Published in the bulletin of Holy Ghost Catholic Church in Knoxville, TN, on the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ Sunday.
My dear Parishioners,
Peace! There are fourteen (14) In Brief passages in the Catechism of the Catholic Church regarding the Sacrament of the Most Holy Eucharist. The following is a reflection on article 1417.
As followers of the Lord Jesus Christ, we have both the obligation and the privilege of receiving Holy Communion at least once each year (annually). This reception has been called our “Easter duty.” The Easter Duty is spelled out for us elsewhere: “… humbly receive your Creator in Holy Communion at least during the Easter season, guarantees as a minimum the reception of the Lord’s Body and Blood in connection with the Paschal feasts, the origin and center of the Christian liturgy” (Catechism § 2042). Mother Church has repeated this bare minimum repeatedly, at the Synod of Agde (508AD), Lateran IV (1215 AD), and most famously during Trent (1545–1563 AD; session XIII, Canon ix). The 1983 Code of Canon Law, canon 920 §§1–2 addresses it this way: “After being initiated into the Most Holy Eucharist, each of the faithful is obliged to receive Holy Communion at least once a year; this precept must be fulfilled during the Easter season unless it is fulfilled for a just cause at another time during the year.” The time frame for the Easter Duty is rendered variously as “Paschal Tide” or “Easter Season,” from the Vigil of Easter through second Vespers of the Ascension or Pentecost.
Just because we are obliged to receive Holy Communion, as a minimum, during the Easter Time, is not to disregard the obligation we have to participate in the Sunday Mass (or Saturday Vigil for Sunday) each week, affording us the opportunity to receive Holy Communion weekly (cf. Catechism of the Catholic Church § 2042).
The daily reception of Holy Communion should also be considered. In the Lord’s Prayer we ask the Lord to “give us this day our daily bread” referring not only to breakfast, lunch, and dinner, but also to the bread come down from Heaven which is the Holy Eucharist (cf. Luke 11:3). In the first century, the Apostolic Church enjoyed the practice of gathering daily in the Temple for readings from Sacred Scripture as well as the “breaking of bread,” another way of speaking of the Eucharist (cf. Acts 2:46).
We are to participate in the Eucharistic Celebration at least each Sunday. Full, active, conscious participation, includes: not only timely presence (late arrival and early departure without a serious reason is sacrilegious, disrespecting the Lord and the faithful who actually wish to give Him his due), standing, sitting, kneeling, making appropriate responses at the appropriate time(s), listening attentively to the Sacred Scriptures proclaimed, together with the worthy reception of Holy Communion rounds out our worshipful experience.
Mother Church does recommend with lively concern our frequent, even daily reception of Eucharistic Holy Communion, so does the Lord Jesus Himself: “…take this… do this… in memory of Me” (cf. Matthew 26:26–28; Mark 14:22–24; Luke 22:15–20; 1 Corinthians 11:23–29).
God bless you!
Father John Arthur Orr