Dear Father,
I attended a wedding recently and the priest announced that only Catholics in the state of grace were allowed to come forward for Communion. Don’t you think that this kind of exclusion is why people are leaving the Church?
-Cameron
Dear Cameron,
You don’t say whether you are Catholic or even Christian, so I’m not sure if you felt this announcement was more personally directed to you or not. While the priest surely was not directing his announcement toward you specifically, most likely he was trying to help anyone who would not know what to do at a Catholic Mass.
Frequently, at wedding Masses and funeral Masses, many in attendance are not Catholic. All the various rubrics or directions for sitting, standing, kneeling, answering prayers and the rest surely can be confusing for a non-Catholic. Even we priests have to read Mass directions carefully for certain Masses year after year, such as on Palm Sunday or Holy Thursday.
For some strange reason, even Catholics who never miss Mass often become confused at wedding and funeral Masses. There are crickets at the end of the prayer to which they normally would respond with an Amen. They forget to sit for the first readings and to stand for the Gospel. Thus, many of us priests will give specific directions to everyone at funerals and weddings. We don’t want people to feel embarrassed by not knowing what to do at Mass. For this reason, worship aids, or programs, are often printed giving directions for the various postures at special Masses.
More important than knowing when to sit or stand or kneel is the reception of Holy Communion. Christ, the Son of God, instituted the most holy Eucharist as the supreme sacrament of His presence among us. At every Catholic Mass, Christ offers Himself as a sacrifice to His Father, just as He did on Good Friday when He died on the cross. At Mass, Christ’s offering is re-presented in an unbloody manner through the ordained Catholic priest. At our Masses, the bread and wine are changed completely into the Body and Blood of Christ, just has He did at the first Mass on Holy Thursday, the Last Supper.
Christ has commanded us to consume His Body and Blood, which is what we do when we receive Holy Communion, even if only under the sign of the consecrated bread or host. However, we need to be prepared to receive Christ in Communion. St. Paul says, “Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty concerning the body and blood of the Lord. Let a person examine himself then, and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment on himself. That is why many of you are weak and ill, and some have died.”
Those are sobering words! To receive Holy Communion in an unworthy manner means that we must be free from mortal or grave sin. St. Paul presumes, of course, that he is writing to Christians, that is, people who have been baptized and are members of the one Church.
Therefore, non-baptized persons and non-Catholics are excluded, according to the Bible. Even Catholics who have not gone to the sacrament of Confession and who have committed mortal sins are excluded, according to the Bible. The Church’s canon law stipulates the same.
I’m stressing that this is Biblical teaching so that you can see that it’s not the priest’s capricious decision to announce at Mass who may or may not receive Holy Communion. He’s doing it to protect people from greater harm by receiving Communion unworthily.
You spoke about “exclusion.” In some circles, exclusion has taken on a pejorative meaning, as if all exclusivity is wrong. Are single-sex bathrooms actually evil? Clearly, this can’t be correct. The State has no difficulty in excluding people with no vision from obtaining a driver’s license. The State excludes bars from serving alcohol to underage persons. The list goes on. Exclusion is meant for the protection of citizens. In the same way, you would refuse to give a shot of whiskey to a 10-year-old, and thus you would be acting exclusively.
So, it is with the Church and Holy Communion. Yes, the Church is necessarily exclusive on certain matters. We want everyone in the world to join us to worship God properly, but there is an orderly way to do that. We want everyone to come to our Thanksgiving dinner, but we must make sure that they are able to consume what we serve.
So, what should some not receiving Holy Communion do? The body of U.S. bishops encourages non-Catholic Christians “to express in their hearts a prayerful desire for unity with the Lord Jesus and with one another.” So, too, for non-Christians: “We ask them to offer their prayers for the peace and the unity of the human family.”