If you liked the communion host PEZ dispenser, your gonna flip over this!

I am not making this up.

A reader sent a note with the simple message…. "I’ll see your Communion Host dispenser… and raise you…."

"… pre-filled Communion cups and wafers!"

Yes, folks, we can now beat that pesky Swine Flu with these.

Please note that this is NOT a Catholic company, okay? Don’t freak out or be giving them grief.   This is NOT intended for Catholic worship.

But I thought you would enjoy that anyway.

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Fr. Z is the guy who runs this blog. o{]:¬)
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26 Comments

  1. Reminds me of the tray with shot glasses of grape juice that got passed around at my childhood church (not Catholic)…I always thought it was rather weird…esp. these folks CONDEMNED anyone who drank liquor (with shot glasses of grape juice??)…whatever.
    Somebody’s always out to get the “shoddy buck” as the Irish say…

  2. Stephen Anthony Gregory says:

    I wonder if the Eastern Catholics and Orthodox have changed anything about the way they distribute Holy Communion because of the pandemic. Somehow I doubt it.

  3. FrCharles says:

    Man. I can hardly imagine what a project the purifications would be. One would have hyponatremia before he even began the second ablution. ;)

  4. I am an Orthodox Priest and I can say that we have not changed anything in out Liturgy one bit becasue of this nonsense. Several bishops have released statements saying that communion is the body and blood of Jesus Christ and will not make you sick.

    Maybe I will order some of those cups and hand them out at the start of Liturgy and then at the consecration everyone can just hold it up… There you go…

    Seriously this is way too funny.

  5. I should have added, and sad, to the end of that.

  6. Dan G. says:

    Several years ago, visiting my brother’s Vineyard church, I was shocked to find that sealed grape juice cups like these were at the entrance doors, and anyone who intended to receive communion would pick one up, take it to his seat, and then wait to drink it at the designated moment. My brothers and I grew up in churches that used the “tray with shot glasses of grape juice”– which at least involves a gesture of communal sharing. But sealed individual cups at the door?

  7. kab63 says:

    Our Eastern Catholic church has not changed how Communion is distributed but we’ve been told to stop kissing the Cross, only bow and touch our forehead. Our pastor has always been very clear on how we’re to receive (“Open your mouth wide and don’t stick out your tongue at me!”) and I’ve never had his or Deacon’s fingers touch my mouth.

  8. ssoldie says:

    Goes along with the other novelities brought to us with the N.O.M, why not? We had something similar in the lutheren church, it was circular and had alot of little cups full of grape juice, if it worked for the luthern’s service, it would work for the N.O.M, their liturgy’s are very much alike.

  9. Fr. Charles: Please excuse my ignorance, but could you define “hyponatremia”? Is that something to do with diabetes?:<)!

  10. Subvet says:

    First we had TV dinners, then “lunchables” and Eggos to substitute for genuine meals, now this.

    We’re doomed folks, just doomed.

  11. Random Friar says:

    Hyponatremia is “low sodium,” literally. This often happens when you drink too much water and do not replenish your electrolytes. You can get “water intoxication” (really). This can be a very serious condition and lead to death.

  12. VivaLaMezzo says:

    K… I’m more concerned about the need for latex gloves and masks during the sign of peace!

  13. Sedgwick says:

    I’d like a little vinaigrette with my Protestant wafer.

  14. jfk03 says:

    In my Eastern Catholic (Ukranian) parish, the priest takes the Body and Blood of the Lord from a chalice and places it directly into our mouths with a golden spoon. Infants and small children also receive the Eucharist. This will not change despite the swine flu hysteria.

    I attended Mass in a Roman church in Sacramento, CA several weeks ago. On instructions from the bishop, the faithful were denied the right to receive the host on their tongues and were told to receive it in the palm of their hands, which is completely foreign to our tradition.

  15. Andy F. says:

    These have regrettably been around the Protestant world for quite sometime. My first encounter with them was 1999. I was a high schooler. We Nazarenes called them “Jesus Lunchables.” You either laugh or cry.

  16. Tom Ryan says:

    I knew of a Catholic church in Tennessee that use disposable paper medicine cups at least 10 years ago.

  17. southern orders says:

    Believe it or not, in this small southern community I visited a bereaved family and before our left, the daughter brought out a box of these things and asked me to bless them because her elderly parents (one of whom had just died) watch Mass on EWTN and at Communion time, would receive “holy communion” along with the television congregation. They were probably watching a taped version of the daily mass to boot! I was so stunned by what they had that I actually blessed it (like a sacramental, not like a sacrament!) and asked if I could take a few home. But I haven’t tried it by watching Mass on EWTN and then communing. But I did take a phone photo of it and send it to a priest friend of mine who was in disbelief too. I still can’t believe I blessed it. They can be ordered from some large evangelical mega church in north Georgia.

  18. GScheid says:

    yeah, while flipping channels one day I saw another church hand these out and instructed them all to consume at same time.

  19. MrsHall says:

    The church I grew up in (Assemblies of God) used these once a year, on Easter, because the sanctuary was packed and it saved the ushers the trouble of passing out the bread and grape juice separately. I was later told that a lot of the big congregations used them to save time. We only took Communion once a month because it was so time-consuming. I hate that attitude and love the extravagant amount of time it takes at Mass on Sunday for everyone to receive Communion. It would take even longer without the “extraordinary” ministers of the Eucharist, and I say let’s go for it. It’s worth the time it takes.

  20. irishgirl says:

    They look like the containers that applesauce and pudding come in!

    I hope that we Catholics don’t go for stuff like this…the things that people think of in this swine flu hysteria…sheesh…

  21. catholicmidwest says:

    This is just evidence of the difference between Catholic Holy Communion and protestant holy communion.

    We transubstantiate–in the hands of the priest the bread and wine BECOME the Body and Blood of Christ, whole and entire.

    There are many other ideas about Holy Communion among protestants. It’s a sad tale. Most protestants believe that communion is only a community meal or a symbol. Some believe that Christ is somehow present in the assembly or inside the bread & wine, having not changed it physically in any way. Some believe that after the service is over, Christ is no longer present in the elements of communion and remnants can simply be thrown away like food scraps. This is what allows paper cups and disposable containers like these to be used.

    Catholics CANNOT use disposable objects for Holy Communion. Once transubstantiated, the bread and wine remain the Body and Blood of Christ until consumed and used by the recipient. To throw Holy Communion in the trash is a sacrilege.

  22. catholicmidwest says:

    BTW, what’s really sad is that protestants go through the trouble of doing all this, and a) almost all of them don’t have a valid apostolic succession and therefore can’t transubstantiate anything, b) they totally miss the reception of Holy Communion. However, it does keep them from performing sacrileges all the time in this paper cup way.

    BTW, I don’t know how many Catholics know this, but most protestant groups don’t have their communion services every day, or even every week. They print in their bulletins when these services will be held, and they’re considered “special events.” Some protestant congregations only do them near Easter.

  23. Dr. Eric says:

    MrsHall,

    If the Assemblies of God people were worried that communion took too long, why didn’t they just reduce the Pastor’s sermon time? ;-p

  24. catholicmidwest says:

    Dr Eric,

    The understanding of church in the Assembly of God congregation is quite different the one in the Catholic Church.

    To understand, you have to think of the thousands of protestant groups as a huge family tree originally branching off of the Catholic church, each branch splitting in turn into sticks, each stick into twigs, each twig into leaves. At each split, there is a “doctrine” or practice that separates the one division from the others. These “doctrines” or practices can be major or quite minor. They may deal with such things as the way Scriptures are treated or how belonging to the Church is described. They may deal with interpretations of scripture. They may even be familial or geographic.

    The Assembly of God is a “pentecostal” denomination, which generally means charismatic in nature (as opposed to literal bible-based [ie evangelical) or practice-based (baptist)]. Note that many people who belong to protestant churches may no longer be aware of the reasons they split from their parent organizations–and may not even be aware they split from somewhere! [This is not emphasized and people often don’t care about such things. They get their sense of validity from other things.]

    The Assembly of God was originally derived from the “Church of God” denomination (in which my grandfather was a minister). The “Church of God” denomination, in turn, is derived from the “holiness churches” of which the original Methodism is the root (Wesley).

    Among all of these churches (Church of God and Assembly of God), the sermon is analogous to our holy communion experientially. The sermon is one of the main reasons a member of this church shows up on Sunday morning–to hear the sermon and to sing (which is worship). There may be praying in tongues, depending on the congregation, but there is surely praying out loud. For the sermon, the preacher has “heard the call to preach,” he is said to be anointed in preparing the sermon and the sermon is understood as an extension of the scriptures by way of the Holy Spirit.

    Holy communion for them is a rededication ritual (sort of like an altar call) done a 2-4 times a year or maybe more, depending on the congregation, and it’s considered symbolic, although holy because of the prayer intention it contains. {There are no claims of transubstantiation or anything near it.}

    So, this is why the sermon is so long and involved. It’s generally prepared with a LOT of care and conscientiousness, as well. They can be quite something to listen to.

  25. catholicmidwest says:

    BTW, I could never be protestant again–I know too much about Christianity now–but the one thing I miss the most is the music. It was glorious, even when the congregation had only 60 or 70 people and part of them were kids. People *worked* to learn how to play instruments correctly and sing well because it was WORSHIP. And there was neither showing off nor resentment over any of it.

    Most Roman Catholic music is absolutely ABYSMAL–like stray cats gone mad. Now and then when the local parish sings “Amazing Grace” I can still close my eyes, shut out the caterwauling, and hear the music of my childhood in my memory.

    I have heard beautiful Roman Catholic music–chants, rarely Pange Lingua which I love (and once Christus Vincit by the crowd in St Peter’s square!)–but parishes invariably don’t use any of this sort of thing with any regularity. It’s very sad.

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