The wisdom of tradition
in the manner of receiving Holy Communion
a c o n v e r s a t i o n w i t h D R . P E T E R K WA S N I E W S K I
John-Henry Westen spoke with Dr. Peter Kwasniewski during Voice of the Family’s online conference “Love and reverence due to Our Lord”, held on 16 July 2020. JOHN-HENRY WESTEN: Could you give us, first of all, a short history of the manner in which Holy Communion has been received in the Church? DR. PETER KWASNIEWSKI: The early centuries of the Church don’t give us as full a picture as we would like to have. We have a lot of fragmentary evidence. It seems that there was a diversity of manners of receiving. Communion was received in the hand but in a very reverent manner, not in the way it is done today. However, we also have evidence from St. Ephraim the Syrian, from the liturgy of St. James, from St. Gregory the Great, and from some other Fathers of the Church that Communion was given in the mouth as well and that the clergy were the ones who most properly communicated with their own hands. The regional Council of Rouen in 878 mandated Communion in the mouth; the canons of the Coptic Church say “God forbid that any of the pearls”, by which they mean the consecrated fragments, “should adhere to the fingers or fall to the ground”. And even St. Cyril of Jerusalem, who is often quoted as a proponent of Communion in the hand, says the fragments are more precious than gold dust and that we should sooner lose one of our own members than lose any fragments. So, there is a very heightened awareness early on of the awesomeness of the Sacrament and in fact it is this growing sense of reverence that leads the Church over time, progressively, to restrict and, finally, to abolish Communion in the hand, except of course for the clergy. By the beginning of the second millennium, Communion in the mouth is universal for the laity, and in fact that goes along with a decrease in Communion under both kinds. That is, the host is received kneeling and on the tongue, and the chalice
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becomes more and more reserved just for the celebrating priest or bishop. Essentially, for the second millennium of Catholic history, it is always Communion on the tongue for the laity, out of honour for our Lord and in the spirit of adoration. JHW: Before we talk about how that got reversed, would you mind going a little bit more into the way Communion in the hand was condemned? PK: As I understand it, the earliest records we have don’t seem to condemn Communion in the hand so much as enjoining or requiring Communion in the mouth as the more reverent way. It is actually remarkable how universal the practice is in the second millennium – to the extent that it simply is not discussed anymore. What we are seeing here is, in my opinion, a clear example of organic development. That is, the Church under the guidance of the Holy Spirit responding more and more appropriately to the gifts that she has received. This is not to say that for the Christians in the third or fourth century it was wrong to do things the way they did, but they had not yet arrived at the most reverent, the safest and the most efficient way of giving Communion. We also have to bear in mind the practical question which is that there were far fewer communicants in the early Church. As the Church grew and spread and there were more and more faithful, the question arose: how are we going to give Communion to so many people? And as anyone can see who has been to a traditional Latin Mass, where all the faithful are lined up along a Communion rail, kneeling, and the priest goes right CAL X M A R IA E
