Public Masses Resume in Italy, but Not Without Controversy

National Catholic Register ^ | May 18, 2020 | Edward Pentin

[ebb tide]

Public Masses Resume in Italy, but Not Without Controversy

The head of Italy’s bishops and the Italian prime minister signed a joint protocol May 7 allowing public Masses to resume.

But others have strongly opposed it. “How sad!” commented one. “This is a total disrespect and mistrust in Our Lord,” said another. Others wrote to remind the Church in Italy that the “Eucharist is God,” and that it is “such an appalling sight! May God forgive us.”

Simona, a Rome citizen, expressed her disapproval and asked why the rule applies to receiving the Host but the “same rule isn’t applied in grocery stores or the pasticcerie [pastry shop].” Similar arguments were made about suspending public Masses while supermarkets were allowed to be open throughout the lockdown.

She told the Register it was probably because they were “thinking of precautions that doctors make because of their contact with bodies.” But applied here, she said “such a precaution effectively denies the sacrality of the Eucharist, it denies his Body and Blood.”

Priests in Rome have said privately they are very unhappy about the disposable gloves rule but worry about going against it for fear of sanctions by the police. Of particular concern is what happens to the disposable gloves after they have touched the Lord in the Sacred Host.

[ebb tide]

Andrea Zambrano, a journalist with the Catholic online daily La Nuova Bussola Quotidiana, said evidence suggests the pandemic is being used as “excuse to dismantle the liturgy,” beginning with the “prohibition of Communion on the tongue” which he said was not in the joint protocol with the government but which the Italian bishops “added later” in each episcopal decree for individual dioceses. The news was first reported on the MiL - Messainlatino website.

[ebb tide]

Ping