8-year-old's first Holy Communion invalidated by Church

[adrian]

Source

BRIELLE, N.J. - An 8-year-old girl who suffers from a rare digestive disorder and cannot consume wheat has had her first Holy Communion declared invalid because the wafer contained none, violating Catholic doctrine.

Now, Haley Waldman's mother is pushing the Diocese of Trenton and the Vatican to make an exception, saying the girl's condition - celiac sprue disease - should not exclude her from participating in the sacrament, in which Roman Catholics eat consecrated wheat-based wafers to commemorate the last supper of Jesus Christ before his crucifixion.

"In my mind, I think they must not understand celiac," said Elizabeth Pelly-Waldman, 30. "It's just not a viable option. How does it corrupt the tradition of the Last Supper? It's just rice versus wheat."

It's more than that, according to church doctrine, which holds that communion wafers must have at least some unleavened wheat, as did the bread served at the Last Supper.

What's your thought on this?

[Glen Miyashiro]

Re: 8-year-old's first Holy Communion invalidated by Church

Boy, religions have a lot of crazy rules.

[Linkmeister]

Re: 8-year-old's first Holy Communion invalidated by Church

Well, at least this is just bureaucratic rather than political interference.

[Albert]

Re: 8-year-old's first Holy Communion invalidated by Church

I've never heard before that the "communion wafer" HAD to contain wheat! Where on earth did they get that notion from? It's certainly not in the New Testament.

Unleavened bread can be made from many grains.

What absolute nonsense. The Church should be ashamed of itself.

[craigwatanabe]

Re: 8-year-old's first Holy Communion invalidated by Church

This is why I left my church and decided that my relationship to God is a personal one.

It's okay to remember the last supper that Jesus had but I would imagine that if Hostess Twinkies were served to Jesus on that fateful day, we'd all have a bunch of kids happy to go to communion and a bunch of fat Christians as well!

If it's so important that we eat unleavened wheat because that's what Jesus did, then why at some communions the church allows children to drink grape juice instead of wine? And don't tell me it's because wine is derived from grapes because if that's the case, then there's no reason at all to be serving alchohol at a church service period.

The whole point of symbolism in churches has become so absurd especially when I see fellow church members cleansing their soles on Sunday only to taint it on Monday and so forth.


To the family of that poor child: You don't have to be accepted in any church to be accepted by Christ. Your love of God and your devotion to his scripture is all it takes.

God has forgiven all of mankind by virtue of Jesus' crucification. He gave his only son for the salvation of all of us. As a father myself, if I had to sacrifice my only son for the sake of all of us, all I would ask for in return is for everyone to work hard to live in peace so my son's death wouldn't be in vain. That's not symbolic, that's true sacrifice. And until we all sacrifice something of value our own greed and contempt to one another will continue.

God isn't looking at us asking us to be symbolic to Jesus' fate on the cross, he's asking us to sacrifice our immoral ways because he's giving us a second chance.

Symbolism is acting. Sacrifice is reality. Remember Jesus by making your life better, not by eating some dumb cracker on Sunday. And yes it's dumb if a child cannot be accepted because she cannot eat wheat.

Jesus accepted a prostitute in his life, I'm sure he'd have accepted an allergic child in his death. And if not, I'd hate to have followed a man with such limited love. Screw that church, they don't have the vision of Jesus.

[pzarquon]

Re: 8-year-old's first Holy Communion invalidated by Church

If you don't like the way a church defines worship or structures its ceremonies, find another one, or just be your own. That's one of the perks of "freedom of religion."

On the surface the story seems beyond ridiculous, the church appearing absolutely unreasonable. But face it some sects, Catholics in particular, have rules, traditions, customs, standards... that's in part what makes a church a church rather than some random gathering of people in a building with a pointy roof. More detail on the specific Catholic issues involved can be found in this article on the same case. Even the linked story notes:

The Diocese of Trenton has told Waldman's mother that the girl can receive a low-gluten host, drink wine at communion or abstain entirely, but that any host without gluten does not qualify as Holy Communion.

The church has developed guidelines to accomodate people with this kid's condition. They can either use a low-gluten alternative or just skip it entirely (note that the communion would still be valid). It's the use of an alternative or artificial substitute that the church is taking issue with. Doesn't sound unreasonable to me.

A debate over the ingredients in a little wafer sounds like a manini thing, but then again, some Catholics think it ain't Catholic unless it's in Latin, or if there's any singing, or... as they say, the devil's in the details.

I mean, I'm not a Catholic and find this all a little weird, but my wife and kids are Catholic so I'm not going to belittle their beliefs, either.

As someone in a discussion on this story at Metafilter noted: "The mother was offered two other dietarily acceptable alternatives and turned them down. It looks to me like she wants to make a big deal out of this, and get attention. Apparently it's working."

[Karen]

Re: 8-year-old's first Holy Communion invalidated by Church

Here's to having church at home! Good grief. I don't attend any church, myself, but I do not mean to belittle the child that did, and it probably meant a lot to the poor thing. Seems to me that Jesus preached a freedom from picky rules and the letter of the law, instead coming to fulfill it in each moment of each day, with a sincere heart, and a simplicity that says except we become as little children again, we can't even enter heaven.

Oh well, off my soap box, for now. (g)

[Kilinahe]

Re: 8-year-old's first Holy Communion invalidated by Church

As someone in a discussion on this story at Metafilter noted: "The mother was offered two other dietarily acceptable alternatives and turned them down. It looks to me like she wants to make a big deal out of this, and get attention. Apparently it's working."

The fact that there's a bunch of people sitting around a table discussing "acceptable" alternatives to a lousy piece of unleavened bread is what boggles my mind. Bread is bread is bread.

Seriously, though, this little bit of insanity is one of millions of things that really make me question the wisdom of the church. And I hate that I'm doing that, because it took a lot of introspection and thought to get me to get back into the church in the first place. I left in my teens and went back after my daughter was born, only because I thought she needed it. Why should she bother with a faith that rejects little girls like her over something so trivial and inane as a list of ingredients? It's frustrating.

[helen]

Re: 8-year-old's first Holy Communion invalidated by Church

The church has developed guidelines to accomodate people with this kid's condition. They can either use a low-gluten alternative or just skip it entirely (note that the communion would still be valid). It's the use of an alternative or artificial substitute that the church is taking issue with. Doesn't sound unreasonable to me.

A debate over the ingredients in a little wafer sounds like a manini thing, but then again, some Catholics think it ain't Catholic unless it's in Latin, or if there's any singing, or... as they say, the devil's in the details.

If I had to make a guess it might have something to do with whatever companies is making the communion wafers who then sells it to the churches. Granted it's not going to hurt their profit margin if a few people can not consume it, but it will hurt them if some other alternative is used, say for example using Nabisco's Oreo or Chip Ahoys cookie as the communion wafer.

[Albert]

Re: 8-year-old's first Holy Communion invalidated by Church

Helen said:

"if some other alternative is used, say for example using Nabisco's Oreo or Chip Ahoys cookie as the communion wafer."

And why not. The whole idea, especially in the Roman Catholic Church (of which I was once a member) is that the "bread" (whatever it is) is "transubstantiated" into the actual body of Christ.

I must admit, I never believed in that cannibalistic aspect of the Mass.

Nor do I see what difference it makes if grape juice (Baptists) or wine (Catholic priests) is used for the "blood".

I grow old, I grow old .... the whole thing seems more and more absurd to me.