Holy Communion on the tongue.

[Toddlerteaplease]

Have any parishes reintroduced this yet? Mine has and I'm not convinced it's a great idea yet. Despite having sanitiser all over the sanctuary. He is only dipping his fingers in a bowl of water after giving the host. His argument is that he doesn't touch the tongue, so it's ok. I'm not convinced.

The bishops conference released guidance for stage 4 reopening which says this is allowed. I can't really think why people would prefer this though

Ah, I haven't read it properly, but last time I asked, the vice chair of the CBCEW wasn't allowing it in his diocese yet. I really don't like it at the best of times any way. But I don't like coming after someone who, potentially has just had Covid breathed all over their hands.

I totally agree. I was reading the guidance for work and was surprised by that part

In my church (Church of Scotland) Communion only happens three times a year.
We use actual fresh bread, not wafers, the loaf is cut up and served on a platter, carried round the pews by the elders. The parishioners help themselves to one small cube of bread each, without touching the others.
Similarly, the wine is served in individual small glasses, so no cross contamination.
We have always done it this way, but Covid has shown how much safer it is than a communal chalice, or the minister putting wafers in people’s mouths.

I thought you catch Covid via the air, not by eating it???

You do, but anything round peoples mouths or breathing/or coughing on or near peoples hands is a bit iffy at this time.

In the Catholic church in the UK this is now allowed again. Very few actually request it. Priests sanitise their hands with alcohol gel after each communicant (or are meant to.....the churches I have been to all stick to this), and those taking on the tongue are requested to wait until everyone else has been before they go up.

My priest, despite sanitising his haves with gel during mass. Just dips his fingers In a bowl of water after giving it on the tongue. People who want to receive that way are supposed to go last. I always make sure I get in the queue before any of them!

It's no longer the case that people who want to receive on the tongue should go last, that was dropped by the CBCEW at the last update, now they can go at any time. How popular it is depends on the parish. In our parish it's about 50-50 for weekday Masses, much more in the hand on Sundays. In the other parish I work with it's more popular at the solemn Mass (I'd say over 50%) and obviously 100% at the Old Rite Mass, less popular at the family/children's Mass.

@Fink

It's no longer the case that people who want to receive on the tongue should go last, that was dropped by the CBCEW at the last update, now they can go at any time. How popular it is depends on the parish. In our parish it's about 50-50 for weekday Masses, much more in the hand on Sundays. In the other parish I work with it's more popular at the solemn Mass (I'd say over 50%) and obviously 100% at the Old Rite Mass, less popular at the family/children's Mass.

I think that message may not have percolated to our parish yet unfortunately!

I wish they would still go last. I'm very chilled about Covid. But that is an unnecessary risk.

I think that message may not have percolated to our parish yet unfortunately!

Yes, I've been to a few different parishes while on holiday and in some places they clearly haven't implemented the latest round of relaxations, including this.

I'm glad we don't still go last. As someone who has to organise the communion queues to try to minimise close contact, it was an absolute nightmare to have the stewards have go through the whole church twice at communion, and ask people which way they were intending to receive communion as they came in to church so we could try to seat them to not have to climb over each other. It probably works ok in a small church, but not once you have 200-250 people per Mass.

Yes. We haven’t introduced the last set of relaxations yet, so I don’t see it happening at al for now. I think they’ll probably look at them in the next few weeks but difficult to see that coming back at anything other than after everybody else.

Yes, mine has reintroduced it.