No, but low gluten 0.01% gluten hosts are available for those with the allergy. They are often erroneously called gluten free, partly because low gluten doesn't sound very reassuring. Looking at the number 0.01% (0.0001) is reassuring, though.
The Bible references grains. However, the grains consumed a couple thousand years ago are nothing near the grains we consume today.
In Jesus' time, there were three major wheat varieties: Einkorn, Emmer, and Spelt. These grains had and have a higher protein content and lower anti-nutrient content than the grains of today. This is because today's 25,000+ species were created in a lab to be disease resistant or produce higher yields. However, in order to achieve this, scientists had to enhance their glutens, lectins and phytates, which can be harmful to our body. This is likely why the hybridized strains of wheat produce allergy reactions while the ancient, un-hybridized wheats show little to no reaction, especially Einkorn.
I recall a somewhat similar discussion in the last few years. A member or two who were prone to an allergic reaction to wheat said that the Priest would reserve a bit of the Precious Blood and administer it to them. (I don't recall if it was at the same time as other communicants or given privately after Mass.) It would seem to be the safer course rather than using doubtful matter.
A 100% wheat host from regular commercial flour has how much flour in it, a fraction of a teaspoon. Any gastro/respiratory/dermal reaction is probably more from power of suggestion than anything else.
That said, what would be cost increment for using einkorn/emmer/spelt for everyone?
gluten free? First, if we have a valid priest, then it becomes Christ. My daughter is gluten free and takes the full size host, Christ. Also, even a crumb is all and totally Christ.
2. Low-gluten hosts (partially gluten-free) are valid matter, provided they contain a sufficient amount of gluten to obtain the confection of bread without the addition of foreign materials and without the use of procedures that would alter the nature of bread.
The protein level in gluten plays a crucial role in products keeping their shape. So, the ideal amount of gluten in flour is going to change with what you’re baking. The flour with the lowest amount of gluten in it is cake flour containing only 7-9% gluten. It is of course used in cake, but also muffins and delicate cookies. All-purpose flour has 8-11% gluten in it. It can be used to make things like waffles, pie crusts, pastries, and cookies. Bread flour has the highest amounts of gluten at 12-14%, and works well in yeast products.
Our friend's daughter has Celiac Disease. Her's is rather acute, if you put a hotdog on a bun and took it off to give to her that will trigger a reaction which usually is vomiting. She receives Communion regularly, a full size Host and she has no reactions from Him.
I hope this helps,
JoeZ
Thanks, JoeZ. That's in line with my pious belief that Our Lord would not allow Holy Communion to harm anyone..
.I don't think believing the Holy Eucharist cannot harm the gluten intolerant is at odds with the accidents remaining. Why could Our Lord not make the gluten-intolerant tolerant of gluten during, and for some time after, the reception of the Eucharist?
No, it is Catholic dogma that the accidents of the Holy Eucharist remain. So if a host has, as one of its accidents, that it will cause someone some sort of harm, then that will not change after the consecration.
St. Alphonsus even talked about the case where someone poisoned the altar wine in order to murder the priest, and then confessed doing this to the priest in confession right before Mass (I know, the whole concept is bizarre, but he was trying to illustrate various points), but refused to change the wine and was refused absolution. So, the priest has to go and say Mass anyway, right? He can't act on anything heard in confession.
The problem here is, how does the priest deal with this? St. Alphonsus doesn't say the priest doesn't need to worry about anything, because "Our Lord would not allow Holy Communion to harm anyone". No, he says the priest would have to figure something out or he would die. The question was extremely difficult, as he said it would be intrinsically immoral for the priest to use the altar wine knowing it would kill him, since that would be ѕυιcιdє, and he suggested that the priest drop the cruet on the floor and smash it during Mass, making it look like an accident. That was the best thing he could think of, though this is one of the classic "insoluble" problems of the Seal of Confession.
No theologian has ever answered this problem by saying Our Lord will not allow the Precious Blood to poison the priest.
I don't think believing the Holy Eucharist cannot harm the gluten intolerant is at odds with the accidents remaining. Why could Our Lord not make the gluten-intolerant tolerant of gluten during, and for some time after, the reception of the Eucharist?.
If anyone says that in the sacred and holy sacrament of the Eucharist there remains the substance of bread and wine together with the body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, and denies that wonderful and singular conversion of the whole substance of the bread into the body, and of the entire substance of the wine into the blood, the species [accidents] of the bread and wine only remaining, a change which the Catholic Church most fittingly calls transubstantiation: let him be anathema. Denzinger 884.
This thread comes at an apropos time.Interesting, I'll keep that in mind.
My chapel (SSPX) has a number of attendees who are celiac/gluten intolerant of some sort. So for years they have received some kind of low gluten host.
Recently, somebody from my chapel sent a letter to the district superior arguing that low gluten hosts were of doubtful validity (whether they were arguing that ALL low gluten hosts were doubtful, or that the specific type that my chapel/the district was using were doubtful, I’m not sure. I didn’t see the letter.) anyways, I understand that the issue went all the way up to Menzingen, who instructed that the entire district pause distributing low gluten hosts, and distribute the Precious Blood to the gluten intolerant instead.
I am curious of more of the details here, what exactly the complaint was etc. but because the issue doesn’t concern/affect me at all I don’t want to seem like a busybody by bugging the priest about this.
Interesting, I'll keep that in mind.
2. Low-gluten hosts (partially gluten-free) are valid matter, provided they contain a sufficient amount of gluten to obtain the confection of bread without the addition of foreign materials and without the use of procedures that would alter the nature of bread.
Description
Our superior Wheat Starch is an uncooked highly refined wheat starch. Commonly used in bookbinding and paper conservation as an adhesive for paper, leather, fabric, and other porous materials. It is sought after as a very stable adhesive with excellent long term aging characteristics. This starch is exceptionally white in color due to an extra washing process to remove impurities, gelatinizes at low cooking temperatures and forms cooled pastes which are delicate and smooth in texture. Has a high water holding capacity, pH 5-6.5 (measured in a 70% slurry).
To buffer this material, add 10% (by weight) of calcium carbonate. (http://www.talasonline.com/Calcium-Carbonate)
This product requires cooking.
Here's a "Catholic" one, which I also hold would be invalid. Is this really bread, where the main ingredient is starch and they stick a tiny amount of flour into it? Just because they can get it to sortof look like bread doesn't make it bread. To me, this would be like putting too much water into the wine at Holy Communion time, which if it's too diluted would be held to be invalid.I looked this up, and supposedly it's made out of "wheat starch". But wouldn't anything coming from wheat have gluten in it? I have no idea how this works.
(https://cdn11.bigcommerce.com/s-zjzn8ssx4n/images/stencil/1280x1280/products/15183/73528/J0528__59186.1651012860.jpg?c=1)
I looked this up, and supposedly it's made out of "wheat starch". But wouldn't anything coming from wheat have gluten in it? I have no idea how this works.
Interesting, I'll keep that in mind.(https://i.imgur.com/Fq9OCdW.png)
I don't think believing the Holy Eucharist cannot harm the gluten intolerant is at odds with the accidents remaining. Why could Our Lord not make the gluten-intolerant tolerant of gluten during, and for some time after, the reception of the Eucharist?
.
An accident is some quality that an object has that are not its substance. These are things like taste, color, smell, and so on. This would include chemical reactivity, and every other physical property that it has. So, if some substance makes a person sick, that is an accident of that substance.
This can be more easily explained by saying there is no experiment that someone can do to a host to determine if it is consecrated or not, since any experiment would only tell us the accidents of the host, not its substance.
So, if a certain type of host makes a particular person sick, that is an accident of the host.
Let's see what the Council of Trent says:
So the Council of Trent tells us that the species or accidents of the bread and wine remain after consecration. Therefore the bread and wine will behave exactly the same, on a physical level, both before and after consecration.
If this idea were true, then it would be possible to do an experiment with a sacred host to tell if it is consecrated or not, by giving it to someone with celiac disease, and then based on whether they get sick or not you would know if it is consecrated. This is not only contrary to the Council of Trent, it is contrary to the entire Catholic concept of the Holy Eucharist, which is that Our Lord's presence is a mystery since He is physically undetectable in the sacred host.
They chemically-remove everything but the starch from the wheat to get that product. It is impossible to make "bread" with wheat starch.
1983 Canon
Can. 924 §1. The most holy eucharistic sacrifice must be offered with bread and with wine in which a little water must be mixed.§2. The bread must be only wheat and recently made so that there is no danger of spoiling.§3. The wine must be natural from the fruit of the vine and not spoiled.
1917 Canon
Canon 815 (1983 CIC 924)
§ 1. The bread must be pure wheat and recently made so that there is no danger of corruption.
§ 2. The wine must be a natural product of the vine and not corrupt
Just on an anecdotal level, when I was a Novus Ordo altar boy, I would occasionally bring home some unconsecrated hosts from the sacristy and would eat them, sometimes playing Mass with my younger siblings.My son asked me if I could order some unconsecrated hosts, for him to snack on. I told him NO, it is not good to get that familiar with something that is supposed to be set aside for confecting the Holy Eucharist. I wouldn't go so far as to say it is sinful, but something about it just doesn't seem quite proper.
My son asked me if I could order some unconsecrated hosts, for him to snack on. I told him NO, it is not good to get that familiar with something that is supposed to be set aside for confecting the Holy Eucharist. I wouldn't go so far as to say it is sinful, but something about it just doesn't seem quite proper.I'm Polish and I have never heard of this whatsoever. I had to Google it and I was shocked because this sounds suspiciously similar to what is done with the matzah at a passover seder. Perhaps it's a regional custom within Poland as I'm certain if it was something my very Old World Catholic grandparents were familiar with they would have passed down to my dad and us grandkids. You learn something new every day!
But then there is the Polish oplatki, shared with family members at Christmas time. It is essentially the same composition and texture as the host, just cut in square sheets and impressed with devotional images. You break it off into pieces and family members share it as a sign of devotion and unity, similar to the Orthodox antidoron.
I'm Polish and I have never heard of this whatsoever. I had to Google it and I was shocked because this sounds suspiciously similar to what is done with the matzah at a passover seder. Perhaps it's a regional custom within Poland as I'm certain if it was something my very Old World Catholic grandparents were familiar with they would have passed down to my dad and us grandkids. You learn something new every day!Oh, yes, it's very common, at least amongst any Poles I've ever known (including my wife and son's family):
My son asked me if I could order some unconsecrated hosts, for him to snack on. I told him NO, it is not good to get that familiar with something that is supposed to be set aside for confecting the Holy Eucharist. I wouldn't go so far as to say it is sinful, but something about it just doesn't seem quite proper.When being prepared for First Holy Communion in 1959 the parochial school Sisters used saltine crackers (like the ones commonly put in soup) for our practice. There maybe was one practice with the priest and unconsecrated hosts (that was a long time ago). I does seem best to avoid any uncertainty and confusion.
My son asked me if I could order some unconsecrated hosts, for him to snack on. I told him NO, it is not good to get that familiar with something that is supposed to be set aside for confecting the Holy Eucharist. I wouldn't go so far as to say it is sinful, but something about it just doesn't seem quite proper.I haven't seen host scraps in US stores. Not uncommon in Italy, Spain or Latinamerica. "Obleas" are snacks made with the same basic ingredients and you do find them in the US in latino stores in the candy section. See pics.
But then there is the Polish oplatki, shared with family members at Christmas time. It is essentially the same composition and texture as the host, just cut in square sheets and impressed with devotional images. You break it off into pieces and family members share it as a sign of devotion and unity, similar to the Orthodox antidoron.
I haven't seen host scraps in US stores. Not uncommon in Italy, Spain or Latinamerica. "Obleas" are snacks made with the same basic ingredients and you do find them in the US in latino stores in the candy section. See pics.The colored ones are tortilla size.
I haven't seen host scraps in US stores. Not uncommon in Italy, Spain or Latinamerica. "Obleas" are snacks made with the same basic ingredients and you do find them in the US in latino stores in the candy section. See pics.
When being prepared for First Holy Communion in 1959 the parochial school Sisters used saltine crackers (like the ones commonly put in soup) for our practice. There maybe was one practice with the priest and unconsecrated hosts (that was a long time ago). I does seem best to avoid any uncertainty and confusion.
But does the starch remain "wheat"?
Even with conventional hosts, the wheat bran has been removed, as is the case with all white flour. So removing part of the wheat grain doesn't seem as though it would jeopardize validity.
This would be a good question for Aquinas.
Nonsense. There’s nothing contrary to Trent in considering that God would prevent the accidents from behaving in such a way as to not do harm. In Eucharistic miracles, God changes the accidents entirely. God can do whatever He wants. Some saints were protected by God from being affected by poisons..
I was just informed there is a SSPX priest who uses a gluten-free host for his own communion. I was told this by a former sacristan.I'm assuming that his gluten sensitivity became known after ordination. I have to think that under traditional rules, someone with a known gluten (or alcohol) sensitivity would have been irregular for ordination, in that he couldn't confect the Sacrifice without significant accommodation, and even then, he has to purify vessels and consume the contents, which would have gluten (albeit very small traces) in them.