By Michael Sandrussi
Note: This article only scratches the surface of this issue. The aim is to make you take on the thoughts below and find out more
It was the Papal Mass of World Youth Day 2008 at Randwick. I will never forget this moment as long as I live. I was one of the servers for communion. As a server, we would accompany the Priests and do our best to organise the people as best as we could for Communion, and to be the eyes and ears of the Priest.
I was with a young American Priest. During Communion, one elderly lady standing a metre away from the Father behind the gate stretched out her arm and said ‘can I have three?’
To which the American priest cleverly replied ‘does this look like McDonald’s to you?’
She only received one. She wanted to give two others to friends of hers who could not be present and she had a container there with her to carry the hosts in.
I’m sure that the Good Lord wanted me to see this in order to experience a little of the scandals of the Eucharist.
Ever since then, I always said to myself, ‘Unless I am a Priest of the Lord, hands off!’
Communion in the hand is a very sensitive issue, and although the Church allows it, she does not encourage it.
Blessed Mother Teresa once gave her thoughts on this practice: "Wherever I go in the whole world, the thing that makes me the saddest is watching people receive Communion in the hand."
Cardinal Francis Arinze, Prefect Emeritus of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, has shown a definite dissatisfaction towards the practice, and is keen to remind the Catholic Heirarchy of the many abuses that occur as a result; that they “could happen, and that they already happened, like the use for satanic rituals, the auction on the internet and other wrongs.” He relates a story about one person who went up and received Communion and then took it home and kept the host in his scrapbook. He recalls another story that a host reportedly received at a papal Mass in 1998 was put up for sale on eBay some years later before being withdrawn by the seller.
If you are a frequent visitor of youtube, you may remember the Eucharistic heresies and sacrileges performed by a young man who would throw the Eucharist off a cliff, flush it down the toilet and burn it, among many other sacrileges as well.
Again, in my mind, alarm bells go off...HANDS OFF!
Now, this is not to suggest that everyone who receives Communion by the hand do these actions. On the contrary, I know of some very holy men and women who receive the Lord in this manner, and they do so with the purest of intentions.
The above mention of the sacrileges is made to bring to our minds the necessity of safeguarding the Sacrament. We have the duty to protect the king, and, in many cases, the king has been literally handed over to the enemies of the Church who have brought upon Him all these grievous harms.
So what about the practice in itself, apart from the sacrileges? Well, it is worth analyzing this very act in itself from a logical and observational point of view.
There are two actions that occur when one receives communion in the hand. These are the actions of handling and of eating.
The Language of the Act
There is meaning and logic behind everything we do. God made us as brilliant creatures giving us a purpose and message in all that we do, even something as insignificant as holding an object in our hands.
Our hands are the most silent objects in our body, and yet they speak so much truth. In their actions, they speak.
There is a beautiful Maronite Icon that depicts God the Father, not as an old man as is usually the case, but as a hand, because He is the Creator and Lord of Creation.
When you hold something with your hands, you imply ownership. You are Lord over it. How do I know that you are the owner of a car? You hold the keys. By our hands we own things. We can handle them in any way we like because they become ours.
What about eating? When you eat, the food becomes you. Take eating an apple for example. When you bite it and swallow it, the bit of apple goes down through your body into your digestive system and is digested into useful chemicals and proteins that become a part of your overall bodily systems that allow for growth, nourishment and illness prevention. The apple becomes a part of you.
The apple in a sense, serves your needs in the same way that using a mobile phone would serve your needs. And so, rightfully, you would hold an apple with your hand, because it serves you, and thus, you are its owner.
This is not the same with the Eucharist.
Who is the Lord when it comes to receiving Holy Communion? Is it the Communion, or the communicant? If the Eucharist is Jesus Christ, then to Him be glory, honour and service.
In Holy Communion, I do not want the Eucharist to become a part of me, as is the case with the apple. Rather I want to become it; I want to become like Him. During Communion, the aim is to become more like Christ who is received at that moment. This should be the inward intention of receiving Christ in the Eucharist.
So then, is it right for me to then confuse this whole act by stretching out my arms to handle Him?
We always wish for people to know our true intentions in our actions. It has happened all too often where people intend one thing and say or do another, and they get so upset when they are misunderstood and misinterpreted.
In all things, my outward expression should reflect my inward intention, especially if the intention is that of becoming Christ-like when receiving communion.
Let us also remember who it is that we are receiving. It is he whom Heaven itself cannot contain. It is He whom the angels fear. It is the Lord almighty, who exists from everlasting to everlasting. It is the ‘I Am’, the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords, who died on the cross and rose from the dead for the salvation of humanity. He is the Lord of the Universe. When we receive communion in our hands, we grab hold of Divinity. He is the one who should have us in His hands.
The Eucharist and the Priestly ministry
Saint Ephrem the Syrian, one of the Great Church Fathers, known throughout the ages as the harp of the Holy Spirit, makes a fabulous and insightful reflection on grabbing hold of the Divine. He relates two events from two different characters in the Old Testament, Adam and Uzziah. Adam, King of Paradise, became bold and plucked the fruit of the Tree out of season. Likewise Uzziah, King of Judah, took in his hands the priest’s censer which by right was not his.
In the midst of Paradise God had planted the Tree of Knowledge
to separate off, above and below, sanctuary from Holy of Holies.
Adam made bold to touch, and was smitten like Uzziah:
the king became leprous, Adam was stripped.
Being struck like Uzziah, he hastened to leave:
both kings fled and hid, in shame of their bodies.
(Hymns on Paradise. 3:14).
Ephrem here connects the fruit of Divinity with the Priesthood. He comments on Adam’s touching with his hands. Elsewhere, Ephrem and so many of the Fathers will see Christ as the fruit of another Tree, the Tree of life, who is plucked daily by the Priest. When a Priest is newly ordained, the custom is that we kiss his hands, simply because his hands give us the Lord.
Moreover, Saint Thomas Aquinas tells us of the Sacredness of the Eucharist and the privilege to touch it. He reminds us that reverence demands that only what has been consecrated should touch the Blessed Sacrament. By baptism, the Christian has been consecrated to receive the Lord in Holy Communion, but not to distribute the Sacred Host to others or unnecessarily to touch it. "To touch the sacred species and to distribute them with their own hands is a privilege of the ordained, one which indicates an active participation in the ministry of the Eucharist" (Dominicae Cenae, 11).
Furthermore, do we not call the Priest ‘Father’? If He is then our Father, are we not then His children? As children then, we are fed by the Father. The Father does not merely give us food, but He feeds us too. The imagery of receiving the Eucharist on the tongue powerfully demonstrates this child-like approach to the Eucharist.
We should not regard that those who do receive communion in the hand will share the same fate as Adam or Uzziah. Not at all. But it is a reminder that for all ages the Priest is the one who ministers and orders the distribution of the Eucharist. Let us also remember that the Priest is in Persona Christi, in the Person of Christ, and thus, has the right and duty to hold the communion Host with his hands, and even then, very delicately.
What should we do?
Well, the principle is this: in order for any action to be complete and understood perfectly, it is necessary that the inward intention is reflected in the outward expression.
In terms of Receiving the Holy Eucharist, we want to be owned by Christ, so that “it is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me” (Gal 2:20). He takes ownership. Jesus takes the wheel. We fall into line with Him, not the other way around. You are what you eat. The point of receiving Christ is so that you become what you receive. Let that intention fill your mind and heart every time you approach the Lord Almighty.
Receive Christ according to this intention, i.e. on the tongue. Are those who receive Communion in the Hand not as holy as those who receive Him on the Tongue? No, not necessarily. You can receive Christ in the Hand and have pure intentions, and you can receive Christ on the tongue with bad intentions, such as receiving Him and not believing that it is truly Jesus Christ, or receiving Him in a state of mortal sin. Remember, Jesus could only enter into our Lady’s womb because she was Full of grace. We are called at least to be graceful.
In the end, we must always remember that we are receiving Jesus Christ our Lord and God, into our very mouths and bodies. He comes not merely to give us food, but to feed us, as a mother feeds her children. You can take Him and feed yourself, or you can claim your place as God’s child interiorly and exteriorly and be fed. The Eucharist is Jesus Christ, He whom the Angels fear to approach. Us mere humans should not rush in where Angels fear to tread.
