is defending a practice with a very shady history of introduction into the Liturgy. First novelty, and then disobedience is part of that history.

Balderdash. If anything it’s a very ancient history.

 

[At_Trent]

Nothing “silly” about having someone’s saliva on one’s fingers as they reach for the next consecrated host. That is a world way from what we expose our hands to when lowering or raising a kneeler.

And no saliva makes it’s way into the Cup ?

Hey, if you cant’s stand the thought, carry on. I’ve been receiving on the tongue since about 2005 I think it is. I still have a pulse, and I haven’t been sick other than a cold every year or so, just as I’ve had all my life.

And besides, members of the Curia are speaking in favor of COTT.

 

[At_Trent]

Both methods of receiving Christ in the Eucharist are found in Church history. Just because the Council of Trent made on the tongue the norm, doesn’t mean it’s “Traditional” or the only right way. When I’m at an EF Mass or an OF Mass where the parish uses the rail it seems proper to receive on the tongue. But at a normal Mass, especially when an Extraordinary Minister is distributing I do what St. Cyril of Jerusalem taught in the 4th century “placing thy left hand as a throne for thy right, which is to receive so great a King, and in the hollow of the palm receive the body of Christ, saying, Amen.” (Fifth Mystagogical Catechesis, 21)

When Pope Paul VI decided to restore the option of following the ancient practice of receiving in the hand he said “The practice must remain the option of the communicant. The priest or minister of Communion does not make the decision as to the manner of reception of Communion. It is the communicant’s personal choice.”

“In the church, when the priest gives the portion, the recipient takes it with complete power over it, and so lifts it to his lips with his own hand.” (St. Basil the Great: Letter 93)

Yet the overwhelming majority do the opposite.

 

[At_Trent]

Balderdash. If anything it’s a very ancient history.

Nope, I’m speaking of the re-introduction of the practice by those with no authority whatsoever to do so .

 

[FAB]

Problem is, the Host always winds up on the tongue. And, the Church did not consider all you say here. Those who introduced the practice may have agreed with you if they were here, but they are the ones who decided CITH was a good idea. It was not introduced into the Liturgy by Rome. It’s introduction was by those at the bottom of the ladder . That’s not the way it’s done.

Again, today, it is permitted. Just remember that when one starts defending it, one is defending a practice with a very shady history of introduction into the Liturgy. First novelty, and then disobedience is part of that history.

Bottom of the Ladder?? Bishops charged with the teaching of the Church are bottom of the ladder?
Even if that were the case, and I remind you that it is not, many of the greatest changes in the Church were made by those at the bottom of the ladder.
Despite what history you think the practice has, it is permitted and accepted.

 

[ConstantineTG]

Problem is, the Host always winds up on the tongue. And, the Church did not consider all you say here. Those who introduced the practice may have agreed with you if they were here, but they are the ones who decided CITH was a good idea. It was not introduced into the Liturgy by Rome. It’s introduction was by those at the bottom of the ladder . That’s not the way it’s done.

Again, today, it is permitted. Just remember that when one starts defending it, one is defending a practice with a very shady history of introduction into the Liturgy. First novelty, and then disobedience is part of that history.

Do you think all changes to the Liturgy are from the top-down and never the bottom-up in the entire history of the Church?

 

[At_Trent]

Bottom of the Ladder?? Bishops charged with the teaching of the Church are bottom of the ladder?
Even if that were the case, and I remind you that it is not, many of the greatest changes in the Church were made by those at the bottom of the ladder.
Despite what history you think the practice has, it is permitted and accepted.

 "When therefore a small number of episcopal conferences and some
 individual bishops asked that the practice of placing the
 consecrated hosts in the people's hands be permitted in their
 territories, the Holy Father decided that all the bishops of the
 Latin Church should be asked if they thought it opportune to
 introduce this rite. A change in a matter of such moment, based
 on a most ancient and venerable tradition, does not merely
 affect discipline. ** It carries certain dangers with it which may
 arise from the new manner of administering holy communion: the
 danger of a loss of reverence for the August sacrament of the
 altar, of profanation, of adulterating the true doctrine."**

Pope Paul VI Memoriale Domini

Right there is H.H. Paul VI reminding us what the “teaching of the Church” is.

Now show me a document from a Pope or member of the Curia promoting CITH. Not someone at the bottom asking permission.

 

[ElToro]

And no saliva makes it’s way into the Cup ?

Hey, if you cant’s stand the thought, carry on. I’ve been receiving on the tongue since about 2005 I think it is. I still have a pulse, and I haven’t been sick other than a cold every year or so, just as I’ve had all my life.

And besides, members of the Curia are speaking in favor of COTT.

My fingers don’t have the anticeptic qualities of the Precious Blood sacramentally present in the form of alcoholic wine.

 

[Ter1]

I would consider that it is popular because:

1. For the last 40 or so years most children making First Communion were taught how to receive in the hand, very few were taught how to receive on the tongue. And it is something that needs to be taught, there is a fairly specific method (i.e. rest the tip of you tongue on top of your lower lip and open your mouth wide - this provides a ‘flat’ space on which the host can be placed). The ‘just stick your tongue out’ mentioned earlier has problems, particularly that the tongue is often sloping down away from the mouth which risks falls. Also I think that the disappearance of kneeling to receive made it more difficult to administer COTT - the change in ‘angle of approach’, no longer reaching down to place on tongue. They were taught to receive on the hand and know it’s a valid method of receiving, therefore they do so.
2. For the novice COTT is a nerve-wracking experience, you’re afraid the Lord will fall. In fact, I, who am accustomed to receive on the tongue, find it nerve-wracking when faced with someone who obviously is not used to administering that way. I have on occasion had to shut my mouth really fast because the Host was falling and then ‘lip’ the portion that had been left sticking out into my mouth.
3. Many people like the symbolism of making a cross/throne with their hands when they receive the Lord (as per the Cyril of Jerusalem quote) as an outward expression of enthroning him, whom they are receiving, in their hearts.
4. We are not Manicheeists (I made up the spelling - you know the heresy St Augustine was exposed to), we do not believe that the physical body is sinful. We do believe the soul/heart can be sinful (as Jesus said, it is from the heart that evil desires come), which is why we are obliged to go to Confession before receiving if we are in a state of sin. Since the body is not sinful one part of the body is not more or less worthy to touch the Lord (though St James in his letter comes close to saying the tongue is the least worthy part), therefore there doesn’t seem to be any intrinsic reason why receiving on the tongue is better than the hand. And it is definitely easier for those administering. And so the majority of Catholics have no reason to reject the method that has been presented to them (by their bishops) as an acceptable method of receiving.

 

[FAB]

“When therefore a small number of episcopal conferences and some
individual bishops asked that the practice of placing the
consecrated hosts in the people’s hands be permitted in their
territories, the Holy Father decided that all the bishops of the
Latin Church should be asked if they thought it opportune to
introduce this rite. A change in a matter of such moment, based
on a most ancient and venerable tradition, does not merely
affect discipline. ** It carries certain dangers with it which may
arise from the new manner of administering holy communion: the
danger of a loss of reverence for the August sacrament of the
altar, of profanation, of adulterating the true doctrine.”**

Pope Paul VI Memoriale Domini

Right there is H.H. Paul VI reminding us what the “teaching of the Church” is.

Now show me a document from a Pope or member of the Curia promoting CITH. Not someone at the bottom asking permission.

You do know that Church works under the principal of collegiality VII, so conferences and bishops are not some fringe. Your quote is out of date

 

[oneGODoneCHURCH]

You do know that Church works under the principal of collegiality VII, so conferences and bishops are not some fringe. Your quote is out of date

How is it any more out of date than any thing else Pope Paul or an earlier Pope was stated? Given that the same concerns are still being raised by our current Pope.