Lenten Practices

Our second question comes from a female who’s name is Theresa from New Jersey.

She asks:

 Did the Catholic Church change the rules regarding not eating meat on Friday all year i long as opposed to just the Lenten season?

I do feel as if there is a deeper question under this question.  I do feel as if we have to answer where did the tradition of lent come about and why it is celebrated.

Where did lent come from?

Right after Jesus gets baptized Jesus does go into the desert and does something supernatural, he fasts from food or drink for 40 days and 40 nights and with holds and fights temptation from satan in the desert.  Showing him to be the better and true and more glorious moses.

The bible does say that the savior will be like Moses and God will visit his people “The LORD your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your fellow Israelites. You must listen to him. For this is what you asked of the LORD your God at Horeb on the day of the assembly when you said, “Let us not hear the voice of the LORD our God nor see this great fire anymore, or we will die.”

-Deuteronomy 18:15-16

We later see this bare in fruition in the New Testament with Jesus Christ in many people that Christ is God and that he is the light Moses spoke of first in Matthew 1 where the angel Gabriel tells blessed ever virgin mother of us all Marry to name Jesus  Emmanuel “God be with us.” and in John 1 where it states:

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.  He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind.  The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.”

-John 1:1-5

That being said after the great exodus when Moses lead all of Israel out of Egypt across the parted sea he spent 40 years in the desert.  To prove that he is the better Moses he gets baptized representing that movement in and out of the water and then spends 40 days with out eating  and in prayer showing that he can stay faithful to his father and see the promise land something Moses failed to do.

As Christ’s disciples we are to follow Christ’s lead.  If we are truly christians we follow after what the lord does.  We bare our cross and fast from something for that time period but we don’t stop after that. Early first century christians followed this tradition from scripture and some of our brothers and sisters in the Marianite, Oriental, and African rites do fast completely for that forty days and hold daily gatherings that can last up to a half day.  Here are some church father quotes on lent from the earliest Christians:

“Do as your lord does.”

-Ignatious of Antioch (35-108 AD)

“Do not abandon the 40 days fast but you should fast every third day of the week and fifth.”

-Justin Martyr (100-165 AD)

“As we are therefore beginning this sacred season, dedicated to the purification of the soul, let us be careful to fulfill the Apostolic command that we cleanse ourselves from all defilement of the flesh and of the spirit (IICor. 7:11), so that restraining the conflict that exists between the one and the other substance, the soul, which in the Providence of God is meant to be the ruler of the body, may regain the dignity of its rightful authority, so that, giving offense to no man, we may not incur the contumely of evil mongers. With just contempt shall we be tormented by those who have no faith, and from our wickedness evil tongues will draw weapons to wound religion, if the way of life of those who fast be not in accord with what is needed in true self-denial. For the sum total of our fasting does not consist in merely abstaining from food. In vain do we deny our body food if we do not withhold our heart from iniquity, and restrain our lips that they speak no evil.” – St. Leo the Great – ‘Lent the Season of Purification 

We can clearly see that the earliest Christians did celebrate lent and did in fact  they did partake in it pre council of Nicea and pre 325 AD and pre 329 when scripture was officially compiled.

Where does the tradition of fasting from meet every Wednesday and Friday come from?

Fasting from certain foods is  a biblical and phenomenal  discipline. For instance in Daniel 10:2-3 we see, “In those days I, Daniel, was mourning for three weeks. I ate no delicacies, no meat or wine entered my mouth, nor did I anoint myself at all, for the full three weeks.” Catholics engage in a practice quite similar to Daniel’s when, as a way of commemorating Christ’s Crucifixion on a Friday and doing it in memory of Christ, they abstain from eating meat on that day of the week during Lent. The fish is a symbol of Christ.

The Ash Wednesday practice of having an individual’s forehead signed with the sign of the cross with the  ashes has a biblical parallel. Putting ashes on the individual’s head was a common biblical expression of mourning (1 Sm 13:19, Est 4:1, Is 61:3; see also Est 4:3, Jer 6:26, Ez 27:30, Dn 9:3, Mt 11:21, Lk 10:13). By having and displaying the sign of the cross made with ashes on their foreheads, Catholics mourn Christ’s suffering on the cross and their own sins, which made that suffering necessary.

Has the church changed her teachings on obtaining from meat on Fridays and Wednesdays on lent?

No

Has the church changed her teachings on obtaining from meat on Fridays and Wednesdays during the remainder of the liturgical year?

 

According to the  1983 Code of Canon Law specifies the obligations of Latin Rite Catholics

Canon 1250  All Fridays through the year and the time of Lent are penitential days and times throughout the entire Church.

Canon 1251  Abstinence from eating meat or another food according to the prescriptions of the conference of bishops is to be observed on Fridays throughout the year unless (nisi) they are solemnities; abstinence and fast are to be observed on Ash Wednesday and on the Friday of the Passion and Death of Our Lord Jesus Christ.

Canon 1252  All persons who have completed their fourteenth year are bound by the law of abstinence; all adults are bound by the law of fast up to the beginning of their sixtieth year. Nevertheless, pastors and parents are to see to it that minors who are not bound by the law of fast and abstinence are educated in an authentic sense of penance.

Can. 1253  It is for the conference of bishops to determine more precisely the observance of fast and abstinence and to substitute in whole or in part for fast and abstinence other forms of penance, especially works of charity and exercises of piety.

In order to be a practicing catholic you do need to fulfill the five precepts of the church.  The five precepts are:

1.You shall attend Mass on Sundays and on holy days of obligation.

2.You shall confess your sins at least once a year.

3.You shall receive the sacrament of the Eucharist at least once during the Easter season.

4.You shall observe the days of fasting and abstinence established by the Church.

5.You shall help to provide for the needs of the Church.

Friday and Wednesday are days of fasting and abstinence set up by the church.  Therefor the church did not change its teachings.

The First Crack At It

Our first question comes from a woman from New Jersey who’s name is Theresa  and she asks:

Why did the Catholic church changed her rules about receiving communion from mouth only now to the hands?

Communion-in-the-hand has the stamp of approval by the Holy See as one of the options for the United States, and for many other countries, including Italy. Reception of the communion via the lounge is still appropriate.

In the document:”En reponse a la demande,” to presidents of those conferences of bishops petitioning the indult for communion in the hand, 29 May 1969: AAS 61 (1969) 546-547; Not 5 (1969) 351-353. it states:

“The option offered to the faithful of receiving the Eucharistic bread in their hand and putting it into their own mouth must not turn out to be the occasion for regarding it as ordinary bread or as just another religious article. Instead this option must increase in them a consciousness of the dignity of the members of Christ’s Mystical Body, into which they are incorporated by baptism and by the grace of the Eucharist. It must also increase their faith in the sublime reality of the Lord’s body and blood, which they touch with their hand. Their attitude of reverence must measure up to what they are doing.”

When a protestant asks you “do you have an intimate relationship with Jesus?” you can proudly say yes.  The reason to sum it up why the communion is received on the hands as a viable option is because it does show a deep profoundness of the fact that we do carry Christ with in us as the true body of believers.  As you engage your senses you should be reminded of this reality that your relationship with Christ is real and you can touch and feel the lord and his substance and that it is real not only in the eucharist but in life (the mass is a visible proclamation of our faith) . It also has to do with our dignity as well we come with out stretched arms with emptiness begging for the bread of life partaking it and being satisfied and ready to take that out into the world in a few moments, this increases the reverence as well.

It is not irreverence but it adds another element to the reverence. Communion on tongue is still normative and is still enforced lightly.  Communion on the hand should be taken.

The question has to be asked now did the church fathers and the patristic writings teach anything on reception of the communion?  Yes they did, let us examine these two quotes:

“It is good and beneficial to communicate every day, and to partake of the holy body and blood of Christ For He distinctly says, He that eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life. John 6:54 And who doubts that to share frequently in life, is the same thing as to have manifold life. I, indeed, communicate four times a week, on the Lord’s day, on Wednesday, on Friday, and on the Sabbath, and on the other days if there is a commemoration of any Saint. It is needless to point out that for anyone in times of persecution to be compelled to take the communion in his own hand without the presence of a priest or minister is not a serious offense, as long custom sanctions this practice from the facts themselves. All the solitaries in the desert, where there is no priest, take the communion themselves, keeping communion at home. And at Alexandria and in Egypt, each one of the laity, for the most part, keeps the communion, at his own house, and participates in it when he likes. For when once the priest has completed the offering, and given it, the recipient, participating in it each time as entire, is bound to believe that he properly takes and receives it from the giver. And even in the church, when the priest gives the portion, the recipient takes it with complete power over it, and so lifts it to his lips with his own hand. It has the same validity whether one portion or several portions are received from the priest at the same time.”

–To the Patrician Cæsaria, concerning Communion.

I just quoted something rather large but according to one of our holy church fathers Saint Basil under these two circumstances it is appropriate to receive the eucharist in hand:

1) under times of persecution where no priest is present
2) for hermits and ascetics in the wilderness who do not have priests

The guidelines set up by another church father St. Cyril for receiving eucharist in hand is this:

“When thou goest to receive communion go not with thy wrists extended, nor with thy fingers separated, but placing thy left hand as a throne for thy right, which is to receive so great a King, and in the hollow of the palm receive the body of Christ, saying, Amen.”

–Catechesis mystagogicaV, xxi-xxii, Migne Patrologia Graeca 33

In conclusion the church did not make it mandatory to change the way the communion is received from the tongue to the hands rather the practice has always been there but some how it has crept into the church. So it is not wrong to do either but it is only wrong to receive the communion in hand if there is a priest present and if you aren’t a hermit.

I do not know who is to blame, that isn’t my job my job is to defend the church with my life by not only being a white martyr but by willing to be a red martyr for the church.  My job  on this blog is to clear up misconceptions and to defend attacks given to the church any way possible.

Man is sinful but not totally corrupt and due to this culture we live on which avoids getting on our knees and humbling ourselves and doing what others do it is only natural this happens, have faith with proper catechesis and discipleship this will be solved.