Who should apologize for the Paris Olympic games opening ceremony?

The thing with the whole Olympic Last Supper sacrilege is they really don’t care how we feel. Of course, any sincere response that seeks to please God is the best response, but when I think of our righteous anger over it I wonder what the best response is.

Those of us who are demanding an apology from the Olympic “people of power” (myself included) are maybe missing the point. The “people of power” don’t care one tiddly-wink for the feelings of Christians. They planned, approved, choreographed, photographed, publicized, and promoted the pathetic little attempt, all the while high-fiving each other and winking at the world. They don’t care, and any apology they offer “if” their actions hurt some people is a pile of doodies. It means nothing. It is just more of a mockery. So, while it is just for them to apologize, it means little.

Some bishops have instead been calling on Catholics to make acts of reparation for the offense, and I feel like this is the route. The French people who put on the parody were likely raised by someone who was baptized Catholic once upon a time. But they lost faith in the presence of Christ in the Eucharist, and as Flannery O’Connor famously said, “if it’s just a symbol, to hell with it.” The once-Catholic people of France, and all the world, have lost faith. It has become a symbol to them, and they have responded: “to hell with it.”

Those French people are potentially you and I, if our love is lost. Since, as I’ve mentioned many times before, polls remind us that less than 30 per cent of practising Catholics believe in Christ’s real presence in the Eucharist, we are the only ones who can do anything to make amends to God.

This all made me think about the reasons why I stopped receiving Our Lord on my hands. Not so long ago, the Church made it allowable for certain reasons, but with many warnings and expectations. Before that time, it was mostly unheard of that the hands of anyone other than a priest would touch a consecrated Host. (There are a few instances in localities in the 300s where it is believed people received on their hands for a time, but they stopped.)

The reasons I stopped are many. I had witnessed Our Lord dropped on the floor. I had witnessed people walk away without consuming. I had witnessed Our Lord consumed like a tortilla chip, while the communicant looked around for people he knew. I discovered that it is still the desire of the Church that we receive on the tongue.

But it was something that happens on the altar that made me really re-think things. The priest, before consecration, purifies his hands. After consecration, he is meant to keep his fingers from touching anything but the Eucharist. After Holy Communion, he again purifies his fingers in water that must be poured out into the earth before touching anything again. Why does he do all of these things?

Quite simply it is because he knows the Eucharist is God, and God should not be defiled by that little bit of breakfast that is still sticking on his fingers. The particles of the Eucharist remaining on his fingers should not be dropped on the floor. The water goes into the earth because, if it holds particles of the Eucharist, it would be a foul thing to just pour it into the sewage. He has been holding God! Can you imagine if you were allowed to hold the world’s greatest jewel? You would be wearing gloves. We’re talking about God!

So, I began to ask myself why the priest purified and guarded his fingers while I did not. I did not wash my hands before receiving, guard my fingers after receiving, or purify them after consuming. I just went to coffee and donuts. So, either the actions of the priest were right, or mine were. If mine were, then “to hell with it.”

During the English revolt against the Church, King Henry VIII made a man named Thomas Cranmer bishop. He was in charge of overseeing the new liturgy for the Church of England, but the common people were still Catholic at heart and their belief in the real presence persisted. Cranmer took the task of removing the people’s faith in the “superstitions” of the Romans. His first steps were to insist that people receive Communion on the hand. There would be no kneeling to receive, the minister would not wash his fingers, the host would not be called the Body of Christ, and the people would no longer confess their need for mercy before receiving. If the people would behave casually with Communion, they would be convinced there was no need for formality. He was right. (He also removed Latin from the service.)

If we behave as though the Eucharist is a symbol, we will come to believe that it is. Our children will follow, and their children will never even know that they were expected to believe it was anything but a symbol. Entire nations will revert to paganism and continue making a mockery of the great act of Christ’s love.

We are the ones who might consider offering an apology for any insincerity we may have when we approach God’s throne: for our distractions, our presumption, and our forgetfulness.

A beautiful act of reparation is to simply call out to God in our hearts whenever we receive him: “My God, my God, I love thee in the most Blessed Sacrament.” Then simply close your eyes to be with him who loves us beyond reckoning.

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