OCD (germs) and Holy Communion

[Fagin99]

Hi, this is a genuine question so I'm looking for helpful suggestions please if anyone has been in the same position.

I've recently started going to church again where there is Holy communion every week. However, I have life-long OCD around contamination (germs) and drinking from the same cup makes me incredibly uncomfortable. I do not want to do this, and I don't think I'm being completely unreasonable in cold/flu season.

I have so far 'got around' this by asking for a blessing only, but this is attracting slightly confused looks which is also making me uncomfortable. I genuinely don't know what to do and I'm finding it all very upsetting. I could talk to the vicar about it, but I genuinely am ashamed of the OCD and go to great lengths to hide it in everyday life.

For what it's worth, yes I have had therapy and it's helped me to life a pretty normal life. But I cannot get comfortable with sharing a cup with all these people, which is distressing as I don't want to appear like I'm not committed.

I know some churches accept dipping the wafer into the wine (intinction?) but even this feels strange and I don't want to risk upsetting anyone by doing something different.

Has anyone felt like this? Or can offer a helpful suggestion? Thank you x

My church leaders always offer to dip wafer and, it’s not a big deal. I’m sure your church will understand. Message your vicar or email them if it’s easier. I’ll say a little prayer for you. X

In our church a few people just have the bread and then get up and leave the altar. I’m sure that would be fine to do.

Having a blessing seems like a very reasonable solution. Are you sure people have noticed that you are having a blessing instead of drinking from the cup? I think we often over estimate what other people notice.

Just to say, that I do not suffer from OCD but it would never occur to me share a cup with a whole church load of people. I think it’s very reasonable to not want to do that!

The Catholic Church doesn't allow intinction (dunking). It's been shown to convey more bacteria than sharing the chalice. Germs on hands have usually come from worse places than lips - door handles, books, shaking hands. Just go back to your place after receiving your wafer.

Our church hasn't gone back to sharing the wine post COVID. Before it was completely normal.

This practice of sharing a cup should have stopped with Covid. I don’t have OCD but am freaked out by things like this. Placing the host into someone’s mouth instead of hand is disgusting too. Fingers are bound to touch lips and then germs get spread. I was extremely clinically vulnerable during Covid so perhaps I’m more sensitive about such things. I’ve not been to communion for decades except for a blessing. As a questioning teen it appeared cannabalistic to me to consume the body and blood of Christ and that opinion has stuck with me ever since. I’m a terrible Catholic though! Do whatever you feel most comfortable doing and don’t worry about what other people think.

You can just have the host. The chalice is optional.

I don’t have OCD and have always thought it gross to share the cup. My nan would never drink from the cup and always dipped her bread into the cup and then ate it. Not sure if that’s an option.

There most be people who can't take it due to allergies - just tell them that you can't take if for health reasons?

I do partake but I also think it's a bit gross, I assume cold sores get spread that way! Anyway just get up after the wafer

I take communion most Sundays for the last few years, drink from the cup, and haven’t noticed any increase in illness whatsoever since doing so. If I have a cold or something I don’t take the wine out of care for others, but otherwise I crack on. However, with OCD I’m guessing this won’t give much comfort.

You can just take the wafer in our church and no-one bats an eyelid. Could that be an option for you?

It’s perfectly ok to keep your personal info to yourself, but I would really hope that clergy in any church would be understanding and non-judgemental if you were to tell them about your OCD or even just ‘I have a thing about germs’. That said, clergy are human too and you will have more of a feel for the team in your church than I do. .

Ultimately, there’s no shame in suffering from OCD, and nobody should make you feel shame for suffering.

I always sit in the first seat at the small service I attend (in the round) so I’m first, but we have two chalices anyway, one purely for dipping, at least half dip and at larger services there’s 2 queues.

Thank you so much for all your replies. Each one has been read and appreciated. You've really helped me to feel less 'silly' and I think I'm going to take a moment to consider what makes me comfortable, and ask the vicar about that option.

I think I've always been keen to 'fit in' and I didn't want to risk bringing attention onto myself, but I perhaps just need to be braver and do what feels right.

It's very helpful to hear about what others have done/do, and it's good to know I'm not the only one who prefers a non-cup option. I pretty much do everything now in normal life that non-OCD people do (albeit with a few extra, discreet hand washes) but I just cannot get comfortable with sharing the communal cup, sadly.

This reminds me of a story my vicar godfather told: just as he handed the chalice to the next person, he realised that there was a big glob of spit in it. When it was handed back it had gone 😱🤮

I’m RC and have attended mass regularly through my life. I’ve never once had the wine. The thought totally grosses me out and I really don’t think God will mind

Surely not everyone drinks alcohol so passes on the wine?

I've had communion many rimes and never had the wine.

I just have the bread not the wine. Its easy to bypass the wine. Take host from one person then move back to seat. Don't sweat it.

You need to join the Baptists! (Picture coming to explain the mini cups). However we don't really go for wafers so you would have to contend with someone having touched your cube of bread...

It sounds like you have done major work in largely overcoming your OCD and I know how much that involves coming out of your comfort zone and doing hard things, so hats off to you, OP! You should be enormously proud of yourself.

If your boundary is not to take the wine, you’re perfectly within your rights to do so. Plenty of people without OCD feel icky about doing it, so don’t pathologise it, would be my approach.

I’ve never told anyone this, but the reason I never wanted to be confirmed as a child is because I didn’t want to drink out of the same vessel as other people. I’m in my fifties. I still don’t want to drink out of the same vessel.

I don't have OCD and I think it's entirely reasonable to avoid the communal cup.

I normally go for a blessing instead, now, and I don't think anyone notices or cares.

The communal cup should have gone out with Covid. I always wonder how many of the elderly congregation are getting laid low (or worse) by Communion viruses every year.

@NotMeNoNo I thought the same!
I grew up Baptist and although I'm not somebody particularly fussed about germs, I've never been able to shake off the idea that a communal cup is gross.

I had communion this morning while visiting at a (non-denominational) local church.

We had little pieces of bread which each person picked up for him/herself off the plate and each person also had their own little shot glass of non-alcoholic communion ‘wine’. It’s a good system.

Hope you find a resolution to your problem, OP. 🙏🏻

Fagin99 Christ asked to take the Eucharist in his memory, it doesn’t have a set amount to do so. You can take it once in the rules of the Canon in the catholic tradition. Some people like to take it more or less.

Some things
You could perhaps gear yourself to once a year to battle this or more but not every week till you felt more able to do so. I have battled with taking the sacraments. Not for the same reason, but I used to be fearful of the calories with extreme anorexia by DSM and I am overcame it. People can at times overcome their conditions like this.

You could also consider asking them to pour the wine into hands as I have done myself and done the sign of the cross with it. You could bring a tiny container like an egg cup size and ask them to put it in it at the end perhaps.
You could speak to your minister and ask them if you can take the sacraments with your own hands yourself and they might let you if you tell them your issues.
There are some church’s like evangelical where you just go up to the table and take the bread and it doesn’t happen every week though. They tend to use ordinary bread.

In my church there is someone who goes for blessing all the time and you get used to it. Nobody thinks anything of it. However, if someone has been the Eucharist and suddenly get a blessing someone might wonder if they are ok and just forget it. Nobody makes a big issue of it and you are not there for them.
There is a scripture to that some pastors used wrongly during covid that you will not get sick and they ended up dying of COVID, it could have been there time, but it was not good advice. I like to think I would become ill from the Eucharist ever.

Mark 16:17-18
“They shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.”.