What is the loneliest place in the world? Back in the 4th grade in the mid-1970s, I would have argued that the loneliest place in the world was the batter’s box at a baseball game. For context, I was arguably the worst player on my baseball team. I batted 9th and struck out most of the time.
I remember my mom driving me to the games in an old beat-up car. She’d be smiling and joyfully singing with the songs on the radio, while I sat there silent and motionless, holding my ball glove, with a big knot in my stomach.
Sometimes my father would slip away from work and be at the games. One day, after a game, after I—as usual—struck out a few times, my dad led me over to the batter’s box and asked me to show him where I stood in the box. Four-foot me positioned myself nearly two feet away from the plate. When my dad suggested that I might have better success if I stepped up nearer to the plate, I desperately responded something like, “Well, you know, I don’t want to get jammed by an inside pitch.”
Now, here was a moment. Did my father laugh at my sad and silly excuse? No. Did he tell me that going forward I needed to man up and stand on top of the plate and risk being hit with a fast-moving hard ball? No. Instead, he just gently said, “Well, okay. You do what you think is best.”
At the end of that long baseball season, every boy on the team got a ribbon or a plaque for participating, for just being there. No one’s self-esteem was bruised (as my ribs I feared may have been if I had stood closer to the batter’s plate). The post-season activities were inclusive and welcoming. No humiliation and equal dignity for all.
A writer once wondered if our culture’s desire for inclusiveness and equality contributed to the modern custom where everyone present at Holy Mass, both Catholics and non-Catholics, are invited to process up at communion time. If a person is not prepared to receive Our Lord in Holy Communion, they’ve been told to cross their arms and get a blessing. That way no one is excluded, and all are welcome.
A few years back I offered Mass at a Catholic high school where a good number of the students were not Catholic and a good number of the Catholic students were not sacramentally prepared to receive the Eucharist. At Communion time it seemed like a third to a half of the students who processed up the aisle and stood before me crossed their arms for a blessing. Having a sacred host in my fingers, I had to pause, put the host back in the ciboria, and bless the student. Then I’d pick up another host, and another student would approach and cross his or her arms. It felt discombobulating, disjointed, and haphazard.
The next year I went back to the school to offer Mass, and constrained for time, I instructed all present who were not receiving Holy Communion to remain in their pew and pray. I explained that this was not merely by preference or opinion, but that these blessings were a form of liturgical abuse. Calling the blessings “liturgical abuse” was deemed insensitive of me, and therefore people were offended. I learned later it was not so much the students, but some teachers who took offense.
Why did I use the term “liturgical abuse”? Well, for the simple reason that blessing people at communion is not in the rubrics for the Mass. That means it’s against the rules. It’s like the baseball umpire, on his own authority, allowing four strikes instead of three. The Liturgy Document from Vatican II in 1963 stated: “Therefore no other person, even if he be a priest, may add, remove, or change anything in the liturgy on his own authority” (SC 22).
Has the Church ever spoken out one way or the other on people getting blessings at communion? It has. In 2008, the Under-Secretary for the Congregation of Divine Worship gave reasons why the practice was illicit. He included the fact that the blessing of everyone is given directly after the Communion Rite ends. No one is excluded from the blessing, and it is no less efficacious than any blessing given at communion time. The giving of blessings by extraordinary ministers of communion were also to cease as they blurred the line between the lay faithful and the ordained clergy (a blurring which is very serious and damages belief and vocations).
A few years back, the Bishop of Springfield, IL, Thomas Paprocki, instructed his priests and eucharistic ministers to stop blessing people at Communion time:
I do not give any blessings during the time for Holy Communion. Everyone at Mass receives a liturgical blessing from the celebrant at the conclusion of the Mass, just a few moments after the distribution of Holy Communion and immediately before the dismissal . . .
I do nothing with babies or children being held in the arms of an adult . . . I do happily and readily give individual blessings to babies, children and anyone else who so wishes after the recessional as I shake hands and greet people as they exit church.
A priest-assistant of Bishop Paprocki wrote that each liturgical procession has a purpose. The procession at the beginning of Mass moves the priest and ministers into the sanctuary. Others don’t take part in this procession. There is a procession during the Gospel acclamation that moves from the priest chair to the ambo. It is not expected that people from the pews jump in and join that. In a similar manner, the Communion procession moves the communicants from their places in the nave to the steps of the sanctuary. Again, it is not envisioned that others take part in the procession.
The priest was not suggesting that infants and very young children are to be left unattended in the pews. However, he wrote: “Young children were carried or walked in the Communion procession for centuries and, to my knowledge, no child felt left out or neglected because a blessing was not given.”
There’s a bit more to be said on this, but for now understand something very important: You do not process up during the Communion Rite at Mass to receive something. You process up to receive someone.
That someone went on a procession to Jerusalem. St. Luke wrote how He stopped and turned to face the great crowd following Him. That means Christ had been walking out in front of them, leading them, all facing the same direction. What did Christ tell the crowd when He turned? Did He say something warm and welcoming? No. Early on, when John and Andrew asked Christ where He was going, He had said, “Come and see.” But now it was late in the game. This time He told those following Him: “Whoever does not carry his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple.”
The loneliest place in the world was the hill called Calvary. And the loneliest man in the world hung on a cross there. That man, out of love for you, makes that hanging mystically present at every Mass. If you focus and get silent, you can hear that man give you advice on how to have spiritual success. If you follow His advice, you will be given the strength to stand up at the plate and face the fast-moving hard balls that this discombobulated, disjointed, and haphazard world throws at you.
In moments of weakness, you may give sad and silly excuses on how you might follow Christ without carrying your cross. After giving your excuse for doing so, listen for Christ’s answer. Listen and watch as He hangs for you in His Mystical Body. Picture Him hanging up there as He gently says: “Well, okay. You do what you think is best.”
Photo by Kelem Figueiredo on Unsplash
