Catholic sacrament of the week.

Quote: AZDuffman

This makes an interesting question I wondered about from time to time. As both host and wine are "complete" is there a purpose for receiving both at Mass? When I grew up, the wine was only at certain masses, the 9:30 IIRC, and others for occasional times. Everybody took the host but maybe half passed on the wine. So, other than the re-enactment aspect of The Last Supper, is there a major purpose to receiving both?

Vatican II encouraged the faithful to be able to receive from the chalice but probably more than half pass on receiving. The reason they gave was to emphasize the full symbolism of the meal characteristic of the Last Supper.

Quote: FrGamble

The Crusades and Inquisitions while awful, especially to our modern eyes,

The Church didn't tolerate competition and went
to any means possible to wipe it out. They wanted
a religious monopoly and had one in their part
of the world for a very long time.

Quote: FrGamble

You forget also that the Church encouraged science

Is that what you call this?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Condemnations_of_1210%E2%80%931277

Oddly enough, the Church banning certain aspects
of scientific thought had a positive effect in that it
made people start looking at things differently,
scientifically. Historians consider this period the
beginning of modern science. Not what the Church
intended at all.

Maybe not what the University of Paris might have wanted, but the development of modern science was what God wanted.

Quote: FrGamble

Maybe not what the University of Paris might have wanted, but the development of modern science was what God wanted.

LOL! Good answer, it's the catchall answer. I've
heard ministers use it, my minister father in
law uses it. Man made a mistake, so god corrected
it by making the mistake go in the right direction.
And you can't argue because it can't be proven.

Al Gore does it with Global Warming. Every weather
event, every storm, points to GW. Who can argue,
you can't prove it either way. There's a name for
these kind of arguments, I can't remember what it is.

Quote: FrGamble

Vatican II encouraged the faithful to be able to receive from the chalice but probably more than half pass on receiving. The reason they gave was to emphasize the full symbolism of the meal characteristic of the Last Supper.

Clear, concise answer, thanks!

As to passing, many people do not like the communal cup. One of my parents asked why they had to do it that way, the reason given was "tradition." When we visited family in another state and Diocese the church there had the wine in shot glasses. A little difference in logistics but in the end the Sacrament was the same.

Does the Church still practice the Communion
of Saints? Where the members in the Church
and in Purgatory ask the saints to help them
out through prayer. I always wondered how
the saints know they're saints. They weren't
when they died, but got voted in later.

Kind of strange.

Quote: AZDuffman

Clear, concise answer, thanks!

As to passing, many people do not like the communal cup. One of my parents asked why they had to do it that way, the reason given was "tradition." When we visited family in another state and Diocese the church there had the wine in shot glasses. A little difference in logistics but in the end the Sacrament was the same.

I've never heard of a Catholic Church using the tiny shot glasses I have seen in Protestant Churches. In fact I think doing that is against the liturgical rules. If people are worried about sharing a communal cup they usually just don't partake. One interesting method that was used back in the day was straws. If you go the Vatican museum you can see examples of this. For every chalice there were ministers standing on either side, one with clean metal straws and you would take one, take from the chalice and then deposit the used straw into another container. There have been many studies done about sharing wine from the metal chalice and all of them have pretty much showed that shaking hands is the most dangerous thing done at Mass.

Communion of the saints is the same thing that any Christian does when they ask another person to pray for them. The saints know they are saints because they are in Heaven and you don't need to Canonized (officially declared a saint) to be a saint.

So the saints job when in heaven is to look
down on Church members and help them
out? Kind of like watching a really bad reality
show.

Quote: FrGamble

I've never heard of a Catholic Church using the tiny shot glasses I have seen in Protestant Churches. In fact I think doing that is against the liturgical rules. If people are worried about sharing a communal cup they usually just don't partake. One interesting method that was used back in the day was straws. If you go the Vatican museum you can see examples of this. For every chalice there were ministers standing on either side, one with clean metal straws and you would take one, take from the chalice and then deposit the used straw into another container. There have been many studies done about sharing wine from the metal chalice and all of them have pretty much showed that shaking hands is the most dangerous thing done at Mass.

We were all amazed when we saw it, same reason as you give. But that was how they did it. I have heard of priests and churches bending the rules on various things and the Diocese or Vatican were very limited in what they could do because it was so popular with that Parish. Similar to how you can often not fire your top salesman who drives you nuts but doesn't outright break policy.

I wish I could remember where this church was. If I had to guess I would say Oakland County, MI. This was also 30 years ago.

Shaking hands is probably more dangerous. I did wonder if the "purifiers" as they called them that they used to wipe the chalice, as well as crosses on the Good Friday Service, was ever "treated" with something. I thought I used to smell a small odor when we opened a drawer of them to set Mass up, like they were treated with disinfectant or something.