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Communion In The Hand

 I don’t do it. I have a disability. Nobody should want to drop a consecrated Host, but if you know that you’re more likely to drop one than almost everyone else, just receive on the tongue.

I don’t think that kneeling and receiving on the tongue is necessarily better, except to say that altering a body posture can alter a heart posture. In the main, that’s why we do it. To be somewhat funny about it, I would absolutely rather lick or bite the finger of a minister of Holy Communion than drop the Blessed Sacrament on the floor. Don’t worry about it, though; if Jesus were mostly ashamed of us, he wouldn’t show up at all.

I started reading some lay “trad” essay on Substack about how it’s somehow wrong to receive in the hand, and I stopped. Just precious self-important nonsense, as usual. Please feel free to lick your hand, if you do happen to receive in the hand, and you suspect there might be a crumb. Our Lord shouldn’t be left like a hobo, after all. We do seem to spend a good deal of time trying to impress each other with displays of our own purported reverence, besides.

I would say that it’s a benefit of attending a Traditional Latin Mass that Communion in the hand is not practiced. Less to be anxious about in the reception process itself. Otherwise, I have no authority, and no commands to give.

One obvious reason not to offer the lay faithful both the Host and chalice ordinarily is that it kind of inadvertently trains people to think that they receive part of Jesus in one, and part in the other. The bishops and popes have been trying to avoid the proliferation of this error since the Protestant tragedy over 500 years ago. I didn’t understand this, when I was a separated Christian. Liturgical idolatry that sometimes gains a foothold in certain circles reinforces clericalism as surely as any disdain for the laity in earlier times.

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