[imagesource:pexels]

An Italian priest, Father Eros Accorigi, says he is being treated as if he killed someone after asking a young altar girl to assist him in serving communion to his flock.

The priest asked “the purest heart among so many sinners” to assist him without “an extraordinary minister of communion” during a recent Sunday mass at Santi Vito, Modesto e Crescenzia church in Ossanesga.

Purest of heart or not, the flock was horrified and is now attacking the priest for the ‘liturgical horror’.

The scene was filmed and shared on Gloria.tv, a Catholic video-sharing news site, prompting furious emails from churchgoers to the bishop in which they denounced the unholy mess. Father Eros told the local newspaper that “it was as if I had killed someone, I don’t think the eucharist has been vilified, I really don’t … I didn’t do anything wrong.”

According to Catholic church law, holy communion can be served only by bishops, priests or deacons. A priest can seek the assistance of an “extraordinary minister of holy communion”, who could be a seminarian or layperson, under certain circumstances.

But a young altar girl? Hell no. Or as a congregant noted on the Catholic blog Messa:

“It was not a mere liturgical horror, but an act of unprecedented gravity, and reflects a deep-rooted, profound and widespread ignorance about the Eucharist, which has been reduced to a simple ‘food’ to be sloppily distributed to those present.”

The bishop of Bergamo has now been urged to intervene, but so far the ‘home office’ has only urged Father Eros to “not do it again”.

Fortunately, the priest hasn’t been thrown to the devil by all the congregants as some have supported him.

“I’m sorry, but what is the problem?” wrote one on Messa. “If the child had made her first communion, which I think is very plausible, then she should be able to distribute the eucharist in an extraordinary situation.”

I’m no expert on Catholicism, but me thinks Jesus would have been cool with a child of the purest heart helping out.

[source:theguardian]