RECEIVING OUR LORD ON THE TONGUE.
I truly believe that one important way to change our thinking, and thus our whole approach to the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, is to make sure we do not receive Holy Communion as if it were just another meal.
I am always concerned about the need for more reverence and an increase of the sense of sacredness whenever I assist at my local parish, celebrating the Novus Ordo.
Slowly, since we were assigned a new priest a few years ago, I have noticed an increased reception of Our Lord on the tongue. In addition, there have been enough people kneeling to receive that Father has finally provided kneelers so we can truly humble ourselves (without feeling others may be falsely interpreting the reason for our posture.)
I found this list on (Please click on the Corpus Christi link below to see their whole post):
The Council of Saragossa (380AD) declared “anathema” anyone who dared continue receiving Communion in the hand.
The Synod of Toledo (589AD) declared likewise.
The Sixth Ecumenical Council of Constantinople (680AD) forbade the faithful from placing the Host in their hands, threatening transgressors with excommunication.
The Synod of Rouen (650AD) condemned Communion in the hand to halt widespread abuses that occurred through this practice, and as a safeguard against sacrilege. Furthermore, this same synod decreed: “Do not put the Eucharist in the hands of any layman or laywoman, but only in their mouths.”
Pope Saint Sixtus I (d. 125AD) said about the practice: “It is prohibited for the faithful to even touch the sacred vessels, or receive in the hand.”
Saint Thomas Aquinas (d. 1274) said: “Out of reverence towards this Sacrament [the Holy Eucharist], nothing touches it, but what is consecrated; hence the corporal and the chalice are consecrated, and likewise the priest’s hands, for touching this Sacrament.” (Summa Theologica, Part III, Question 82)
Pope Saint John Paul II said: “To touch the sacred species and to distribute them with their own hands is a privilege of the ordained.” (Dominicae Cenae, February 1980)
Pope Saint Paul VI (1963-1978) said: “This method of distributing holy communion [on the tongue] must be retained, taking the present situation of the Church in the entire world into account, not merely because it has many centuries of-tradition behind it, but especially because it expresses the faithful’s reverence for the Eucharist” (Memoriale Domini, 29 May 1969)