My only surprise at the news that 1300 parishoners at a Catholic Church were exposed to Hepatitis A is that this kind of thing isn’t reported more often. Sharing the same cup of wine among hundreds of communicants probably infects thousands every Sunday, but since it’s just with colds or the flu, it escapes media attention.
This is another case where behavior that’s been accepted for decades from a church wouldn’t be tolerated for a moment if attempted by a private institution. Imagine, for instance, if a grocery store offered samples of grape juice from the same cup. The same people who happily eat the body and drink the blood on Sunday would be calling the health department or complaining to store management.
TR
Seriously. I haven’t taken wine at Mass in 20 years.
Cat Lady
Transubstantiation FAIL.
wonkie
What cat lady said.
joe from Lowell
What TR said.
There are still parishes that offer the cup to everyone at Sunday mass?
ChrisS
Thankfully, I spend my sunday mornings sleeping off whiskey hangovers and repairing the holes in the drywall from the night before.
Anya
OT, but this Health Reform Explained Video: “Health Reform Hits Main Street” by The Kaiser Family Foundation is simple and useful to demystify the health care act.
mistermix
@joe from Lowell: I’m only there for weddings and funerals, but the local Catholic church I last attended still does.
SiubhanDuinne
@Cat Lady: Brilliant! Early as it is, I think you win the day.
@thread, assuming anyone here knows: Do the Presbyterians still pass around little shot glasses of Welch’s grape juice and cubes of Wonder Bread for their (rare) communion services?
anon
OT: was watching the “Today Show” this morning (only because was trying to get one of the toddlers to finish her milk). One of the first Rethuglicans they had on in a one-on-one re the change of power was McCain. God, the media love sucking that guy’s cock.
damn good mr. jam
There’s alcohol in the wine. Is the problem with the fingers that deliver the bread?
anon
I thought Hep A spreads via the oral-fecal route. Like someone working at a restaurant doesn’t wash his hands after taking a crap.
Naively, this would seem to be “oral-oral,” though I guess maybe someone stuck his hands on the lip of the cup…
dr. bloor
@Cat Lady:
Maybe Jeebus had Hep A.
Dave
@joe from Lowell: Absolutely. And not just RCs. I am Episcopalian and they offer the cup. But more often than not we just dip the wafer into the cup. I don’t see many people straight drinking it now.
anon
@damn good mr. jam:
I don’t think alcohol is necessarily that much of a disinfectant. It’s a virus, not a bacterium, and it’s not like the alcohol in the wine is that concentrated or carefully wiped along the lip.
…OK, from a google search: “Generally, enveloped (lipophilic) viruses are susceptible to alcohol: Herpes simplex virus (HSV), human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), influenza virus (Flu), respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), vaccinia virus, Hepatitis B and C viruses are considered susceptible to alcohols. However, certain nonenveloped (nonlipophilic) viruses such as hepatitis A and enteroviruses, which are both responsible for viral gastrointestinal infections. Depending on the alcohol concentration of the hand-cleanser and time of exposure to the alcohol, hepatitis A and other nonlipophilic viruses may not be eliminated.”
Southern Beale
Well, that’s not how communion is done everywhere anymore, for that reason. At my church we do it by what’s called “intinction”: You take the piece of bread and dip it into the cup of wine (we use grape juice). Other churches pass around these trays with individual servings of wine or juice in tiny little cups.
I think the AIDs crisis of the ’80s, when people didn’t really understand how the disease was spread, did a lot to change how communion was given. I haven’t had the old-fashioned “sip from the same cup” style since the 60s.
More common, and what we still don’t hear about so often, is the old-fashioned “salmonella in the potato salad at the church picnic” stories which send 30-40 people to the hospital. You used to hear those stories all the time but I suspect nowadays it’s so common it doesn’t really raise an eyebrow.
Southern Beale
@SiubhanDuinne:
See my comment above. We’re Presbyterian.
Also, we didn’t use Wonder bread. We got a loaf of wheat bread from the organic bakery up the street. Communion is once a month and at specially-designated worship services. Not so rare, just not every week.
Rick
As a sporadic churchgoer (don’t worry — its a liberal episcopal congregation) — I think anon is right about transmission route. Likely culprits would be person wiping the cup — or worse yet — the people who dip their bread with the fingers into the cup. A popular practice, particularly among horribly unhygenic kids, like my 7 year old. Yikes — my blood drinking days are over, now that I think about it
@damn good — probably not enough alcohol in wine to kill germs instantly. (Yes, I’m a science geek).
dr. bloor
The issue is whether the churchgoers accept the practice, and it appears that they do. That those same people would be grossed out at the prospect of drinking juice samples from the same cup at a supermarket isn’t relevant.
cleek
@damn good mr. jam:
you’d need at least 80% ethanol and many minutes of exposure to even come close to being able to kill Hep B & C on a dry surface. and it’s much less effective on Hep A. and since a drinking cup is a wet surface, and the time between uses is so short, even Everclear would have a tough time killing anything. and, of course, wine is only 10-13% alcohol.
it isn’t going to disinfect anything.
AAA Bonds
Various dioceses have, throughout any number of epidemics, re-worked the Eucharistic part of Mass to prevent transmission of disease. Our local diocese did so during the swine flu scare, for one, replacing the common cup to prevent it from getting people sick – with exactly the sort of little “sample cup” mentioned in the original post.
Can I be honest? I’m surprised at the ignorance about the practices of the Catholic Church on this blog for people who like to pop off about it so much, and also the levels of OCD that are radiating off this thread. You’re not going to get the Black Death every time you share a cup with someone.
Although I can tell you: intinction is a probable way for Hep A to get spread because it often results from unsafe food handling. And dipping the Host into the cup yourself isn’t allowed in the Catholic Church, although plenty of people do it anyway.
Martin
@cleek: So, Jesus is blowing a 12.0? That’s like +350. And he’s doing that every Sunday? That’s one badass frat boy.
Bill E Pilgrim
That whole “blood and the body” thing is so pre 80s dating behavior.
damn good mr. jam
anon, Rick, cleek:
Thanks for setting me straight. I never liked church music anyway.
mistermix
@dr. bloor: If the congregation paid the cost of the public health investigation for this Hep A outbreak, as well as the cost of treatment, I’d be more willing to adopt your live and let live attitude. But they won’t, so why shouldn’t they be regulated in the same way as any other business dispensing food?
@AAA Bonds: Obviously, the inadequate sanitary precautions you mention weren’t enough to stop Hep A in this case. And, as someone who was raised Catholic, I have friends who still attend Catholic services and tell me that common practice is a shared cup and a wipe. How is that a demonstration of ignorance?
Southern Beale
@AAA Bonds:
I agree. Actually, it’s not just ignorance about the Catholic Church so much as it’s ignorance about the church in general, and not just on this blog but all over the blogosphere.
Sorry folks, I love you, but as I’ve said a thousand times before, not all Christians are right wing hypocritical homophobic Fundiegelical Republicans.
OK flame away …
Odie Hugh Manatee
I’m a former (ok, they’ll never let me go!) RC and I never thought the idea of symbolically feasting on the body and blood of someone I didn’t know was a very good idea. I should have at least met him first, you know, maybe become friends with him.
Mom always warned me about strangers.
Sorry, but I have always found the practice just creepy. As a kid, I thought they were nuts doing it but I had to follow along to keep everyone happy.
I’m glad I grew up.
New Yorker
I’d just like to say that I’m sure I made myself sick many times by sharing the same joint with a bunch of different people.
Bill E Pilgrim
@damn good mr. jam: Funny, that’s the only part I did like. It made the entire 20 years or so more or less worth it just for that. Even though I really did hate all the rest, every bit of it.
Never regretted that part for a second though, Bach, Schubert, Gounod, et al, I never would have been exposed to them, well possibly not at all, but certainly not so much.
Bill E Pilgrim
@New Yorker:
I hear you, New York.
Assuming that by “joint”, you mean “blog”, right?
mistermix
@Southern Beale:
Good to know. How’s that relevant to a discussion about the sanitary practices at communion? Are you really so reflexively butthurt that you think any discussion of church practice is an attack on “Christians”, or are you just trolling?
Odie Hugh Manatee
@dr. bloor:
Ok, that really has me scratching my head. Is this line of reasoning a clue as to why teabaggers exist?
That statement is just. so. stupid. it. hurtz. Is it because they are all buddies worshiping the Sky King so sharing a bit of bread and wine is just kosher but sharing a cup in a supermarket makes them go YUCK!?
Weird…
Violet
@SiubhanDuinne:
I think it differs by church. One I know of used to have grape juice only, but a decade ago or so changed to both wine and grape juice. The wine is always in the inner or outer ring of little cups in the cup-holding tray they pass around so parents will know which is which and not give their kids the wine. As to the Wonder Bread, I’m not sure. I think they moved to some sort of cracker-ish type thing, but I’m not sure.
evinfuilt
Sorry, at all the Catholic services I’ve been dragged to for my partners family. It’s a shared cup and quick wipe with a cloth. In busy services they get multiple lines and each one gets its own cup and cloth.
It would be damaging to their faith if they had to treat the body and blood as something other than the blood and body. Takes an Atheist to explain to some of them, that they believe in transubstantiation, and that means it is the blood, and in this case, Jesus has Hep-A. They will not change their practices, because that means its just wine and no magic to protect them.
Glad to know some christians care about their health, but the Catholic church has never really cared. Suffering is a core tenant, and all those that suffer are held in higher esteem.
Capri
In one study looking at potential sources of transmission of hepatitis virus, it was found that the bowl of after-diner mints that many finer establishments have sitting by the register consistently has BY FAR the highest concentration of pathogens compared to any other location – including the restrooms.
I haven’t taken any mints from one of them since I read the article.
TR
@mistermix:
I don’t think it’s an overreaction.
I made a comment about believing in a just God in a thread here a month or so ago, and I was immediately ridiculed in at least two dozen comments in that thread about my stupid belief in the magical sky fairy and whatnot. I actually hesitated in hitting submit on that first comment because I thought the same shitstorm would ensue.
Carnacki
Seriously, and since the Catholics are really serving blood for these people to drink, why hasn’t the Van Helsings of the world stepped in to stop this vampiric practice?
Smurfhole
@evinfuilt:
My local Catholic parish stopped serving wine at Communion for months following a flu epidemic. We were also told not to shake hands during the sign of peace. Communion under one form is just as valid as Communion under both forms- actually, as a recovering alcoholic I’ve never taken a sip of the Communion wine even once.
See above.
See above. I very much doubt the local bishop is an atheist, but these are the rule changes he promulgated the last time a health crisis arose.
See above. How does the fact that at the parish/diocesan level the Catholic Church DOES change Communion practices in response to local health concerns comport with your assertion?
Carnacki
@ChrisS: Drink a lot of water when you go on a bender and you won’t have hangovers, or at least not as severe. Also try Alka Seltzer Morning Relief.
Athenae
At my mother’s church, and mine, the Eucharistic ministers both wipe off the cup between people. I don’t drink the wine because Communion wine = eww, but not because I’m paranoid about germs.
Best Communion wine story ever was at my cousin’s wedding. She was horribly nervous, all those people staring at her, so when the priest offered her the chalice she slugged about half that thing back. I laugh every time we see the video. “Blood of Christ?” “Hell yeah, Father, I’mma do a keg stand!” Poor thing.
A.
Smurfhole
@TR:
You noticed that too, huh?
master c
Same thing with raping kids. Wouldnt be tolerated by my mother if someone else was doing it.
joe from Lowell
@mistermix:
Because they’re not a business. The regulations you’re talking about rightly apply to commercial operations.
Uh, yeah, imagine that guy, getting the impression that you’re being being belligerent!
ChrisS
@AAA Bonds:
Can I be honest? I’m surprised at the ignorance about the practices of the Catholic Church on this blog for people who like to pop off about it so much,
I can’t tell you much in the way of specifics about the Tea Party practices and rituals, but I’m pretty certain that a lot of the beliefs they publicly espouse are logically inconsistent, have negative consequences for America, or both.
mistermix
@TR: I’ll take your general point that the commenters here are generally not pro-religious, and certainly the FP posters aren’t AFAIK, but it still doesn’t help to take offense where none was offered.
John M
Why is everyone talking about the wine? I think it’s telling that the church is suggesting that everyone who took communion may be at risk, not simply those who took the wine (in my experience, 50 percent or fewer of Catholics who take the host also take the wine).
I think it’s pretty easy to turn the post on its head. Plenty of the people who get the heeby-jeebies about the Catholic Church’s rituals think nothing of eating at a restaurant, where who knows what happens in the kitchen or how many employees really are washing their hands after they use the restroom.
Svensker
@SiubhanDuinne:
The Presby church we went to a few years ago had homemade challah bread — you’d tear off a piece as the officiant held the loaf and then “intict” it, i.e., dip it in organic grape juice. It was a rich, anti-war congregation tho. Communion was once a month.
The Baptists are the only ones I know who do the shot glasses of Welch’s and cubes o’ Wonder Bread — grew up with that.
Smurfhole
@mistermix:
No, clearly no offense was intended by implying Catholics are morons or hypocrites for drinking Communion wine together when they wouldn’t share a cup at the supermarket sample table.
Heh, indeedy.
geg6
@mistermix:
I agree with both your points. If churches insist on the practice of sharing the cup (whether by everyone drinking from it or dipping the host) and refuse to use the the same measures that any other food purveyors are required to use, then they should have to pay the consequences that any other food purveyor would have to pay.
And though I ecstatically left superstition, quasi-cannibalism, and masochism behind me when I gave up the RC church many years ago, I have been to many RC masses since (my family and most religious friends and acquaintances are Catholic) and the wine is always offered from the common chalice. You don’t have to drink from it and choose to just take the host, but every RC church service I’ve attended in my entire life has had the common chalice and that includes the funeral mass I went to last month.
TR
@Smurfhole:
Kinda hard not to notice.
joe from Lowell
@geg6:
How many people does Grandma have to have over for Thanksgiving dinner for the health department to pay attention?
I think the commercial/non-commercial distinctions is the proper line for applying public health regulation.
Svensker
@Capri:
Why did you have to tell me this? Bye bye, buttermints.
mistermix
@John M: I do know that restaurants are inspected by the Health Department and, in a lot of areas, the health department rating is public record that has to be posted conspicuously by the restaurant. That’s a lot more than I know about the local church.
@Smurfhole: “Inconsistent” is the word I’d use, but if “moron” or “hypocrite” is more correct in your experience, you’re welcome to use it.
Svensker
@SiubhanDuinne:
Did attend a Reformed (Calvinist) church for a while and they had little shot glasses of grape juice and pieces of whole wheat pita. We sometimes go to Orthodox services and they have chunks of bread but a common cup wiped by the priest between sips — sorry, I do not do the common cup.
Course, the Quakers don’t do “communion” at all, although they do have food after service which is considering “communing”. Never any wine, tho, except at super liberal Quaker joints.
Oh, and attended a few Lutheran services where you had the choice of common cup of wine or a little glass of grape juice.
TR
@mistermix:
You’re assuming that there are hordes of Catholics who take wine out of a common chalice at Mass and would refuse to do the same with a common cup of grape juice at a supermarket. Got any evidence to back that up?
I went to Christmas mass and sat close to the front, and I’d have to say maybe 15%-20% of the people who took communion went for the wine as well. Most of the time, the four people holding chalices just stood there watching the crowd file past them.
Who’s to say that same small percentage who has no problem taking wine at Mass wouldn’t mind taking grape juice at Safeway?
You’re assuming, without evidence, that all Catholics drink wine and you’re assuming, without evidence, that all Catholics would avoid the grape juice.
Maybe the figments of your imagination are being inconsistent, but those of us in the real world are not.
TR
And by the way, plenty of grocery stores have the common food pile — I’ve seen dishes of crackers and pretzels that shoppers gleefully stick their hands into all the time. I must have missed the hordes of complaints to the Health Department over that.
geg6
@joe from Lowell:
Grandma is not serving thousands or hundreds of people at a time, so your distinction is less than apt. And, honestly, I could sue the crap out of grandma if I can prove she took no safety precautions in her food prep. If you’re serving hundreds or thousands (unlike grandma and more like a restaurant or bar), you probably want your servers/prep staff to take a ServeSafe course or, at the least, use gloves when touching the food and not allow people to share from a glass. Common sense, really. But then, we’re talking religion here and obviously common sense has no place in that.
master c
What are yall fightng about?
Dont get it. Im RC-and I never take the wine. I always sample at Costco tho!
joe from Lowell
@geg6:
Hundreds. Or thousands! You have a very optimistic impression of parish church attendance.
So, if attendance at a church service is small enough – in the mere dozens – public health regulations shouldn’t apply? But beyond that, they should?
Do you actually have a principle guiding your thought here, beyond your contempt for people whose religious life is different from yours?
magurakurin
since people are sharing restaurant gross out stories…
I used to make donuts in the basement of a diner in the Philly ‘burbs. It was an after school job and I would do my homework behind the 100 pound sacks of flour as we waited for the dough to rise. One evening I heard water running at the pot sink where we and the bakers washed all the pots. Thinking it strange I popped my head around to look and there was John the pot washer from upstairs in the kitchen. Much to my shock and dismay he had his cock out and was pissing into the pot sink. He was equally shocked and then began to explain, “Danny, don’t tell nobody you seen me pissin’ in the pot sink, now. But it’s really better than me going out in the front and using the bathroom on the dining room floor. The customers don’t wanna see the dirty old pot washer walking out into the dining room.” He was quite convinced of this logic, but even at 15 years of age I was equally convinced the customers would clearly prefer seeing his dirty ass to being informed that the he was urinating in the very sink where the pans were washed. Yeah, I was pretty sure about that.
Needless to say John was fired after the owner was informed. It was actually a difficult decision for me. I didn’t want to be a rat, but the general consensus of my immediate superiors (themselves teenagers and stoners) was that something like pissing in the pot sink simply could not stand.
I still eat in restaurants though. And I’ve seen a lot of nasty shit.
The Catholic Church, however, I gave up about the same time as John the pot washer got the axe.
And the backwash in the wine cup, whoa. Actually, my mother never let us drink from the wine cup precisely because of public health issues and she is still practicing Catholic to this day.
joe from Lowell
@magurakurin:
Anybody ever work in a Chinese restaurant?
I don’t care. Lo mein is good. Orange shrimp is goooooooooood.
JustMe
Honestly, if there were serious health risks with communion, you’d hear about not just Hep A risks but Hep A outbreaks and cold sore outbreaks on a regular basis.
I’m Orthodox Christian, and we get communion spooned to us. Now, some churches, wanting to be more sanitary, put the spoon into your open mouth and turn the spoon upside down, dropping the communion into your mouth without having the spoon touch your mouth, but that’s not the norm: for the most part, our mouths touch the spoon. And churches tend not to have any major public health problems over this.
Yes, things have gone on like this for 2000 years, but even people 2000 years ago were not stupid: had the spread of infection been a problem, they would have changed their communion methods.
magurakurin
@joe from Lowell
Lemon Chicken tastes goooooood.
Jinchi
That’s because they believe the priest’s blessing banishes all the germs.
Jane2
@AAA Bonds: Agree. One news story about this and suddenly it’s a widespread problem and just another example of the awful, terrible, no-good, very rotten church?
TR
@Jinchi:
Nice of you to say that after a dozen or so of us here have already indicated we believe nothing of the kind.
But again, you all know what we believe much better than we do, right?
joe from Lowell
They Sign of Peace probably spreads more germs than Communion.
The arch-diocese told everyone to just waive to each other during the swine flu “outbreak” last year. It seemed a bit anti-climactic.
Zach
“Exposed to Hep A” is fear mongering on par with waking up to a mushroom cloud or whatever (not in terms of its impact on the world, though). Someone in the church tested positive for Hep A. Do you use public restrooms? Eat from common dishes? I’m guessing those aren’t wiped between uses and filled with alcohol (they use wine that’s stronger than table wine to assist in sterilization). Obviously, taking communion carries some risk of infection, but the CDC’s looked at it and found that there’s no measurable risk. The Catholic church has done infinitely many shitty things, but it’s got no interest in killing parishioners and has spent a lot of time looking into this and altering services in reaction to health concerns.
This church appears to be doing the appropriate thing in light of realizing that they’ve exposed people to a small risk of infection… it’s annoying when folks react hysterically to institutions doing the right thing. The next person to test positive for a common viral infection at that church might not be so forthright about it next time.
If it were high enough to be measurable, I’d bet a lot of money that there’s a higher per capita rate of Hepititis A infection from visits to the Old Country Buffet than taking of Communion. I’m not Catholic or even religious, by the way.
Michael
If you believe in what is supposed to be happening to it as a mystery, you won’t (and can’t) believe that the cup is capable of transmitting disease.
And there is no practicing, believing, dogmatically devout priest that would (or should) allow the contents of his cup to be tested.
It is all a big catch-22 which has undoubtedly led to a number of localized disease outbreaks in the past.
Paul W.
Yeah, my church did the individual cups as well… but we were Presbyterian. Seems like folks know what they are getting in to when they share a cup like that though, those that do it despite the dangers probably figure that if God wills it then so be it anyway.
eemom
I got $5 sez this is gonna turn into another why-do-you-hate-Catholics thread.
Or maybe not. The topic is kind of grossing me out.
@JustMe:
Same here. Of course I never go to church so it’s not much of an issue.
Mattminus
All the grossed out responses really show how OCD we’ve become about germs. Is sharing a cup with people that you’re supposed to be in some sort of deep community bond with really that big a deal? Isn’t the beautiful symbolism worth the minuscule health risk?
It’s also a pretty good indicator of our collective innumeracy.
Michael
@JustMe:
Same here, but I rarely take communion anymore. Even though I’m barely to the right of Trotsky on the notion of religious faith, I still like to be prepared when I go stand in line.
Call it a personal cultural relic.
Peter
@master c: …wait, what?
John M
@mistermix: Sure, the health department inspects restaurants. They are for-profit enterprises in the business of selling food, and most of their work is done behind closed doors. While you may not know much about what goes on in a local church, those who do attend Catholic churches see the consecration and distribution play out right in front of them every weekend.
I would understand your outrage if the Catholic Church were running a bunch of restaurants while claiming that the First Amendment prevented health inspections and that the profits were tax-exempt. That’s not what’s happening here. The Church’s distribution of bread and wine is done in the limited context of a religious ritual. The risks of infection are open and obvious to anyone who pays attention. And, of course, the health department’s inspections don’t include weekly blood tests of restaurant employees, so something like this could happen (and has happened) at restaurants. Also, as others have said, it’s not clear at all that anyone has been infected. Because someone with Hep-A was involved in distributing communion, there is a risk that it has spread, but it may not have happened at all.
Your tongue-in-cheek headline actually does highlight the issue. The Health Department is “the state.” Your giddiness at the idea of the government using its power to alter a ritual held sacred by a church that you abhor is precisely why the Free Exercise clause matters.
Stefan
I’m a former (ok, they’ll never let me go!) RC and I never thought the idea of symbolically feasting on the body and blood of someone I didn’t know was a very good idea. I should have at least met him first, you know, maybe become friends with him.
What “symobically”? It’s actually — for believing Catholics, the wafer and the wine become the actual body and blood of Christ, so you’re not “symbolically” ingesting anything, you’re actually drinking real blood and eating real human flesh — Christ’s actual physical being is present in what still appears to the worshiper as the wafer and the wine.
Stefan
Yes, things have gone on like this for 2000 years, but even people 2000 years ago were not stupid: had the spread of infection been a problem, they would have changed their communion methods.
Actually, yes, 2000 years ago people were stupid, and deeply so. They had no realistic idea about how infection was spread.
Smurfhole
@Michael:
Hello? Practicing Catholic who believes just that! I think there are several of us on the thread who’ve already indicated what we believe. Did you just ignore every comment to post this, or did you only ignore ours because they interfered with your generalization?
That’s because according to Catholic belief, it becomes the blood of Christ during the Mass. It’s not supposed to be spilled or dropped, and the priest is supposed to drink all of the remainder left over from the Mass. They’re not going to test it in the middle of the service, but in my personal experience when they fear disease outbreaks they won’t serve the wine at all. Everyone gets the bread, not the wine. Communion under one species of Host is still valid Communion.
Undoubtedly, the evidence we don’t have that you’ve conjured up agrees with you.
JustMe
Actually, yes, 2000 years ago people were stupid, and deeply so. They had no realistic idea about how infection was spread.
The Emperor Tiberius banned public kissing ceremonies in Rome because he realized that it was spreading cold sores. People might not have understood the germ theory of disease or how sickness could spread through carriers and hosts, they seem to have had a pretty good idea about how direct contact with the infected would spread a sickness.
ed drone
@Capri:
That’s why I like the ones who offer wrapped mints. Of course, the pathogens are on the wrappers, but the mints are safe.
Ed
master c
@Peter: This is another case where behavior that’s been accepted for decades from a church wouldn’t be tolerated for a moment if attempted by a private institution.
Smurfhole
@mistermix:
Heh, indeed.
ThatPirateGuy
@Mattminus:
In a word: no.
But it is really a minor risk and people already wasted the money on the building, and their time in the service so what the hell go for it. Way worse is what is taught in those buildings.
Smurfhole
@master c:
Define “private institution.” Are we talking about free sample trays at the supermarket? Public restaurants where sick employees drag their flu-infected asses into work to make the month’s rent? Bars where people smoke cigarettes and blow carcinogenic chemicals into other peoples’ faces?
ed drone
@joe from Lowell:
Last Sunday, just before the peace, I coughed, so I refused to offer my hand to anyone, feeling guilty that I wasn’t quicker with my handkerchief. So I did what I often do anyway, and hugged the others. I’m a good hugger.
And as for the cup, we (Episcopal) offer real wine (a dessert wine, alas) with a wipe and an eighth-turn or so of the cup, so it takes a while for my germs to reach someone else.
Ed
ant
@joe from Lowell:
I was a delivery boy for a nasty ass Chinese restaurant for quite some time in a former life. The place eventually got shut down by the heath department.
I still love dirty rottin’ Chinese food to this day. I don’t care.
catclub
@anon: “(only because was trying to get one of the toddlers to finish her milk)”
… a likely story.
Did you mean finish throwing up her milk, cause that’s all I figure the Today show is good for.
catclub
@Zach: “but it’s got no interest in killing parishioners”
depends on if they know what is in the parishioners’ wills.
Where there’s a will, there’s a way.
Michael
@Smurfhole:
Lighten up, Francis. I’m not being critical – I’m simply stating in dry, clinical terms that for those who believe in the mysterious results of the ritual, there is no testing that can be allowed because the worldview offered by their belief negates the possibility of disease.
Smurfhole
@Michael:
Those of us with health concerns don’t even drink the wine. I’ve never drank Communion wine once in my entire life. And stopping the religious ritual to take some of the consecrated Host for disease testing is as sacreligious as it is impractical.
Worth noting, though, that none of these people have reported being sick yet. They were exposed to Hep A. We don’t know what that means yet, or how many – if any- will get sick.
Froley
It’d be fun to see a Catholic priest arrested for conspiracy to commit cannibalism. Most states don’t allow factual impossibility as a defense (although it would be nice to see them try to use it — “It’s just a cracker and some Welch’s Your Honor, ’tis not the body and blood of a man.”)
burnspbesq
“This is another case where behavior that’s been accepted for decades from a church wouldn’t be tolerated for a moment if attempted by a private institution”
Attitudes like this are why the American people correctly decided, after the Constitution went into effect, that the first order of business for the first Congress should be to add a Bill of Rights.
Smurfhole
@Froley:
Yes, about as funny as it would be to see atheists go to federal prison for hate crimes for talking shit about the Catholic Church. In other words, not the slightest bit funny, and a very serious infringement on everyone’s First Amendment rights.
Smurfhole
Corroborative article.
Communion cup may hold risk of spreading illness
By Ed Stannard, Register Metro Editor
[email protected]
A warning from a Long Island, N.Y., church that Christmas Day worshipers may have been exposed to hepatitis A has renewed concerns about catching disease by drinking wine from a Communion chalice.
While hepatitis is rarely spread in this country, both religious and medical leaders said Tuesday that those who are concerned about viruses, such as a cold — and especially those who are sick — may want to avoid sharing the common cup.
Nassau County health officials offered injections to kill the hepatitis A virus, and vaccinations because of concerns that worshipers who attended two Christmas Masses at Our Lady of Lourdes Roman Catholic Church in Massapequa Park, N.Y., may have been exposed to the disease.
“An individual tested positive for hepatitis A who is involved in the Communion process,” said Nassau County Health Department spokeswoman Mary Ellen Laurain, according to Newsday.
The Roman Catholic Diocese of Rockville Centre would not say whether someone with hepatitis was offering the Communion cup to worshipers, or whether someone who drank from the cup had the disease.
“It was probably a full church,” Sean Dolan, a spokesman for the diocese, told Newsday. “We’re hoping no one comes down with the virus, but we also urge prudence.”
The county Health Department offered injections of immune globulin, which contains hepatitis-killing antibodies, as well as hepatitis A vaccine to prevent contracting the disease.
“We trust people to take responsibility for themselves and their own health,” said Bishop Ian T. Douglas of the Episcopal Diocese of Connecticut on Tuesday. The Episcopal and Roman Catholic churches both offer bread and wine from a chalice to represent Jesus’ body and blood. Other Protestant churches use separate cups for wine or, in some cases, grape juice.
The bread and wine “bind us one to another (with) Christ in the world today and to the church catholic throughout the ages,” Douglas said. However, only one element is needed to take part in the Eucharist, he said.
Hepatitis A, a disease of the liver, is more common in other, poor countries, said Dr. Joseph K. Lim, director of the Yale Viral Hepatitis Program, because it is spread by ingesting fecal matter in contaminated water or food. It is a less serious disease than hepatitis B or C, which are chronic diseases spread by blood or sexual activity, and which can result in cirrhosis of the liver or organ failure.
“Usually people will become sick, they’ll become yellow, they’ll develop abdominal pain,” Lim said. Death is rare, but possible.
“The key issue here … there’s probably someone in the preparation of the chalice or someone who was partaking in Communion early on who contaminated the supply,” he said.
Vaccination is one protection against hepatitis A, but that won’t stop other bugs, such as those that cause the flu or the common cold. Washing hands is always advised, Lim said.
During the H1N1 epidemic last year, some churches stopped offering wine at Communion, and many advised people not to shake hands at the passing of the peace.
Because of sanitary standards in this country, “overall, the risk would be exceedingly low” of contracting hepatitis A, Lim said. There are “traditions of faith we wish to honor and respect, but the parish may want to rethink how they distribute the elements,” Lim said.
Odie Hugh Manatee
@Stefan:
Well it never did for me and I guess that may have something to do with my being a “former RC”. I have never believed and I grew up in the church, was an altar boy for four years and went to school at Our Lady of Lourdes (Spokane). It just never took and I walked away from it in my teen years, never looking back once. In my later years I came to the conclusion that the only difference between Jim Jones and Christianity is that Jimmy poisoned the drink and got it over with quick. They’re both apocalyptic death cults but only one is socially acceptable. Yes, in many ways Christianity has done good things in its time but IMO that pales when considering the evil shit that has been done in its name.
Faith? The only faith I have is that when man gets his hands on something, no matter how beautiful it could possibly be, there will be plenty of others who will gladly use it to fuck things up royally for the non-believers out there.
Smurfhole
@Odie Hugh Manatee:
I respectfully disagree.
Barb (formerly Gex)
@Southern Beale: My complaint here is not so much with religion or Catholicism. It is with the fact that *this* particular Catholic congregation does not have to meet minimal public health safety standards simply *because* they are Catholic. This is not a criticism that should be raising a defensive response (except, of course, for those who start generalizing to all Catholics or all Christians, etc).
I am very much outraged by the fact that they get to risk public health in ways that no other organizations could without risk of being shut down because they are religious. Those congregants don’t just stay in church. They go out in public. Everyone else who has been put at risk should be pissed about this for the same reasons I am. This is no different than being pissed that the anti-vaccination idiots if you ask me.
So, I hope I was able to voice my complaint in a way that doesn’t bash religion or Catholicism.
Cheers
Barb (formerly Gex)
@mistermix: Our local schools no longer allow children or parents to bring homemade food to events either. But of course those secular public schools are also staffed by mandated reporters and subject to criminal repercussions if they endanger students. Without attacking religion or Catholicism, those things do not strictly apply to religious organizations in our society.
Batocchio
At the services I’ve attended, there are usually one of two options, or both:
1) Individual shot glasses, or
2) A community chalice, that people dip their communion wafers into.
When I was a kid, people would drink directly from the group chalice, or at least had that option.
Smurfhole
@Barb (formerly Gex):
So far, all we know is that one of the people who handed out Communion or was involved in the service had Hepatitis A. We know the congregation was exposed to the disease because of this one person. We don’t know who this person was, what they did, or if anyone else even got sick. For all we know, this was one of the altar boys whose involvement with the Eucharist itself consisted of carrying the (closed) containers of bread and wine, and of eating the bread and drinking the wine him- or her- self.
I haven’t heard any evidence yet that indicates this is any different than a restaurant employee coming in despite being sick and exposing hundreds of restaurant patrons to germs.
What would you have them do? Blood tests every week on every participant in Mass? Denying Communion to sick people? How much government intrusion into religious matters is called for? How about if this is (as mentioned above) Grandma’s Thanksgiving dinner? Or some secular private club’s private fundraiser?
Maybe we should get pissed at people who eat anything in public gatherings. That’s about as productive.
It didn’t, but it raises very troubling questions as to how you think a religious organization or any other non-commercial organization should be dealt with. I think the implications of allowing government to intrude on that have the potential to affect your civil liberties whether you care about the Free Exercise clause or not.
Stefan
Those of us with health concerns don’t even drink the wine. I’ve never drank Communion wine once in my entire life. And stopping the religious ritual to take some of the consecrated Host for disease testing is as sacreligious as it is impractical.
If you’re actually a believing Catholic, how could you have any health concerns? You’re drinking the blood of Christ, and Christ doesn’t have any communicable diseases. And if you don’t believe you’re actually drinking the blood of Christ, then guess what — you aren’t a Catholic.
Asshole
@Stefan:
Let’s look at some relevant passages from the Catechism of the Catholic Church that address this issue.
http://www.vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p2s2c1a3.htm
1358 We must therefore consider the Eucharist as:
– thanksgiving and praise to the Father;
– the sacrificial memorial of Christ and his Body;
– the presence of Christ by the power of his word and of his Spirit…
1374 The mode of Christ’s presence under the Eucharistic species is unique. It raises the Eucharist above all the sacraments as “the perfection of the spiritual life and the end to which all the sacraments tend.”201 In the most blessed sacrament of the Eucharist “the body and blood, together with the soul and divinity, of our Lord Jesus Christ and, therefore, the whole Christ is truly, really, and substantially contained.”202 “This presence is called ‘real’ – by which is not intended to exclude the other types of presence as if they could not be ‘real’ too, but because it is presence in the fullest sense: that is to say, it is a substantial presence by which Christ, God and man, makes himself wholly and entirely present.”203
1375 It is by the conversion of the bread and wine into Christ’s body and blood that Christ becomes present in this sacrament. The Church Fathers strongly affirmed the faith of the Church in the efficacy of the Word of Christ and of the action of the Holy Spirit to bring about this conversion. Thus St. John Chrysostom declares:
It is not man that causes the things offered to become the Body and Blood of Christ, but he who was crucified for us, Christ himself. The priest, in the role of Christ, pronounces these words, but their power and grace are God’s. This is my body, he says. This word transforms the things offered.204
And St. Ambrose says about this conversion:
Be convinced that this is not what nature has formed, but what the blessing has consecrated. The power of the blessing prevails over that of nature, because by the blessing nature itself is changed. . . . Could not Christ’s word, which can make from nothing what did not exist, change existing things into what they were not before? It is no less a feat to give things their original nature than to change their nature.205
1376 The Council of Trent summarizes the Catholic faith by declaring: “Because Christ our Redeemer said that it was truly his body that he was offering under the species of bread, it has always been the conviction of the Church of God, and this holy Council now declares again, that by the consecration of the bread and wine there takes place a change of the whole substance of the bread into the substance of the body of Christ our Lord and of the whole substance of the wine into the substance of his blood. This change the holy Catholic Church has fittingly and properly called transubstantiation.”206
1380 It is highly fitting that Christ should have wanted to remain present to his Church in this unique way. Since Christ was about to take his departure from his own in his visible form, he wanted to give us his sacramental presence; since he was about to offer himself on the cross to save us, he wanted us to have the memorial of the love with which he loved us “to the end,”209 even to the giving of his life. In his Eucharistic presence he remains mysteriously in our midst as the one who loved us and gave himself up for us,210 and he remains under signs that express and communicate this love:
The Church and the world have a great need for Eucharistic worship. Jesus awaits us in this sacrament of love. Let us not refuse the time to go to meet him in adoration, in contemplation full of faith, and open to making amends for the serious offenses and crimes of the world. Let our adoration never cease.211
1381 “That in this sacrament are the true Body of Christ and his true Blood is something that ‘cannot be apprehended by the senses,’ says St. Thomas, ‘but only by faith, which relies on divine authority.’ For this reason, in a commentary on Luke 22:19 (‘This is my body which is given for you.’), St. Cyril says: ‘Do not doubt whether this is true, but rather receive the words of the Savior in faith, for since he is the truth, he cannot lie.'”212
Godhead here in hiding, whom I do adore
Masked by these bare shadows, shape and nothing more,
See, Lord, at thy service low lies here a heart
Lost, all lost in wonder at the God thou art.
Seeing, touching, tasting are in thee deceived;
How says trusty hearing? that shall be believed;
What God’s Son has told me, take for truth I do;
Truth himself speaks truly or there’s nothing true.213
1406 Jesus said: “I am the living bread that came down from heaven; if any one eats of this bread, he will live for ever; . . . he who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life and . . . abides in me, and I in him” (Jn 6:51, 54, 56).
So, it remains both bread and wine by nature and something more than that by the miracle of transubstantiation. If someone put cyanide on Communion wafers, they would still kill people. Catholic dogma never states that once these objects are transubstantiated they lose their natural form. Furthermore, a recovering alcoholic would not drink the Communion wine- it may be the blood of Christ, but it is also wine. If failing to accept that the Eucharist isn’t also bread and wine is somehow “non-Catholic,” then apparently there hasn’t been a single Catholic in the history of the Catholic Church.
Or, to quote Dorothy Day’s letter to an agnostic,
“St. Teresa says that Christ is disguised as bread so that we will not fear to approach Him — so that we can go to Him in confidence, daily, needing Him daily as we need our physical bread.
“We are not, most of us, capable of exalted emotion, save rarely. We are not capable of feelings of love, awe, gratitude, and repentance. So Christ has taken the form of bread that we may more readily approach Him, and feeding daily, assimilating Christ so that it is not we but Christ working in us, we become more capable of understanding and realizing and loving Him.”
http://www.catholicworker.org/dorothyday/daytext.cfm?TextID=54
Turning to your second misunderstanding, Communion under one form is wholly valid.
http://www.nccbuscc.org/liturgy/current/GIRM.pdf
As the news article above noted, furthermore, during the H1N1 flu virus outbreak numerous dioceses only served Communion in one form- the form of bread. Were those Masses invalid? Apparently not, according to both Catholic doctrine as promulgated and according to the edicts of the relevant bishops and priests.
It seems clear that (according to Catholic doctrine) transubstantiation does not somehow miraculously erase the “natural” qualities of bread and wine when they become the body and blood of Christ. It is also clear that Communion under one form is every bit as complete a celebration of the Eucharist as Communion under both forms. Cf. also http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/04175a.htm
I hope that clarifies these issues. Please let me know if you have any further questions or concerns about these relatively unfamiliar points of Catholic doctrine.
Froley
@Smurfhole: So are you saying that eating a 2,000 year old man is the same as speech?
Asshole
@Froley:
Are you saying that eating God is the same thing as eating some shithead like you?
Asshole
Actually, Froley, I don’t know where you went to law school but let’s talk about this. Catholicism existed when America was founded, right? In fact, Maryland was more or less what you might call a Catholic colony. Now, obviously, if the Founding Fathers intended to treat miracles like transubstantiation the same way they’d treat eating trollmeat like yours, they probably would’ve worked to specifically exclude the Free Exercise of “cannibalistic” Catholicism from the Bill of Rights safeguard of other religions, wouldn’t they? Yet, they didn’t do so.
I think that tells us all we need to know about your position vis-a-vis American law. But maybe you can find some case of Know-Nothings versus Papist Immigrants circa 1845, written by some judge who later became a prominent local Klansman, and use that to buttress your position somehow. Get back to me on that legal research of yours.
Cordelia Lear
As a physician with many additional class hours on epidemiology, outbreak management and public health, I find this article and discussion amusing. Hep A is a relatively quick-onset hepatitis unlike the others, so we should certainly know by now if someone were to show symptoms or test positive.
Where’s the outbreak, exactly?
If not even one person has tested positive, then why is this more noteworthy than any of the similar exposures all but the most reclusive members of society undoubtedly have each year without contracting it?