Sometimes some of us, after reading the passages of the Holy
Scriptures, particularly the New Testament, claim with the utter conviction
that at the time of Jesus Judaism was filled with so many laws that it was
impossible for an ordinary person to fulfill all the requirements of those
laws.
But
the truth to be told, Jewish people had only 613 commandments at that time.
They were the statements and principles of law, ethics, and spiritual practice
contained in the Torah
or Five Books of Moses, the Five First Books of our Old Testament. The 613
commandments were either "positive commandments" to perform an act or
"negative commandments" to abstain from certain acts. There were 365
negative commandments, corresponding to the number of days in a solar year,
and 248 positive commandments, ascribed to the number of bones and significant
organs in the human body.
In
our Catholic Tradition we have developed our own laws directing the live of the
Church and her faithful. Those laws are contained in so called the Code of
Canon Law. We have almost three times more laws/commandments/canons than the
Jewish people of Jesus' times had. We have 1752 canons, and thousands more
paragraphs explaining them even in more details.
As
I promised last weekend I would like to look with you, as we continue reading
chapter 6 of the gospel according to John, the Bread of Life Discourse, into
some of the laws of our church pertaining to the Eucharist. Since we have 62
canons devoted strictly to this subject I am intending to bring to your
attention only some of them. From time to time I will provide some further
interpretations of particular canons hoping that I am not in any error. If I am
in error please let me know so I can make necessary corrections in the next two
weeks during my reflection times and on my blog. I am not a Canon Lawyer. As I
also mentioned the last week the next weekend we will look closer at the basic
biblical interpretations of the Bread of Life Discourse. The interpretations
which complement the canons of our church.
So let us begin:
Can
897-the most August sacrament is
the Most Holy Eucharist in which Christ the Lord himself is contained, offered,
and received and by which the Church continually lives and grows. The
eucharistic sacrifice, the memorial of the death and resurrection of the Lord,
in which the sacrifice of the cross is perpetuated through the ages is the
summit and source of all worship and Christian life, which signifies and
effects the unity of the People of God and brings about the building up of the
body of Christ. Indeed, the other sacraments and all the ecclesiastical works
of the apostolate are closely connected with the Most Holy Eucharist and
ordered to it.
Canon
900-§1. The minister who is able
to confect the sacrament of the Eucharist in the person of Christ is a validly
ordained priest alone.
Can.
901 A priest is free to apply the
Mass for anyone, living or dead.
It means a Mass may be offered for living or
deceased, baptized or non-baptized, sinner or saint.
Can.
905 §1. A priest is not permitted to
celebrate the Eucharist more than once a day except in cases where the law
permits him to celebrate or concelebrate more than once on the same day.
§2. If there is a shortage of priests, the local ordinary can
allow priests to celebrate twice a day for a just cause, or if pastoral
necessity requires it, even three times on Sundays and holy days of obligation.
Can.906 Except for a just and reasonable cause, a priest is not to
celebrate the Eucharist sacrifice without the participation of at least some member
of the faithful.
In 1992 the Pontifical Council of the
Interpretation of Legislative Texts gave an authentic interpretation of another
canon, #220, paragraph 2, stating that women and girls could be altar servers
at Mass.
Can.
912 Any baptized person not
prohibited by law can and must be admitted to holy communion.
However this canon has to be supplemented by
Canon 844.
Can.
844 §1. Catholic ministers administer the
sacraments licitly to Catholic members of the Christian faithful alone, who
likewise receive them licitly from Catholic ministers alone, without prejudice
to the prescripts of §§2, 3, and 4 of this canon, and ⇒
can. 861, §2.
§2. Whenever necessity requires it
or true spiritual advantage suggests it, and provided that danger of error or
of indifferentism is avoided, the Christian faithful for whom it is physically
or morally impossible to approach a Catholic minister are permitted to receive
the sacraments of penance, Eucharist, and anointing of the sick from
non-Catholic ministers in whose Churches these sacraments are valid.
My understanding is that that means the
Eastern Churches such as Coptic, Ethopian, Maronite, Syriac, Armenian, Greek
Byzentine (22 different churches to be exact) and the Polish National Catholic
Church. But does not include Baptist, Methodist, Lutheran, Presbyterians,
Anglican, Episcopalian Churches, or any other Protestant Churches or non-denominational
churches at this time.
§4. If the danger of death is
present or if, in the judgment of the diocesan bishop or conference of bishops,
some other grave necessity urges it, Catholic ministers administer these same
sacraments licitly also to other Christians not having full communion with the
Catholic Church, who cannot approach a minister of their own community and who
seek such on their own accord, provided that they manifest Catholic faith in
respect to these sacraments and are properly disposed.
Can.
915 Those who have been
excommunicated or interdicted after the imposition or declaration of the
penalty and others obstinately persevering in manifest grave sin are not to be
admitted to holy communion.
I am pretty sure this is going to be brought
on numerous occasions due to the elections coming up this November. Also my understanding is that whenever this
penalty is applied the primacy of individual conscience has to be protected and
recognized, and the matters of any scandal have to be seriously taken under
consideration. Canon 916 addresses the
issue who should not receive the
communion in more details.
Can.
916 A person who is conscious of
grave sin is not to celebrate Mass or receive the body of the Lord without
previous sacramental confession unless there is a grave reason and there is no
opportunity to confess; in this case the person is to remember the obligation
to make an act of perfect contrition which includes the resolution of
confessing as soon as possible.
Can.
917 A person who has already
received the Most Holy Eucharist can receive it a second time on the same day
only within the eucharistic celebration in which the person participates.
Can.
919 §1. A person who is to receive the
Most Holy Eucharist is to abstain for at least one hour before holy communion
from any food and drink, except for only water and medicine.
To explain it further, the one-hour fast is
computed from the time of the completion of the consumption of food or drink
until the reception of communion.
§3. The elderly, the infirm, and
those who care for them can receive the Most Holy Eucharist even if they have
eaten something within the preceding hour.
Can.
920 §1. After being initiated into the
Most Holy Eucharist, each of the faithful is obliged to receive holy communion
at least once a year.
§2. This precept must be fulfilled
during the Easter season unless it is fulfilled for a just cause at another
time during the year.
The diocese of the United States have an
indult which allows the Easter duty to be satisfied from the First Sunday of
Lent to Trinity Sunday.
Can.
924 §1. The most holy eucharistic
sacrifice must be offered with bread and with wine in which a little water must
be mixed.
§2. The bread must be only wheat and
recently made so that there is no danger of spoiling.
§3. The wine must be natural from
the fruit of the vine and not spoiled.
Can.
927 It is absolutely forbidden,
even in extreme urgent necessity, to consecrate one matter without the other or
even both outside the Eucharistic celebration.
Can.
931 The celebration and
distribution of the Eucharist can be done at any day and hour except those
which the liturgical norms exclude.
The vigil Holy Day or Sunday mass cannot be
celebrated earlier than 4 pm. And to be considered the Vigil mass the proper
readings and prayers of the day have to be used.
Can. 938 §1. The Most Holy Eucharist is
to be reserved habitually in only one tabernacle of a church or oratory.
§2. The
tabernacle in which the Most Holy Eucharist is reserved is to be situated in
some part of the church or oratory which is distinguished, conspicuous,
beautifully decorated, and suitable for prayer.
Since
1977 it has been a requirement that new churches that are built have only one
altar, and the blessed sacrament is not to be reserved on the altar of
celebration. The liturgical laws strongly recommend a separate blessed
sacrament chapel as the most fitting place for Eucharistic reservation.
The Eastern Churches:
I. Alexandrean:
1. Coptic Church (Patriarchate): Cairo, Egypt
2. Ethiopian Catholic Church (Metropolia): Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, Eritrea
II. Antiochean or West Syrian:
1. Maronite Church (Patriarchate): Bkerke, Lebanon, Cyprus, Jordan, Israel,
Palestinian Authority, Egypt, Syria, Argentina, Brazil, United States,
Australia, Canada, Mexico (Never separated: union re-affirmed 1182)
2. Syriac Church (Patriarchate): Beirut, Lebanon, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait,
Palestinian Authority, Egypt, Sudan, Syria, Turkey, United States and Canada,
Venezuela
3.
Syro-Malankara Church (Major
Archepiscopate): Trivandrum, India, United States
III. Armenian:
1. Armenian Church (Patriarchate): Beirut, Lebanon, Iran, Iraq, Egypt, Syria,
Turkey, Jordan, Palestinian Authority, Ukraine, France, Greece, Latin America,
Argentina, Romania, United States, Canada, Eastern Europe
IV. Chaldean or East Syrian:
1. Chaldean Church (Patriarchate): Baghdad,
Iraq, Iran, Lebanon, Egypt, Syria, Turkey,
United States
2.
Syro-Malabar Church (Major
Archepiscopate): Ernakulam, India, Middle East, Europe, America (Never
separated)
V. Byzantine or Constantinopolitan:
1. Albanian Church (Apostolic Administration): Albania
2. Belarusian Church (No established hierarchy at present): Belarus
3. Bulgarian Church (Apostolic Exarchate): Sofia,
Bulgaria
4. Križevci Church (An Eparchy and an Apostolic Exarchate): Križevci, Ruski
Krstur, Croatia, Serbia, and Montenegro
5. Greek Byzantine Church (Two Apostolic Exarchates): Athens, Greece, Turkey
6. Hungarian Church (An Eparchy and an Apostolic Exarchate): Nyiregyháza, Hungary
7. Italo-Albanian Church (Two Eparchies and a Territorial Abbacy): Italy (Never
separated)
8. Macedonian Church (An Apostolic Exarchate): Skopje, Republic of Macedonia
9. Melkite Greek Church (Patriarchate): Damascus, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan,
Israel, Brazil, United States, Canada, Mexico, Iraq, Egypt and Sudan, Kuwait,
Australia, Venezuela, Argentina
10. Romanian Church (Major Archiepiscopate): Blaj,
Romania, United States
11. Russian Church (Two Apostolic Exarchates, at present with no published hierarchs):
Russia, China; currently about 20 parishes and communities scattered around the
world, including five in Russia itself, answering to bishops of other jurisdictions
12. Ruthenian Church (A sui juris Metropolia, an Eparchy, and an Apostolic
Exarchate): Uzhhorod, Pittsburgh, United States, Ukraine, Czech Republic
13. Slovak Church (Metropolia and an eparchy): Prešov, Slovakia, Canada
14. Ukrainian Catholic Church (Major Archiepiscopate): Kiev, Ukraine, Poland,
United States, Canada, Great Britain, Australia, Germany and Scandinavia, France,
Brazil, Argentina
