We’re back to the “no debate” mode with this post. I’m interested in experiences. I’ll give a bit of historical background, my own experience, and then it’s your turn.
It would have been unthinkable, before the Second Vatican Council, for lay Catholics to receive Communion in their hands, rather than on the tongue. That began to change in many countries during the 1960’s with the Vatican giving letters, instructions and indults on the matter begin in 1969.
I’ll give you links to brief histories on the matter from two ideologically opposed sources:
and
The New Liturgical Movement blog.
In brief, the United States bishops came to permitting this practice far later than others around the world - 1977. There had been previous attempts:
1970 - a majority of US bishops approved it, but it was at the 2/3 level required.
It was considered again in 1973, rejected, then finally approved in 1977:
Communion in the hand was authorized eight years ago in a Vatican document that expressed the hope that the practice might increase among Catholics "the sense of their dignity as members of the mystical body of Christ (the Church)."
Since that time, it has been authorized in 53 countries of the world, including most of Europe, Canada and Mexico. The hierarchy in each country or region must request Vatican approval to introduce the practice in their area.
Twice before - in 1970 and 1973 - the American hierarchy failed to approve communion in the hand, which most church leaders concede is practiced widely despite the lack of official sanction.
A St. Louis Review article on the introduction in the Archdiocese in October, 1977:
Cardinal Carberry emphasized that “Communion in the hand is an option, and that the customary method of receiving Communion on the tongue is to be available to our people at all times.” The Cardinal called implementation of the option "an opportunity to again instruct our people on the value of the Eucharist and the devotion which we should have to Our Blessed Lord present in the Holy Sacrament of the altar.”
A month later, some reactions:
In general, there were mixed reactions to the option, with some pastors reporting a majority of their parishioners opting for Communion in the hand while other pastors said communicants by tongue were still in the majority in their parishes. Still other pastors thought parishioners reacted to the option about 50-50, neither method of receiving Communion clearly preferred. A frequent comment from the pastors was their surprise at the number of teenagers and young people who opted to continue receiving Communion on the tongue, while many older persons — more than the pastors said they expected — opted for Communion in the hand. The pastors also noted that there appeared to be no uniform procedure among husbands and wives, nor among families.
Many parents received Communion in the hand while their children received Communion on the tongue, and the opposite was true also. Many of those contacted by the Review said their parishioners had strong favorable reaction to the cassette tape on the Communion option prepared by John Joseph Cardinal Carberry and played at Masses last weekend.
Ah, the cassette tape catechesis - right up there with filmstrip catechesis.
Along with pamphlets. Here are a couple of examples which I was able to find via Ebay.
Click on the gallery photos for larger images - sorry they are cut off at the bottom, but that’s the way they are on the listing.
Also…that second pamphlet - those from that publisher in that style were ubiquitous. Who published them?
Anyway:
I would just like to point out a couple of things.
First, if you dive into the explanations and rationales, you can see - as we see with almost all elements of the Liturgical Movement and the post Vatican II liturgical changes - the stated intention was to help the laity deepen faith and the clear expectation was that of course it would do so.
Secondly, that very fact is an good caution, isn’t it?
Unintended consequences, human nature, as well as social, cultural and institutional realities do have a habit of wreaking havoc on our ideals.
So…my memories?
Scant. Which is interesting, because it seem to show that even though we were not receiving Communion in the hand before 1977 in Knoxville, Tennessee, it did not feel like a big deal. It doesn’t stick in my memory as such, at least.
I was a senior in a Catholic high school in the south, and I don’t remember when this was - probably the fall - that the priest/principal gave us instructions on receiving in the hand in our religion class.
He stood at the front of the classroom - a very large fellow - and quoted St. Cyril, demonstrating how to make “the left hand a throne for the right, which receives the King.”
And…that’s all I remember. What did just occur to me was that even before this, some seniors had been designated as Eucharistic ministers during school Masses. This had started before my senior year - it was permitted in the US beginning in 1971 - so perhaps that was the reason it doesn’t stick in my emotional memory as a big deal for a lay person - even a teenager - to touch the Host.
(I did not pass muster, in case you are interested, and was not admitted to the EM ranks as a high school senior. Yes, I was bitter. Perhaps that explains my career ever since? Who knows.)
So there you go.
Do you have any memories of this change?
“6. The Communion
The actual communion, as long as the Eucharist had the form of a real meal, was accomplished by the passing of the consecrated elements from hand to hand. When it became a formal act, it was prefaced (demonstrably as early as the end of the second century) by the bishop saying, “Holy things to holy persons” (from the Septuagint version of Lev. 24:9; cf. Matt. 7:6). The congregation answered, “One alone is holy,” etc., and then approached the altar, where they received the elements in their hands, standing. Great care was exercised to prevent a crum of the hallowed bread or a drop of the consecrated wine falling to the ground; in the reception of the former it was usual to place the left hand under the right in the form of a cross. The careful washing of the hands before communion was prescribed; and Cyril of Jerusalem instructs his catechumens to receive the chalice bowing low. The distribution of the elements was performed in Justin’s time by the deacons; but this function was withdrawn from them with the gradual growth of reverence for the elements and belief in priestly dignity and power. As a transitional stage, the deacons are found in some places entrusted with the administration of the chalice, as the less important. When a definite formula of administration came in is uncertain, though there are no traces of one in the apostolic age. The oldest was the simple statement; the formula is Hoc est corpus Christi, Hic est sanguis Christi. In the Apostolic Constitutions (VIII., xiii. 4) “body of Christ” for the bread, and “blood of Christ, cup of life” for the cup. In Mark the Hermit (c. 410) a longer formula occurs: “the holy blood of Jesus Christ for life eternal”; and in seventh-century Gaul a still further expansion, “May the Body and Blood of our Lord bring to thee remission of sin and eternal life” (Council of Rouen, can. ii.). Each communicant answered “Amen,” as an expression of faith. That the earliest use was to give first the cup and then the bread is shown by the Didache, and possibly by Luke 22:17 and 1 Cor. 10:16.” History is older than the 1960s, and the ancient practice was to receive the Gifts in the hands. Also, the Catholic Church is bigger than the Western, Roman Catholic Church. The 23 Eastern Catholic Churches have a wide variety of Eucharistic practices, and I ask you not o please study more deeply into the diversity and richness of the Church Universal.
Growing up in Zimbabwe as a mission territory, this wasn't much of an issue. Taking communion in the hand had been official practice since 1971. Some of the older Irish missionaries still followed earlier communion practices at remote outstations, but the Jesuits at Chishawasha who had worked in the country since 1877 and the more progressive Dominicans in the Eastern Highlands adopted Vatican II changes early on.
What was more divisive was inculturation and that involved adoption of the kurova guva ritual as an official Catholic rite in 1982. This was an indigenous Shona rite performed to welcome the spirit of the deceased into the family as a spirit elder, and to induct it into the community of the spirit ancestors. Again, for older clergy, this was an uneasy mix of cultural traditions; as a younger Shona and Ndebele priesthood replaced the older foreign missionaries, the rite became more familiar and accepted. Marian devotion remained as strong as ever.
Catholicism has a much longer history in Zimbabwe than in South Africa (characterised by Calvinism since the 1650s) and dates back to the Portuguese Jesuit missionary, Fr Gonçalo da Silveira, who worked to convert Shona people at the court of the Monomotapa dynasty until he was martyred in 1561. He had been influenced by the travels of St Francois Xavier, had served with Ignatius of Loyola in Goa and attributed the conversions among the Shona to the intercession of the Virgin Mary. The ruler Chisamharu Negomo and his mother greatly admired a painting of the Madonna shown to them by Fr da Silveira and Chisamharu claimed Our Lady smiled at him (something that always reminds me of the miracle claimed by St Therese of Lisieux who saw a statuette of Mary smile at her). Before he was killed, Fr da Silveira said Mass at least three times a day and had to improvise because, as with many far-flung missionary expeditions, wafers, bread and wine could not be obtained. The reverence was always there.
Sorry for the length of this post, happy Thanksgiving to all in the United States.