An assistant prepares ciboria of hosts for Communion before Pope Francis’s celebration of Mass marking the feast of Pentecost in St. Peter’s Square at the Vatican June 4. ( Credit: Paul Haring/CNS.)
Pope Frank has ruled that gluten-free hosts are out of the question. Low gluten is okay, though. A call for eucharist oversight has been added, apparently there’s some distress about the wide availability of hosts, why you can even get them on the internets! *gasp*
Because bread and wine for the Eucharist are no longer supplied just by religious communities, but “are also sold in supermarkets and other stores and even over the internet,” bishops should set up guidelines, an oversight body and/or even a form of certification to help “remove any doubt about the validity of the matter for the Eucharist,” the Vatican’s Congregation for Divine Worship and the Sacraments said.
You really have to love the absolute silliness of the whole transubstantiation business. It’s so wonderfully contradictory, and well, just absurd. Here’s a bit of it:
The letter also reiterated norms already in place regarding Eucharistic matter:
– “The bread used in the celebration of the most holy Eucharistic sacrifice must be unleavened, purely of wheat, and recently made so that there is no danger of decomposition.”
I would have thought that Jesus, being a god and all, wouldn’t be subject to decomposition.
– Bread made from another substance, even grain or mixed with another substance so different from wheat that it would not commonly be considered wheat bread, “does not constitute valid matter.”
– The introduction of any other substances, “such as fruit or sugar or honey, into the bread for confecting the Eucharist,” it said, “is a grave abuse.”
Why? A tiny sliver of a pleasurable sensation would be that mortal [as in sin] in nature? Sugar is inimical to Jesus? Hmmm. So, Jehovah can be defeated with iron, or a chariot, if you have one handy, and Jesus can be handled with a liberal application of sugar, fruit, or honey. Good to know.
– Low-gluten hosts are valid matter for people who, “for varying and grave reasons, cannot consume bread made in the usual manner,” provided the hosts “contain a sufficient amount of gluten to obtain the confection of bread without the addition of foreign materials and without the use of procedures that would alter the nature of bread.”
– Completely gluten-free hosts continue to be “invalid matter for the celebration of the Eucharist.”
Who would have thought Jesus to be so darn complex?
– Eucharistic matter made with genetically modified organisms can be considered valid matter.
I think I’d like some details here.
The U.S. bishops’ Committee on Divine Worship has said Catholics who cannot receive Communion wafers at all, even under the species of low-gluten hosts, “may receive Holy Communion under the species of wine only.” The church teaches that “under either species of bread or wine, the whole Christ is received,” it said.
There, the whole matter of baked Jesus is now settled.
For some reason I’m thinking of angels dancing on pins.
It’s that silly, yes.
Good morning!
“I would have thought that Jesus, being a god and all, wouldn’t be subject to decomposition.”
Jeus is long past his sell-by date of returning within the lifetime of his original followers. Stale crackers all around.
Good morning, Raucous Indignation!
Busterggi:
Oh, yes, that’s very true. Forgot about that.
If Jesus ever returns, we should send him to see a doctor. It can’t be healthy to be made of gluten.
Magic can only go so far
It is really sad how they do not see contradiction in setting restrictions on allegedly allmighty and omnipresent God.
While it’S plain silly, I’m wondering how many people will get hurt by eating the gluten wafer despite it making them sick. How many will take it as a sign of god that they’re evil sinners?
There is an exception for those who can’t cope, under the “species” of wine only. The church notes that a medical excuse from a doctor is not necessary. I expect they think that’s right generous.
Charly
Once upon a time, dead Catholics could not be cremated because resurrection of the body.
As I child I could not figure out why God couldn’t deal with that.
Oh sure they do.
You know better than me how much unreasonable grip faith has over people. I think people will nevertheless take the wafer, because they’re still afraid, because they think they must be doing something wrong, because they’re afraid to stand out.
Giliell:
Oh, I have no doubt. They’ll feel guilty, and no one specializes in guilt quite like Catholicism. There will also be a heaping helping of “god will make it right” and all that nonsense.
sez Tabby Lavalamp @6: “If Jesus ever returns, we should send him to see a doctor. It can’t be healthy to be made of gluten.”
Atheistic fool that you are! You clearly do not comprehend the intricate sophistrication of Catholic theologicalisms. See, everything that exists has “substance”, which is what the thing actually is, and it also has “accidents”, which are the sensory impressions the thing generates in people who see/hear/smell/etc whatever-it-is. Us puny humans have no access to a thing’s substance; we can only percieve a thing’s accidents. Got that?
The miracle of transubstantiation (and it is a miracle, a miracle which goes off on command every Sunday, in God knows how many Catholic churches around the world) is that the substance of the
crackerHost is utterly, totally, 100% transformed to the substance of Jesus’ flesh… while, at the same time, the accidents of that blessedStyrofoam™baked good are utterly, totally, 100% unaffected by that exercise of Divine power.So the consecrated Host may look like a cracker; smell like a cracker; taste like a cracker; chew and swallow like a cracker; digest like a cracker; have the same effect on celiac sufferers as a cracker; excrete like a post-digestion cracker; and flush like a post-excretion cracker; but all of that is just the accidents, okay? The substance is the important part, and the consecrated Host has the substance of genuine, certified Jesus meat! We know this because the priest says so, and no true man of God would lie about their religion. Really, who are you going to believe—your priest, or your lying eyes, nose, tongue, teeth, bowels, etc etc etc?
So the consecrated Host may look like a cracker; smell like a cracker; taste like a cracker; chew and swallow like a cracker; digest like a cracker; have the same effect on celiac sufferers as a cracker; excrete like a post-digestion cracker; and flush like a post-excretion cracker; but all of that is just the accidents, okay? The substance is the important part, and the consecrated Host has the substance of genuine, certified Jesus meat! We know this because the priest says so, and no true man of God would lie about their religion. Really, who are you going to believe—your priest, or your lying eyes, nose, tongue, teeth, bowels, etc etc etc?
It’s a slippery slope! Before you know it those darn vegetarians will be demanding exceptions because it is meat!
Mary Magdalene: “Yesh-honey, would you mind bringing some wine, dates and figs from the market when you come back from fishing with Shem-Pete and his brother?”
Deiphagy has never been my thing, but have they tried branching out a bit? Horus looks like he would taste like chicken.