My friend’s upset he can’t receive Communion

Dear Mason & Teo,
A Christian friend of mine recently went to a Catholic retreat. Although he enjoyed himself, he was upset that he couldn’t go to Holy Communion. I guess at his church their communion is open to everyone. He says that he believes that it is Jesus in the bread and can’t understand why the Catholic Church would deny him from going to Holy Communion. It has been a sore issue between us. Can you help me explain why my Christian friend can’t go up and receive Communion in the Catholic Church? (Struggling friends)

Dear Struggling,

“Jesus said to them, ‘Amen, amen, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the son of Man and drink his blood, you do not have life within you’” (John 6:53).

Jesus Christ is totally present body, blood, soul and divinity in the Eucharist and he is the channel of eternal life. In Holy Communion, we sacramentally and intimately receive Jesus Christ into our bodies. The “Catechism of the Catholic Church” tells us that of the seven sacraments of the Catholic Church, the Eucharist is the “source and summit of the Christian life.” Jesus in the Eucharist deepens the unity with the church and more fully assimilates us into Christ.

Since the Eucharist is the most important sacrament, the church has guidelines to properly receive it. To receive Communion worthily, you must be in a state of grace, have made a good confession since your last mortal sin, believe in transubstantiation, observe the Eucharistic fast, and not be under a church censure such as excommunication.

“Therefore whoever eat the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord unworthily will have to answer for the body and blood of the Lord. A person should examine himself, and so eat the bread and drink the cup. For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body, eats and drinks judgment on himself” (1 Cor 11:27-30).

Proper catechetical instruction is necessary before receiving our first Holy Communion. It took Jesus three years to prepare his Apostles for the Last Supper. Following Christ’s death and resurrection, a period (usually three years) of discernment and prayerful preparation was the norm for those seeking to be Christian.

Over the centuries, the period of instruction was shortened but never dispensed with. Today, each diocese has its own requirements for those preparing to be received into the church. The period of faith formation should be a significant time of formation, prayer and discernment because to receive Jesus in the Eucharist is an awesome gift and comes with great responsibility.

A weekend retreat is not enough preparation for such an important sacrament.

Partaking in the Eucharist is also among the highest signs of Christian unity. “Because there is one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread” (1 Cor. 10:17). Under ordinary circumstances, for a non-Catholic Christian to receive Holy Communion is to presume a unity that, regrettably, does not exist.

The U.S. bishops have guidelines for fellow Christians on the reception of Communion. It is published in many missalettes: “We welcome our fellow Christians to this celebration of the Eucharist as our brothers and sisters. We pray that our common baptism and the action of the Holy Spirit in this Eucharist will draw us closer to one another and begin to dispel the sad divisions which separate us. We pray that these will lessen and finally disappear, in keeping with Christ’s prayer for us ‘that they may all be one’ (John 17:21). Because Catholics believe that the celebration of the Eucharist is a sign of the reality of the oneness of faith, life and worship, members of those churches with whom we are not yet fully united are ordinarily not admitted to Communion. Eucharistic sharing in exceptional circumstances by other Christians requires permission according to the directives of the diocesan bishop and the provisions of canon law.”

For non-Christians, the bishops’ guidelines state: “We also welcome to this celebration those who do not share our faith in Jesus Christ. While we cannot admit them to Holy Communion, we ask them to offer their prayers for the peace and the unity of the human family.”

Pray for your friend and continue to talk to him about Jesus and our Catholic faith. Encourage him to join a Catholic preparatory class like RCIA (Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults). For truly, as the Catechism says, “the more painful the experience of the divisions in the Church which break the common participation in the table of the Lord, the more urgent are our prayers to the Lord that the time of complete unity among all who believe in him may return.”