Q: With all due respect to GIRM 85, I suspect it is fairly common practice in the United States to regularly rely upon the hosts reserved in the tabernacle for distribution during Mass.
As far as I know, the GIRM does not comment viz. which ministers are entitled to access the tabernacle during Mass in order to facilitate Communion. If it has, are any exclusions made?
Perhaps there is something I have missed here? Maybe the matter is addressed in some post-Conciliar instruction or the like?
If not, then I ask – as far as you know, is the point at hand basically a matter for particular diocesan directives, local pastors’ preferences and guidance, or something else?
Thank you!
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A: As you can deduce, the GIRM makes no provision for bringing hosts from the tabernacle to distribute to the faithful at communion. Its only understanding of the situation is in GIRM 85, which says “It is most desirable” that the people receive communion from hosts consecrated at the same Mass, but it stops short of demanding it, as it does for the priest, who is “bound” to do so.
The missal offers no further solution, as if the very thought of communion from the tabernacle during Mass is toxic.
The American bishops, seeing the practical dilemma, included two comments in their Introduction to the Order of Mass, a publication from the USCCB that was meant to offer suggestions, not norms. It offers two remarks: “If it is necessary to use the hosts consecrated from a previous Mass, a priest or deacon should bring the reserved sacrament to the altar from the tabernacle, reverently but without ceremony” (121). And “These hosts may be brought reverently but without ceremony from the tabernacle to the altar at the breaking of the bread” (131).
At the cathedral where I serve, the tabernacle is some distance from the sanctuary, so I ask one of our communion ministers to bring the ciborium from the tabernacle to the altar, but only after the distribution of communion has begun. We use it only out of necessity.