When you talk about what I'm going to talk about, people are going to say, "Oh my goodness, Father has me directly in mind. I know he's just directing what he's going to say at me." And people become very self-conscious, or even sometimes offended.

What I want to talk about this morning is the reception of Holy Communion, Holy Eucharist. Not because there are any flagrant, or extreme violations, or extreme problems. But it's good always to remind ourselves of what it is that happens when we receive Holy Eucharist and how we should receive it. We have the adage or maxim in English, "Familiarity breeds contempt. " Not that we have contempt for the Eucharist, but we do it so often that we can sometimes become slovenly. Even priests can become slovenly in the way they say mass. As anyone knows who's been a superior of a community of priests? it's always rather delicate to approach the priest and say, "Father, look, you're saying Mass too fast; you're saying Mass too irreverently; you're doing this or that and you ought to correct it. " Several years ago a Jesuit published a book, How not to say Mass, and when we read it in refectory in the monastery one of the old monks said, "How strange that a Jesuit should write a book on how not to say Mass." Well, here we go.

If you were to ask me what are the two dispositions that are absolutely necessary to approach the table of the Lord, I would have to say without hesitation that the first is faith--a deep belief in what it is that we are about, the reception of our Lord. Our Lord who is truly present, body and soul, humanity and divinity, who becomes present at the words of consecration on our altar, and comes into our lives, into our very beings, assimilates us into Himself, into His body through the reception of Holy Eucharist. That is the great thing that we are receiving. We are here to celebrate that great act that Jesus enacted at the Last Supper, on Calvary. We are here to represent that act to the Father, and its benefits upon ourselves. And those benefits come from the reception of Holy Eucharist. And it demands a great faith. Because the Eucharist, like all the great mysteries of our faith, is not something that one can rationally explain. How can Jesus, how can God be contained in that small wafer of bread? But that's our belief, that's our strong belief, that it is truly Jesus present there, on our altars. And once we have received him in Holy Eucharist, we believe He is present in our very persons, in our bodies. We believe that by the reception of Holy Eucharist we become the tabernacles of the Lord. We have our Lord contained within our very selves. That is a marvelous mystery, that is a great mystery, and that's what we're all about on Sunday morning and daily when we receive Holy Eucharist. And that's the first quality that we have to come with, that deep awareness, that deep faith, that deep belief in this. That's what really makes Catholics Catholic. You take away the Holy Eucharist and we're like everyone else. There's no difference. I think it was one of the French revolutionaries who said, "If I truly believed what the Church wants me to believe, that Christ truly becomes present on the altar at the moment of consecration, I would not walk to the communion rail, I would crawl on my belly. That is how deep my faith and my humility would be."

Now we certainly don't expect you to crawl. But you see, there has to be that faith. And out of that faith there has to come a devotion. Out of that faith comes an awareness of what we are about, and a great devotion. You know, each of us by baptism is baptized into the priesthood of Jesus. And one of the ways in which ordinary baptized Catholics exercise that priesthood is by receiving Holy Eucharist. That is the exercise of a power that we have from Christ and we exercise that priesthood every time we go to Holy Mass and particularly every time we receive Holy Eucharist. It's an act of worship, and so we do it devoutly--not necessarily piously. Piety has a kind of obsequiousness about it. We come with devotion, we come with humility. We come, how should I put it, with great reverence and respect. And I think that's what many people complain about in our modern liturgy, the fact that the sense of reverence, of dignity, of awe, has disappeared. But that's more in our disposition than in anything else.

Now there are two ways in which communion is received in the Latin Church. In the eastern Church, the Byzantine, the Greek, in the rites of churches even in union with Rome, communion is received in different ways. If you go to the Byzantine, Ruthenian rite, for example, I can never understand quite how the priest is able to do this, they take the Holy Communion, the bread is put in the chalice and it absorbs the wine, and then they dip a spoon in and how they can fling that Eucharist in the mouth always amazes me, because I'm afraid it would drop short. But they seem to do it, and they do it with a great deal of grace; I suppose it comes with practice. But in the Western church, the Latin church that most of us were baptized into, the two ways in which we receive Holy Eucharist are either on the tongue or on the hand. Now if you are going to receive it on the tongue, the priest will hold up the host, and say "the Body of Christ," and the communicant says, "Amen." That's not an English word, it's an Aramaic word. It really is pronounced "Ahmeen," and it means, "So be it." "I agree." "I believe." "It is the Body of Christ." That's what the "Amen" means: "I concur. I honestly believe that when I receive, that is Christ. And so I say Amen. " And if we choose--no one can dictate how one is to receive Holy Eucharist. A priest can't say "I'm only going to give Holy Eucharist on the tongue." Nor can a priest demand that everyone who comes to communion receives it in the hand. Who decides how one is to receive Holy Communion? The communicant and only the communicant. It is the individual who is going to receive Holy Communion who decides how he or she is going to receive. And oftentimes you'll run into situations--I have--where priests will say, "I'm only going to give it in the hand." And I had to walk in and say, "Father, you cannot demand that." So if you're going to receive it on the tongue, there are certain things that should be kept in mind.

First, the head should be bent back slightly, and the head should be held erect, but kind of tilted back. And the tongue should come out over the bottom teeth, and a little bit equal with the bottom lip, so that the priest has someplace to put the Host. Sometimes people come up and they have their teeth clenched, and you wonder, "How am I going to get our Lord into that person?" And also, if you're going to receive on the tongue, there are certain things that we priests talk about among ourselves (I'm telling the tricks of the trade now), but there are certain comments that we make about certain kinds of communicants. We say, "That one was a snapping turtle," because they close their mouth so quickly that the priest is afraid his fingers are going to be cut offby the teeth, and you look down sometimes and wonder, "Has blood been drawn?" You close your mouth before the priest has time to get his fingers out of the mouth, and on many a time, I've had the scar of the teeth on my knuckles. There are also the plungers, they sort of leap forward. Here you are about to give our Lord on the tongue, and they sort of plunge forward. Or you have the toe dancers, who come up on their toes, and you never know where you're going to light. And others receive on the run. They don't stand squarely in front of you but they stand like they can't wait to get away. Come straight forward, face the priest straightforward, and don't be too far away, because it's awfully difficult at times to reach that far.

If you're going to receive on the hand, then the best way to receive on the hand, then the best way is to put one hand down, and put the other hand on it, and make, as Tertullian used to say, a kind of throne for the Lord. Then you receive the host; when the priest puts it on the hand, you say "Amen." The best thing to do is to take a step or two to the side to make way for the next communicant, then when you're a step or two to the side, you receive our Lord, and then you go back to your place. Communion should not be received on the run, as you're walking back to your place; it should be consumed before you leave the area below the altar.

I think another thing that we would like to remind people about is to indicate clearly to the eucharistic minister how you wish to receive. Sometimes communicants come up with their hands out and their mouth open, and the priest doesn't know which way to give it--how does this person wish to receive? But if you indicate clearly, then it's easier. Another thing, if you're going to receive in the hand, be clear about where the Host should be placed so that it doesn't accidentally fall. By the way, if it should fall on the floor, just indicate it to the priest. Sometimes the priest or Eucharistic Minister doesn't see it.

If you're going to kneel for communion--and it's all right to kneel--remember that when you rise, you have people behind you. Sometimes those who kneel to receive, when they rise, they take a step or two back, and I've seen it at times here at Mass, that an older person stands just behind the one who is rising. Particularly a person who has a cane who steadies his walk, may come close to being knocked over or made unsteady on their feet by someone rising up. So if you're going to kneel, remember to rise straight up, thinking about the possibility of someone right behind you.

Some people ask me at times, "Father, I see on television the masses that come from Birmingham, from Mother Angelica, and I see the sisters genuflecting. Should I genuflect before or after?" Only as a sign of piety, it's not necessary. Nor is it necessary to bow before Holy Eucharist. What is necessary is to receive it with reverence and dignity. And I don't think there should be any genuflections after receiving Holy Eucharist. I don't mean to sound facetious, but if you're going to genuflect after receiving Holy Eucharist, you don't want to genuflect to the tabernacle, because the Lord is within you; you are the tabernacle. If you're going to genuflect in any way, one should genuflect to the Lord who is within oneself, and that's a little difficult, isn't it, to genuflect to oneself.

Let me sum up by saying the two main dispositions that we need--faith. Remember that scene in the fourth gospel after the Resurrection. The disciples are out fishing and the boats are coming toward the shore. And Peter as usual is completely immersed in what he is doing; he's got his outer clothes off so he can work more easily. And the beloved disciple sees someone standing on the shore and he says to Peter, "It is the Lord. " And Peter jumps into the water. That disposition of John, "It is the Lord, " that's what our faith demands. It is the Lord that we are worshipping. It is the Lord that we are receiving. It is the Lord that we are receiving into ourself. It is the Lord who is giving us in Eucharist in a very special way participation in divine life. It is the Lord who is sanctifying us. And that should be the overshelming disposition with which we approach Holy Communion: "It is the Lord!"

And again, from that comes reverence, piety in the best sense, and devotion. The piety, the reverence, and the devotion demonstrate--show forth--the faith that we have, "It is the Lord."