Dr Augustin Sokolovski
On Thursday of Holy Week, the Church commemorates the Last Supper of the Lord Jesus with His disciples, during which the Savior instituted the sacrament of the Holy Eucharist. This celebration is fundamental to all Christian denominations, for the Eucharist—regardless of theological understanding or historical context—is the bedrock and absolute foundation of everything the Church has lived, lives, and will live on earth.
The Eucharist is a gift from Jesus to his disciples and a privilege granted to humanity. The angelic realm, though far more perfect and closer to God, cannot partake of the Eucharist, because this sacrament consists of the Body and Blood of Christ, and angels do not have bodies. At the same time, as if imitating the angelic world, but on entirely different grounds and from different premises, Christians at various times have literally tried to avoid, if not the celebration of the Eucharist—since it was regularly celebrated by priests—then at least receiving Communion. “To receive Communion regularly, one must become like the angels”—that is how the excuse might sound. But angels do not receive Communion, for they cannot.
In one of his letters, which has become a true classic of the ancient approach to this topic, the Church Father, St. Augustine (354–430), writes that in his time there were two practices regarding the frequency of Communion. Both of them, as he emphasizes, were already venerable and ancient in Augustine’s time. According to one view, one should receive Communion on Saturdays, Sundays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, as well as on the feast days of the martyrs; according to another, one should receive Communion daily.
The Church Father refrains from criticizing the first practice, since it is ancient, but he himself adheres to the latter. “If you do not intend to receive Communion today,” he writes, “then, when reciting the ‘Our Father,’ do not utter the words of the petition for the Daily Bread.” Today, after centuries of neglect, the Orthodox Church has returned to the practice of frequent communion. May the words of the great Father of the Church, read on Holy Thursday, serve as our guide.