Q: One of our retired priests is celebrating his 50th anniversary belatedly because of the pandemic. He expects 9 concelebrating priests. But we don’t have separate chalices for each of them. Diocesan guidelines still call for separate chalices for each. (deacons too). As intinction has been prohibited here, what option do we have?
Is there a liturgical problem if concelebrants don’t receive “from the cup”?
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A: I’ve treated this in the concelebration section of my new book Ars Celebrandi. In my view, the best solution during the pandemic is for concelebrants to intinct. The presider must drink from a chalice, but all the concelebrants could use a common second chalice to receive by intinction. All the priests concelebrating must receive under both kinds, and they must receive hosts consecrated at the same Mass. In our diocese, we ask the last concelebrant to drink from the second chalice and purify it.
Diocesan policies may prohibit distributing communion by intinction to the laity, but they cannot prohibit concelebrants from intinction because it’s embedded in the rubrics.