ON the ecclesial level, for quite a number of years, locally, it has been pointed out that throngs of faithful line up to receive Holy Communion at Sunday Masses.
This scene is most heartening indeed. But in all honesty, without passing any rash judgment, in comparison, it has also been sadly remarked that very few frequent the First Rite of the Sacrament of Reconciliation.
Indeed, the Third Rite became a popular ‘penitential’ feature in many churches which was a spiritually enjoyable devotion for those labouring only with venial sins, but for those penitents, burdened with grave sin or sins, was not viable; the latter needed the articulate confession, priestly absolution and penance imposed.
It was timely and beneficial when, abiding by the instructions of the Holy See, some local bishops clamped down sternly on the abuse or malpractice of the Third Rite which is only permissible in cases of emergency, as it was before.
Every conscientious Catholic should know that the reception of the Body and Blood of Christ in Holy Communion requires a soul cleansed from serious sin in a state of grace.
Repeatedly, the Holy Father has warned that unbridled secularism has infiltrated in the Church and corroded the very core of religiosity and reverence towards God, with moral values in families’ lives and society tossed out of the window.
The spiritual crisis concerning the lack of deep faith in the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist and its reception in Holy Communion is not a matter of scruples but of sacrilege committed by the lukewarm Catholic in a state of grievous sin.
From the early stages of Christianity, it has always been the normal catechetical instructions by the Church to nurture deep faith in the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist among the faithful who in turn most fervently received Holy Communion regularly with dignity. But looking back on Church history, sadly we come across some exaggerations and inordinate, though sincere, practices among some early Christians who refrained from regular Holy Communion out of fear of not being worthy enough.
Around 250 AD, a view arose that the Eucharist was ‘too’ sacred to be received by sinful men and women. This opinion began to circulate in Antioch in Syria, adjacent to Palestine.
There is evidence that within 50 years (284-305 AD) it had penetrated into Scythia, near the mouth of the Danube and even into Spain, for at the Council at Elvira in 305 AD, a penance of temporary excommunication is passed against anyone staying away from the sacrament ‘for three Sundays’.
In Egypt, still in the force of the old ways but being influenced by the new St Macarius around 340 AD, punished a woman who had gone five weeks without communicating (Hist Laus 17). But in Antioch itself, in 341 AD, people were being excommunicated for ‘entering the church and listening to the Scriptures … but refusing participation in the communal prayer and Communion’.
Again at an important anti-Arian council held at Sardica (Asia Minor) in 343 AD, a ban of excommunication is decreed against any person going three Sundays without ‘attending the Mass’. In 348 AD, St Cyril of Jerusalem, in his famous Sermons for Neophytes, inculcates the notions of ‘fear and dread’ in connection with the celebration of ‘the dread mysteries’.
But at the same time, in 340 AD, St Hilary is fearlessly telling his people in faraway Poitiers that ‘the Eucharist is our daily Bread, and what does God wish more but that Christ, who is Bread of life and our Bread come down from heaven, should daily dwell in us?’
But returning to the prevalent irreverence of those who dare to receive the Eucharist in the state of grievous sin when confession is readily available, it is most pertinent that Catholics seriously realise that without a sense of sin, it would be impossible to appreciate how Jesus, the Son of God and a member of the human race, by his death on Calvary redeemed us through his victory over death and sin.
All evil is the sum of all sin, the redeeming love of Christ is infinitely greater. Personal sin is a part of the life of all human beings Scripture tells us. ‘If we say we are without sin we deceive ourselves, the truth is not then within us’ (1 Jn 8-10).
A loss of a sense of sin leads to religious indifference and induces a person to look down on essential religious tenets as trivia; it undermines the whole of Christian life.
Without a sense of sin it would be impossible to appreciate the Church’s identity and cherish its indispensable mandate given by Jesus Christ to reconcile sinners, the wonderful gift of the Sacrament of Penance which is the ‘sole ordinary means by which one of the faithful who is conscious of great sin is reconciled with God and with the Church’ (Catechism 1484).
Commenting on the decline in the sense of sin and relevancy of Christian values, Pope John Paul II in a post-synodal exhortation, Reconcilistio et Paenitentia (1984), claims that ‘secularism’ is the principal influence contributing to a loss of a sense of sin, and hence the urge to confess to a priest.
When the present Pope was Archbishop of Krakow, one day after correcting a priest of a grave misdemeanour, he invited the young priest to share a prayer with him and then asked him: ‘Father would you please hear my confession?’ The stunned priest obliged and gave absolution to the future Pope John Paul II.
A worldwide popular saint who kept in the highest esteem the Catholic priesthood, showed the utmost reverence to the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist and gratefully appreciated the supernatural gift of the Sacrament of Penance was St Francis of Assisi.
Considering himself as utterly unworthy, he refused to be ordained a priest himself, but encouraged other friars to prepare themselves piously and humbly and become priests.
In order to be in the state of grace when receiving Holy Communion, Francis exhorted the sinner, friar and layman to go to confession to a priest who alone can absolve from sin. ‘We ought to confess all our sins to a priest … because the power of binding and loosing has been conceded to priests only’ (The Rule of 1221).
St Francis’ deep respect for priests is evident in his Writings. ‘I am determined to reverence, love and honour priests as my superiors … I refuse to consider their sins … I do this because, in this world, I cannot see the Most High God with my own eyes, except for his Most Holy Body and Blood which they receive and they alone administer to others’ (W67).
Writing to priest friars, he strongly advised them to treat the Eucharist with utter respect: ‘Kissing your feet, I beg you to show the greatest reverence and honour for the Body and Blood of Our Lord Jesus Christ and implore all my friars who are priests … to be free from all earthly affection when they say Mass’ (W104).
Then to all friars he wrote: ‘Our whole being should be seized with fear, the whole world should tremble and heaven should rejoice when Christ, the son of the living God is present on the altar in the hands of the priest’ (Ibid).
Francis’ love for Christ was the centre of his life. In atonement for the sins of the world, his passion to share suffering on the cross was rewarded to him by the long agony of the stigmata on Mt Alvernia. ‘Francis burned with love that came from his whole being for the Sacrament of the Body and Blood of Jesus and he was carried away with wonder at the loving condescension and the most condescending love shown here’ (2 Cel 201).
In his book “Richest of Poor Man: The Spirituality of St Francis of Assisi”, the retired Anglican Archbishop, John R.H. Moorman, admiring St Francis’ utter humility, poverty and intense love for Christ crucified, present in the Eucharist, as an edifying compliment, called the Franciscan order a ‘Eucharistic Movement in the Church’.
On the model of St Francis’ love for the Eucharist, may all Catholics deepen their appreciation of the sacrament Our Lord gave us and, by good example, strive to lead others to be proud of their Catholic faith and be worthy members of the mystical body of Christ, Our Lord and Redeemer.
Fr Sebastian Camilleri is a Franciscan Friar and chaplain at the Assisi Centre, in Rosanna, Victoria.
