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Tuesday, August 24, 2004

"I'll take a rice, please; hold the wheat." Every so often, the celiac allergy child is put in the crossfire between liturgical rigorists, campaigning parents, and parish priests. I don't have an easy answer for the situation in which a person who is seriously harmed by the consumption of wheat gluten can't receive the Body of Christ at Mass. To begin with, there is some inflexibility: - Communicants insisting on rice hosts. - Parents insisting on no "wine." - Bishops making a public spectacle and churning up more scandal. The best I can come up with is this: - All Catholic Masses everywhere, even 100,000 people praying with the pope, could offer Communion under both forms. The last thing we need is a celiac sufferer to see the pope and not get Communion. The best thing would be for the practice of offering Communion under both forms to be more strongly reinforced. - Even school Masses, notorious for a particular liturgical shortcut, should offer Communion under both forms -- all the time. - It might not hurt to set up a theological commission to look into the possibility of rice. We're not talking donuts or pizza here. - Contact the Benedictine sisters of Clyde, Missouri (they're in my neighborhood) and get some of their very, very low gluten hosts. And a memo to bishops: this isn't about the disintegration of sacramental life. Honest. It is possible to stick to the sacramental truth and not bully people about it.

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