Our Practice Consistent with Our Faith

This morning I read Elizabeth Scalia on her blog on First Things called The Anchoress and was once again impressed with the sensibility of this woman and her commentary on the practices of the faithful...

Yesterday at Mass, my husband noticed that on the floor of our pew, by our feet, was a quarter of an unconsumed Host. He picked it up and consumed it.

Discussing it on the way home, my husband chose to think the best, not the worst. “Maybe [at a previous Mass] the wedge was part of Consecration Host, and it somehow got picked up with another one and missed, or dropped onto a sweater, or something.”

My husband is always quick to think the best, especially when a matter is too troubling to consider, otherwise. We don’t want to think the worst, that someone simply threw the Blessed Sacrament on the floor, or had casually nibbled at the Host, as though it were a cookie – although such things do, sadly, happen.  Nevertheless it brought home to us, again, the reasonableness of receiving the Eucharist by mouth, rather than by hand.

Ms. Scalia is a perceptive individual but her comments are not merely reflective of the practice of the Roman Catholic faith.  What she and her husband saw and the reaction of her husband was entirely consistent with and consonant with the faith and practice of Dr. Martin Luther.  Sadly, it is not the ordinary practice of those who call themselves Lutherans today...

That which is believed is either confirmed in the practice of the believer or contradicted by practice.  In the case of Lutherans, we have a history and heritage of reverence and devotion to the sacred species of the Sacrament that has distinct implications for our practice.  Luther once took a hatchet to wood that was stained with the blood of Christ from a chalice spill.  He was known to take to task and raise holy hell with those who treated consecrated hosts as unconsecrated and vica versa.  He came down consistently on the side of consecrating only what is though to be needed for the Supper and for the consumption of all that remains (though Lutherans debate where this must take place immediately within or after the Communion or later in distribution to the sick or others not at the Eucharist).  But, again, such is not the regular and normal practice of Lutherans today...

I have been a communicant at parish Eucharists and circuit winkels in which the host box was overflowing with hosts -- far in excess of the number of communicants present or even possible in that setting.  I shuddered to think what happened to that which remained (the reliquae).  Stacks and stacks of trays of individual cups adorn the altar just in case and what happens to that which has been set aside with the Word of Christ and prayer?  Who knows?!  We have much to clean up in our practices...

In both parishes where I have served, I have taught the Altar Guild to individual cleanse every individual cup which has been drunk from and at the altar I have the assisting minister pour the contents of each unused individual cup back into the cruet and then the Altar Guild cleanses those as they would the ones used by a communicant.  This has naturally made most members of the Altar Guild less than thrilled by the continuance of the individual cups (which are used less and less each passing year without my words to encourage but only the faithful practice to point to the better choice).

As an aside, I was told by a seminary professor that he used the toilet off the vestry to take care of what was left from the Sacrament... Granted this was going on 40 years ago and things have changed but the shock of this admission has continued to stand as a warning marker against practices unfaithful with our Confession.

It has been my practice to carefully wipe all the crumbs of the paten and ciborium into the chalice and then consume all the remains of the chalice at the altar (during the final hymn or post-communion canticle).  When spills take place, and they seem always to happen despite our care and diligence, we react immediately.  The congregation has seen me pick up a dropped host and consume it.  The people at the rail and in the pew have watched me drop to the floor and cleanse a spill with the purificator (an extra one is on the altar for just such occasion). 

Ms. Scalia and her husband instinctively knew what to do with a piece of a host they found on the floor.  Ick... some might think... but piety trumps this consideration every time.  Would Lutherans know to do this?  Would they act in an instinctive way as did these Roman Catholics?  We should.  Our faith and the practice of the Reformers would expect us to act in this manner when faced with such a circumstance.  If our people do not think this way, it is perhaps the tip of the iceberg toward an understanding of the presence of Christ in the host and cup that are in violation with our Confession.... Just something to think about. . .