The Consecrated Hands of a Priest

One of the marks of a priest bestowed during his ordination is that of the consecration of his hands. Our hands are used for various works and everyday tasks, and the priest uses his to perform an extraordinary and sacred one that services the people that God has put into his care, namely distributing the Blessed Sacrament to the faithful. In his book Resurgent in the Midst of Crisis: Sacred Liturgy, the Traditional Latin Mass, and Renewal in the Church, Dr. Peter Kwasniewski says:

“…The priest’s hands are specially consecrated with holy oil—why? So that he may rightly and fittingly handle the Blessed Sacrament; that he may handle God Incarnate. His hands are sanctified in view of touching and sanctifying the holy gifts.”

To have the privilege to touch the Sacred Body of Christ, what is going to be touching Him must be sanctified since Jesus Christ is God Himself. He is all good, all knowing, and all powerful, and we are simply His lowly, sinful creatures. Our hands must be purified as prescribed by the Church in order to touch Him just as our souls must be in the state of grace in order to receive Him and just as Mary had to be purified by being immaculately conceived in order to bear Him in Her womb.

In Resurgent…, Kwasniewski goes on to say that a layman’s hands are not consecrated in this way and so receiving Communion in the hand, from this vantage point, is not appropriate. And it would make sense that by the same token, neither are Extraordinary Ministers of Holy Communion. There are special circumstances at times, yes, but honestly they are very rare. Most of the time, Communion can be distributed by only the priest, even if it takes a little longer. And this is the way it is done in the Traditional Latin Mass, where the priest goes around the communion rail as many times as he needs to in order to give Communion to all the faithful. The extra time is just an opportunity for those who have already received to pray and meditate on the great Sacrament that they have just been given (and to practice patience if they start getting antsy), as opposed to rushing to the Post Communion prayer and dismissal. Even with very big crowds, events like that usually have multiple priests present and they can all assist with the distribution of Communion.

I heard a homily once in which the priest talked about two instances after Christ’s Resurrection. The first one was when He appeared to Mary Magdalene and instructed her not to touch Him because He had not yet ascended to His Father. However, later on when He appeared to Thomas after he had doubted the other apostles’ testimony, He instructed him to touch the marks of the nails on His Body. Why was Thomas allowed to touch Jesus but Mary was not? Because Thomas was a priest and had been given the privilege to touch Jesus’s glorified body. Mary was not a priest and so would have to wait until Christ had ascended and she could receive the Eucharist.

Having priests who can distribute Our Lord to us in the Eucharist is a tremendous gift, and the consecration of his hands for this task shows us how sacred the Body of Christ is and that it should be treated with the utmost care and respect. It also reminds us that the priest, by virtue of his office and ordination, is specifically set aside for this task and that it is not intended for the laity.