The production and distribution of eucharistic bread

Packaged eucharistic hosts on a shelf
Packaged eucharistic hosts on a shelf
This is a fascinating and provocative exploration of the production and marketing of communion wafers in contemporary liturgical traditions. Rowan Moore Gerety’s essay gave me some unease at seeing unconsecrated wafers treated so much like any other economic commodity. On the other hand, as several sources in the article observe, this is theologically justified by the fact that, before consecration, it is just bread. Should they have been touched by human hands and human prayer during production, or remain pure? Should their marketing be a matter of pride and honor, or a matter of longtime personal contact between monastic communities and parishes? Should price and efficiency be a factor? The general manager of Cavanagh Company, the largest source of US communion breads, says, “Advertising our altar bread is a positive thing for Cavanagh Company. We take a lot of pride in putting our family name on a product that will eventually become the body and blood of Jesus.” What do you think?
Kimberly Hope Belcher

Kimberly Belcher received her Ph.D. in Liturgical Studies at Notre Dame in 2009. After teaching at St John's University in Collegeville, Minnesota, she returned to Notre Dame as a faculty member in 2013. Her research interests include sacramental theology (historical and contemporary), trinitarian theology, and ritual studies. Her interest in the church tradition is challenged, deepened, and inspired by her three children.

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Comments

59 responses to “The production and distribution of eucharistic bread”

  1. Dr. Dale Rodriguez

    I did a study a few years back on the history of how hosts were made over the centuries for Mass ( flat, braided, cakes etc.) Nobody seemed to know how they were made so I contacted Cavanagh and their reps were very helpful.
    I have to tell you however that seeing hosts on a shelf between chocolate cakes and toasted cakes gave me a pause… Is that for real or just done for this article? They may not be consecrated but because they are set apart for a higher purpose they can be consider blessed and as such their distribution should be done with that in mind.

    Reply
    1. Kimberly Hope Belcher

      I wonder myself. I suspect it is just done for the article, which raises even more questions. The author meant for us to feel uneasy about the realities of economics touching the eucharist – why?

      Reply
    2. Jordan Zarembo

      re: Dr. Dale Rodriguez on January 10, 2012 – 1:01 pm

      In almost any supermarket in Montreal one can buy retailles d’hosties or “host pieces”. The retailles are letter-sheet sized rectangular wafers with a hole the size of a cathedral-sized altar wafer. Although the post-production remainder is ostensibly valid (bleached wheat and water only), if I were a priest I would not consecrate retailles unless I called the producer etc. One of these days I will ask a priest of the Archdiocese if he knows about the validity of this matter.

      If a certain brand of retailles were in fact unquestionably valid, I do not see why it could not be used in an emergency for Mass. The elevation would look strange, but it would certainly be a valid Eucharist. I would also worry about fragments given that the retailles aren’t scored, but I’m scrupulous about such things.

      Reply
      1. Kimberly Hope Belcher

        If I had known that Sunday, I would have brought some home.

      2. Dr. Dale Rodriguez

        Wow, wonder who buy’s them and uses them? Used as croutons?
        Incidentally, I think that any bread would be valid but not legal. In the Eastern Catholic churches leavened bread is baked as a loaf and used. If used in the West it would still be a valid consecration but not legal. I remember several decades ago honey was added to our host recipe prior to JPII’s directive against using anything but flour and water. One can get too scrupulous, some have even asked if tap water should be used or distilled water because tap water may have fluoride in it!

      3. Karl Liam Saur

        Dale

        It wasn’t JP2’s directive. Adding sweeteners rendered it invalid matter long before JP2. I don’t believe there’s a single church outside Protestant denominations that approves the adding of sweeteners to the Eucharistic bread, so it’s not just a Roman thing.

      4. Chris Grady

        There is no such thing as an “elevation” – the rubric goes something like “He shows the Host to the people” and, despite the efforts of some, it doesn’t mean people in low-flying aircraft.

      5. Samuel J. Howard

        Chris, the 1962 rubric reads:

        “Tunc se erigens, quantum commode potest, elevat in altum Hostiam, et intentis in eam oculis (quod et in elevatione Calicis facit) populo reverenter ostendit adorandam: et mox sola manu dextera ipsam reverenter reponit super Corporale in eodem loco unde eam levavit, et deinceps pollices et indices non disjungit, nisi quando Hostiam consecratam tangere vel tractare debet, usque ad ablutionem digitorum post Communionem.”

        Surely you can see how we get “elevation” for the name of the showing of the host to the people out of that.

      6. Jeffrey Pinyan

        Yes, the modern rubrics use the language of “elevare” in the Eucharistic Prayers only before the consecration of the elements (“slightly raised”) and at the end of the prayer, at the doxology:

        110. […] accipit panem eumque parum elevatum super altare tenens […] Hostiam consecratam ostendit populo, reponit super patenam, et genuflexus adorat.

        (It should also be noted that the modern rubrics avoid calling the unconsecrated bread “hostia”.)

        114. Accipit patenam cum hostia et calicem, et utrumque elevans, dicit: “Per ipsum” […]

        It is understandable that the “showing” (ostendendum?) would still be called an “elevation” nowadays, even if the rubrics have moved away from that language. In Mass celebrated facing the people, though, the Host need not be raised very high at all for it to be suitably shown to the people.

        One could even suggest that, since the rubrics do not specify how the Host is to be shown to the people, a priest celebrating Mass ad orientem could turn around to the face the people with the Host, rather than raise it above his head. Then again, raising the Host fits the bill for showing the Host to the people.

      7. Gerard Flynn

        The consecration of the elements begins with the Eucharistic Prayer.

      8. Samuel J. Howard

        One could even suggest that, since the rubrics do not specify how the Host is to be shown to the people, a priest celebrating Mass ad orientem could turn around to the face the people with the Host, rather than raise it above his head. Then again, raising the Host fits the bill for showing the Host to the people.

        I don’t think so. The rubrics specify when the priest is to turn to face the people and this is not such a case.

      9. Samuel J. Howard

        The consecration of the elements begins with the Eucharistic Prayer.

        Correct. (Or even earlier… with the offertory/proskomedia).

        Another good reason to question the strict “bread” before the words of consecration “host” afterwards strict division.

      10. Gerard Flynn

        The offertory of the Mass takes place after the words of institution. (mementes offerimu); the preparation of the gifts, before the Eucharistic Prayer.

      11. Samuel J. Howard

        Ah, it was so nice to have a moment of agreement.

        The official books still do refer to an offertory e.g.

        37. Demum ex aliis formulis:
        …
        2. nonnullae vero, uti cantus ad introitum, ad offertorium, ad fractionem (Agnus Dei) et ad Communionem, ritum aliquem comitantur.

        And it happens before the Eucharistic prayer. Finally, there’s no dispute that there is an offertory in the 1962 rite, which is still a part of the Church’s liturgy!

      12. Jordan Zarembo

        re: Jeffrey Pinyan on January 11, 2012 – 10:23 am

        One could even suggest that, since the rubrics do not specify how the Host is to be shown to the people, a priest celebrating Mass ad orientem could turn around to the face the people with the Host, rather than raise it above his head.

        I saw a priest do just this at a major basilica in Rome this summer. I just happened to walk by a Mass being said in the Blessed Sacrament chapel at the time of the consecration. The priest was saying Mass ad orientem at the main altar. The priest said the consecration and then turned to show the people the Host. I thought it was weird, but like you I didn’t think it was necessarily improper. The priest was saying the Ordinary Form in Italian. What he did was well within the meaning of the rubrics of that form.

      13. Gerard Flynn

        Chris Grady’s views on 1962/2012 and the one Roman rite express by position also.

      14. Jeffrey Pinyan

        I apologize for using “consecration” when “institution narrative” would have been less confusing (and controversial). I tend to adhere to the (pseudo-?)Ambrosian position that it is the sacramental words of Christ which produce the change in the bread and wine (notwithstanding the acceptance of the present text of the anaphora of Addai and Mari as consecratory).

        There is also the position of Fortescue, paraphrased in In Memory Of Me (p. 97) thus: “The [anaphora] is one prayer, and the consecration is the answer to that one prayer; the transformation takes place at the Institution Narrative but is the effect of the whole prayer.”

      15. Joshua Vas

        Jeffrey Pinyan :

        One could even suggest that, since the rubrics do not specify how the Host is to be shown to the people, a priest celebrating Mass ad orientem could turn around to the face the people with the Host, rather than raise it above his head. Then again, raising the Host fits the bill for showing the Host to the people.

        Interestingly Jeffrey, the turn-around is what the Franciscans of the Custody, some of whose churches/monasteries have altars against the wall, do. I remember finding that practice rather curious, as I was expecting the ‘overhead’ gesture.

    3. Dr. Dale Rodriguez

      Karl, I don’t believe it was invalid, perhaps not legal according to canon law, but invalid, no. I do not believe that God can be held hostage by honey. In the eastern orthodox many grandmothers make the prosphora and are known to throw in a little honey or sugar now and then. Early Christians brought their bread to eucharist and Lord knows what was in it. I seriously doubt anybody would be willing to state centuries later that their eucharist was invalid and just plain bread after consecration.

      Reply
      1. Karl Liam Saur

        Well, that’s sentimentality speaking. It’s a sword that cuts two ways, not always in ways that we’d like.

        Anyway, the current canon is simply the successor to that in the 1917 Code (which turn merely codified canons in effect for centuries).

      2. Dale Rodriguez

        Let me understand what you are saying. Eucharist is invalid for millenia because some honey was added? That is just plain crazy.

        In June 1979, the Vatican Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith responded to the issue of valid matter in a letter to then Archbishop Joseph Bernardin, then president of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops (NCCB):

        “It may be helpful to note that recipes sent to the Sacred Congregation over the past several years vary greatly in the matter of “additions”; where there is question of slight additions (e.g., salt, condiments) the matter will be valid but illicit; where there is substitution of all or a large quantity of water by other liquids (e.g., milk, honey, etc.) the matter will be invalid.[7]”

        Also:

        “It follows that bread made of any substance, or to which has been added so great a quantity of any other substance than wheat that according to common estimation it cannot be said to be wheat bread, cannot be valid matter for the performance of the Sacrifice and the Consecration of the Sacrament of the Eucharist.”
        Congregation for the Sacraments, instruction (Dominus Salvator Noster), March 26, 1929; English translation in Canon Law Digest, vol. 1, 355; from Acta Apostolicae Sedis (AAS), 21 (1929), 631-639.

        Adding honey to the mix did not invalidate back then unless it is used as a “substitution” for water or there is a “large quantity” or “so great a quantity”.

        And that is not sentimentality speaking.

      3. Karl Liam Saur

        Dale

        What was sentimental was your breezy God doesn’t care rationalization. It’s a rationalization that cuts both ways (it’s kin to what motivates the traditionalists who believe the Conciliar reforms can be ignored, just for example, because whatever authority under the power of the keys that the Church claims can be ignored when we don’t like the result). I respect that reasoning more when there’s clearly necessary or grave reasons. (Not merely negligence or good intentions. Absent clear necessity or grave reasons, there is no good reason to intentionally include ingredients that might raise a question of invalid matter.)

      4. Dale Rodriguez

        Karl, we are obviously at an impasse.
        If you would reread my original post above (#5) I state:
        “I remember several decades ago honey was added to our host recipe”.
        We no longer add honey to the mixture, that was several decades ago. And you concluded that it was “invalid”. I state that it was illicit but “valid”. We stopped adding honey when the matter was clarified, several decades ago.
        My point is, with all due respect, sheer silliness on your part to judge us and proclaim that we had “invalid” eucharists because a bit of honey was added. And I have provided documentation that it did not invalidate our Eucharist.
        As far as my “breezy God doesn’t care” well, I think the Pharisees said the same thing about that breezy Jesus who didn’t ritually wash his hands before eating. Yes, God doesn’t care sometimes.

      5. Karl Liam Saur

        Dale

        We’re not really at an impasse as you would have it, but reacting to different aspects of what the other is saying. It’s not worth dissecting at this point.

    4. Jim McKay

      Where would you put bread for the Eucharist in your supermarket? Here is another option:

      http://www.expatinthephilippines.com/holy-bread-and-mass-wine-in-an-earthly-supermarket-in-the-philippines/

      Reply
  2. Mary Wood

    Having spent several years of my life producing altar breads for use in Catholic churches, may I query and protest the use of the term “hosts” for the unconsecrated element of unleavened bread manufactured for celebrating Mass?

    We were always careful to refer to altar breads as breads until they were consecrated at Mass. Were we in error?

    These breads were the principle source of income for the monastery, together with the donations that many parishes would add to their modest bills. Each order was separately counted and packed, and the needs of each parish were often presented as prayer topics.

    When the Council reduced the eucharistic fast from three hours to one, the demand for breads immediately tripled, causing a crisis in production! Of course economics is bound up with production of these elements, and why not? Personally I hold no strong attachment to the notion of unleavened white wafers being the material used for the eucharist, as I believe Jesus took what was on the table.

    As a priest friend said, the difficulty is not convincing children that the bread is changed, but that it ever was bread in the first place!

    Reply
    1. Karl Liam Saur

      While whole wheat grain is perfectly licit matter, the white flour version has one symbolic value – it is an echo that the Manna in the desert was likened to hoarfrost. But, since most people don’t know that symbolic reference, it has low value, shall we say.

      Reply
      1. Dale Rodriguez

        I would agree Karl that it has very low value.

        “… unlike your ancesters who ate manna in the desert and died…”

      2. Samuel J. Howard

        It also has the symbolic value of white being associated with “purity” in western culture.

      3. Mary Burke

        “It also has the symbolic value of white being associated with “purity” in western culture.”

        What connection has ‘purity’ (whatever it means) with Eucharistic bread?

      4. Karl Liam Saur

        Except that now, whole grain probably has the stronger association with purity. Associations do shift.

      5. Samuel J. Howard

        What connection has ‘purity’ (whatever it means) with Eucharistic bread?

        There is an infelicity when the priest proclaims the host to be a “spotless victim” and then raises it above his head and it is speckled brown.

      6. Mary Burke

        The “infelicity” exists in the minds of only those who can’t or don’t care to distinguish between sacramental language and non-sacramental language.

        The irony is that “speckled brown” is more likely to have resembled the skin of the human “spotless victim” from Nazareth more closely than white is.

        In some African cultures, white is a colour symbolising death.

        I would suggest the linking of white hosts with “purity” is a case of the canis barking up the wrong arbor.

    2. Kimberly Hope Belcher

      You may well be right about the word “host” – I have never realized it was reserved for the consecrated species, but it makes sense given the origin, and I have corrected the title. Thank you.

      Reply
      1. Ann Riggs

        The restriction of the word “host” to the consecrated elements is probably technically correct; but I routinely hear the word used , by our pastor among others, to describe the unconsecrated ones as well. As in, “We need more hosts added to that ciborium” before mass.

  3. Ann Olivier

    Here’s an article about the current production of hosts in the U.S.. The author, obviously a non-believer, begins with a really flip attitude that put my teeth on edge. But he obviously became intrigued with the differences in attitudes towards “the product” of the nun=producers and the main US commercial company which produces them. Intriguing in many ways.

    http://killingthebuddha.com/mag/dogma/buying-the-body-of-christ/

    Reply
  4. Anne Sinclair

    As one of the people who receives the benefit of Sr. Lynn’s scientific knowledge in the form of their low-gluten host, I am very grateful for the Benedictine Sisters of Perpetual Adoration and their altar bread ministry. I am also grateful to work with a priest who is committed to ecomonically support many religious orders in various ways. We appreciate the “added value” of our breads being touched by human hands and the prayer support for our parish and our personal ministries that come from the Sisters.

    Reply
    1. Kimberly Hope Belcher

      That was my favorite part of the article, Anne.

      Reply
  5. Ann Olivier

    Sorry — the article I just referred to is the same one the thread is about. (For some reason or other, the text at the head of the thread which I got was not Ms. Belcher’s text, and there was no picture, though what I got was about the hosts. Glitch, I suppose.)

    I was impressed by the author’s realization that what was a trivial matter to him had an importance for the nuns which he really couldn’t fathom. They even made him lose his flip attitude.

    Reply
  6. Jack Feehily

    It is, strictly speaking, inappropriate to refer to unconsecrated altar breads as “hosts”. This word comes from the Latin word “hostia” which means victim. Christ, truly present, in the sacred host is the victim who takes away the sin of the world. If someone reports to me they found a “host” on the floor, I immediately assume–as they would–that it was consecrated. If the sacristan reported that they found some hosts in a drawer, I would know they weren’t consecrated and tell him they should be referred to as altar breads.
    As for white vs. whole wheat, this is another of those matters that seems to arise out of ideology. In the recent past, they were often tiny “wafer thins” and only came in white because no one thought they needed to resemble real bread. We were only interested in “real presence”, thank you very much. Once the documents following VII began to call for them to be more breadlike, this inspired the invention of a process by which they could be made of whole wheat flour which gave them a very light brownish color. They began to be made a little larger since they no longer had to melt on our tongues (don’t “chew” Jesus as the nuns instructed). For a while there, it looked like we would be able to make them look, taste, and feel more breadlike but then the temple police stepped in a ordered the end of that. No matter that there are Catholics who lawfully partake of consecrated leavened hosts in other rites, but not us Romans. We need to do what “we always used to do”, even if that excludes what we did long before the invention of the unleavened little wafers. Oh well.

    Reply
    1. Karl Liam Saur

      I think the issue of leaven (and, in some cases, salt) was not nearly as salient in the past generation as the issue of things like sugars and what not, which Eastern churches also don’t tolerate at all for that matter. The Armenian (and I believe Maronite as well) churches also have the same tradition of wheaten flour and water only as the Roman rite. What’s interesting is that the Roman tradition, for all of its usual specificity, is not as specific as some of the Eastern traditions in requiring bread baked within the day.

      Reply
    2. philip sandstrom

      This brings up the Agnus Dei question of ‘do not enter under my roof’ — that is , ‘the roof of the mouth’ where the ‘white hosts’ should not be allowed, but did ‘stick’ to the spritiual and practical discomfort of the receiver.

      Reply
      1. Dale Rodriguez

        LOL!
        And God forbid you attempt to scrape it off w/ your finger because that meant you had to “touch” it and that was verboten!

  7. philip sandstrom

    In some traditional kitchens though out Europe ‘hosts/altar breads’ are used as the base (or bottom layer) for cakes and cookies. One can buy these packaged hosts easily in the grocery stores with the other baking supplies — and the ‘ready prepared’ cakes and cookies in most bakeries. The absolutely ‘pale white/virtual’ host is a result of all the 11/12 century arguments over the ‘real presence’ and the introduction of the ‘elevation of the host’ in the midst of the Eucharistic Prayer — the need was to be seen clearly in the dim light of the church, even when strengthened by the six candles brought out for the purpose (still in the Extraordinary version of the Rite). It is worth recalling that the parallel ‘elevation of the chalice’ only was introduced 100 years later. [Another use for the small pieces left in the host making process is as fish food — for gold fish and others. This too is a commercial production using ‘left overs’ from the convents and other suppliers.]

    Reply
  8. crystal watson

    Why did the use of a loaf of bread torn up get replaced by the use of prefabricated wafers?

    Reply
    1. Karl Liam Saur

      I believe at least as far back as the 11th century, and there was a long intermediate stage before that, with flat loaves baked in a special pattern that would be broken or cut readily in a special way. In different rites and uses, there was different symbolism involved.

      For the Churches that used leaven, it was sourdough until more modern times, and sourdough doesn’t create as much crumbs when divided as bread made from brewer’s yeast (the more modern form of yeasted leaven).

      Reply
      1. Jeffrey Pinyan

        In different rites and uses, there was different symbolism involved.

        The mini-rituals of cutting the loaf and arranging its pieces from the various Rites (East and West) are pretty interesting. A few years ago, when I had a copy of Archdale King’s “Notes on the Catholic Rites” at hand, I copied down his account of the Mozarabic fraction.

  9. crystal watson

    Thanks, Karl.

    Reply
  10. John Swencki

    From what I understand, some Sisters’ host-making/selling ministry was put ‘out of business’ by secular companies. Of course, anyone is free to form whatever kind of business/company they want to, but I have continued too buy hosts from the Poor Clares not only to support them but also in the belief that the Sisters have a real appreciation and reverence for the work they do and the ultimate purpose of their “product”.
    Cavanaugh (et alia) is certainly doing nothing wrong. But I wish they had chosen to manufacture dripless candles instead, and I wish priests would choose to support the Sisters by keeping the acuisition of our hosts “in the family”.

    Reply
    1. Chris Grady

      And what happens if/when there’s no more sisters doing it???

      And what of the funeral directors who don’t buy their caskets from monks who make them? Or people who eat non-Trappist fruitcakes? Or indeed buy vestments made by non-monastic companies, some of which are indeed favoured by the current liturgical purveyors in the current back-to-Baroque Vatican?!

      Reply
  11. John Swencki

    Now wait– the Trappists aren’t the only Catholic religious community with fruitcakes.

    Reply
  12. Chris Grady

    Samuel J. Howard :
    Chris, the 1962 rubric reads:
    “Tunc se erigens, quantum commode potest, elevat in altum Hostiam, et intentis in eam oculis (quod et in elevatione Calicis facit) populo reverenter ostendit adorandam: et mox sola manu dextera ipsam reverenter reponit super Corporale in eodem loco unde eam levavit, et deinceps pollices et indices non disjungit, nisi quando Hostiam consecratam tangere vel tractare debet, usque ad ablutionem digitorum post Communionem.”
    Surely you can see how we get “elevation” for the name of the showing of the host to the people out of that.

    1962? That was abrogated. I wrote the above in 2012 about the only Roman rite.

    Reply
  13. Padre Dave Poedel, STS

    This Lutheran purchases all of our Eucharistic bread at our local Autom Outlet Store. I am pleased to note that the hosts we buy are produced in the land of my ancestors: Poland, where after all, these things are done properly and with reverence. The large Priest size wafer I use at the altar (for showing or elevation) is from Cavanaugh.

    P.S. Sweeteners? Never!

    Reply
    1. Dr. Dale Rodriguez

      “P.S. Sweeteners? Never!”

      Must be those dour Missouri Synod Lutherans 🙂

      Reply
  14. Paul Inwood

    I assume no one is going to comment on the fact that the ‘elevation’ at the institution narrative only officially became part of the rite in 1474 (it was taken over from Parisian devotional practice). No, I thought not. 🙂

    Reply
    1. Jeffrey Pinyan

      The bishop of Paris in 1201 ordered that the priests should hold the host breast-high, before the consecration, and only after the consecration should they lift it high enough to be seen by all. This is the first authentic instance of that elevation of the Host which is so familiar to us. […] Oppose any elevation before the consecration, “lest” (as a London synod of 1215 put it) “a creature be adored instead of the Creator.” […] The elevation of the chalice is found, indeed, even as early as the thirteenth century, but the usage was rare and exceptional. However, it forces its way through, but only slowly, especially outside of France. […] {208} Roman Missals of 1500, 1507, and 1526 make no mention of it. […] Objection that in seeing the chalice one does not “see” the Precious Blood. […] Not till the Missal of Pius V was the second elevation made to correspond with that of the Host. (The Mass of the Roman Rite, vol II, pp. 207-208)

      Reply
  15. Jack Feehily

    And the priest wasn’t elevating it in pious adoration, but because this was the only way the people could see the consecrated host. Certainly, it is appropriate while speaking the words of Jesus to show the people the Bread of Life and the Cup of Salvation. It is a moment for saying my Lord and my God, but not as if he just showed up. After all he slipped in with those gathered, and spoke in his living word, and is the one who at the outset said ” The Lord be with you!”

    Reply
  16. Fr. Jay Finelli

    They are a great company, right here in my back yard. I did a sound-seeing tour on my podcast a couple of years back and it was really interesting to see. You can list here if your interested: http://www.ipadre.net/2009/02/ipadre-142-multiplication-of-loaves/

    Reply
  17. Mary Bost

    It seems to me sometimes that Catholic Communion wafers taste a little like sourdough. Flattened sourdough. Souring dough actual leavens it. If Catholic wafers are made with sourdough, do Catholic authorities realize they are working with leavened dough which has been evidently rolled out?

    Reply

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