‘COMMINGLING RITE’
Originally, the rite of commingling manifested the unity of the presbyterium of Rome
with the Pope. It was a matter of ‘fermentum’: a piece of the
Eucharistic Bread from the Papal Mass was carried to the priests of the
churches of Rome who, because of the service that they fulfilled for their faithful, could not attend the Papal Mass.
The present commingling originates from the first half of the 8th
century by a Syrian Pope when it was introduced into the Roman Mass.
The theology explaining it was just as the double consecration (of bread
and wine) represented the death of Christ, so it was deemed necessary
to symbolize the resurrection, which ensures the bread of immortality,
received in communion. This took place by reuniting the body and the
blood before the communion, a kind of symbolic re-enactment of the
Lord’s resurrection.
The priest says the following prayer:
‘May the mingling of the body and blood of Jesus Christ bring eternal life to us who receive it’.
This
is a modified version of the prayer that was used and the priest says
it quietly. As he says this prayer, he drops a part of the host into the
chalice.
At
Mass, we may not have taken that much notice of this minor rite, or we
could be still giving each other the sign of peace and miss it
completely.
Perhaps we can observe this rite from a different perspective and make the prayer cited above as our own also.
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