Consecrated?

There is a post on Fr Z's blog about the consecration of the chalice and paten. Ah -- so they are consecrated. Does that mean that Sister shouldn't refer to "doing the dishes?" Could this have something to do with the restriction of the purification of vessels to Acolytes? I guess we're all dumbstruck!

This brings up the topic of the general desacralization of the sacred. People quite often walk through the Sanctuary to get into the Church. Those with perfectly good knees bow when passing Our Lord -- exposed in a monstrance no less! In general there is an attitude that nothing is special any more.

Do we need to reexamine certain practices? Archbishop Ranjith seems to think Communion in the hand needs to go. Is the use of an excess number of Extraordinary Ministers of Communion -- who, by the way, still insist on calling themselves "Eucharistic Ministers" -- contributing to the overall loss of sacrality?

There seems to be an overall inability to understand that the Church changed certain things through the years for a reason. She stopped giving people Communion in the hand because of abuses. She stopped giving Communion under both Species because of abuses, and because of the bad theology that tends to develop. Just try to stop the practice in your Church, and you'll see how many think they were deprived of something more than sign value.

Where there is an overall inability to understand, there is an overall need to catechize. We have to teach our people what the Church teaches. We have to pass on what was handed to us, whether it is convenient or not.