Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!uwm.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!mips!apple!rutgers!aramis.rutgers.edu!athos.rutgers.edu!christian From: ejalbert@phoenix.princeton.edu (Edmund Jason Albert) Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian Subject: Re: open communion Message-ID: Date: 5 Feb 90 09:33:23 GMT Sender: hedrick@athos.rutgers.edu Organization: Princeton University, NJ Lines: 37 Approved: christian@aramis.rutgers.edu I fail to see why the Catholic Church does not permit members of other denominations who have been baptized in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost to receive communion. Since a valid baptism can be performed by any baptized Christian if he uses this form, why is someone who has b een validly baptized barred from communion. As an Episcopalian, I believe my church permits all baptized persons to receive. I however would not receive at a Lutheran, Presbyterian, etc. church, because I believe their ministers not to be in apostolic succession and therefore the consecration of the elements to be invalid. Jason Albert Princeton University [We've had this discussion before, but I guess it's long enough ago that we can have it again. In general there are several reasons for closed communion. One is to make sure that the people participating think they're doing the same thing that the church doing it thinks it is doing. Another is for purposes of church discipline. Many churches -- including Protestants -- take seriously the concept that the church should maintain church discipline. When someone sins publically in a way that causes scandal, various procedures are followed, that can end in excommunication. Doing this presupposes that you have to know the people who are participating in communion. It doesn't require you to restrict it to members of your denomination, of course. 1 Cor 11:27 suggests that we have a responsibility to make sure that people partake of communion in a worthy manner. This can of course be implemented by cautioning people solemnly and leaving it between them and God, but one can certainly understand how the ideas suggested in this passage could lead to a bit of control over access to the sacrament. The Catholics seem to have an additional issue, which is that their church is some sense defined sacramentally. For someone to want to participate in Catholic communion and yet not be part of the Catholic church strikes them as peculiar. This is tied in with serious differences between Catholic and Protestant concepts of the Church. --clh]