BOSTON (CNS): A family in the United States has left the Catholic Church after a public row in which their daughter, with a disease preventing her from eating gluten, was not allowed to receive Communion made without wheat.
Jennifer Richardson, 5, has celiac disease. She can’t eat anything with gluten in it.
The Catholic Church requires that hosts for the Eucharist be made of wheat with gluten.
Last year Jenny’s parents, Doug and Janice Richardson, registered Jenny in first Communion class at St Patrick’s parish in Natick, a Boston suburb.
They spoke to the pastor about her condition and asked him to substitute a rice wafer for the wheat host for her first Communion. They offered to make the rice wafers.
The pastor, Fr Dan Twomey, said that was not possible because only wheat is allowed. He said Jenny could, however, receive Communion only under the form of wine, as many others with celiac disease do.
The Richardsons rejected that solution and have joined the United Methodist Church, to which Doug Richardson belonged before they got married.
When Fr Twomey informed Boston Cardinal Bernard F. Law of the case, the cardinal wrote to the Richardsons. He reaffirmed the Church’s position but asked them to reconsider their decision and speak again with their pastor. They declined.
