Instruction concerning penance and holy communion the second part fo the instruction of youth, containing the means how we may return to God by penance, and remain in his grace by the good and frequent use of the sacraments. By Charles Gobinet, Doctor of Divinity, of the house and Society of Sorbon, principal of the college of Plessis-Sorbon.

ARTICLE V. Of an Ʋnworthy Communion.

AN ancient Lawgiver being ask'd why he had made no Laws against Paricides, made answer, because he esteemed that crime impossi∣ble; that there could not be found Children, so degenerate and unnaturall, as to attempt the life of their own Parents.

I would to God we could say the same with truth in the point of Instruction concerning un∣worthy Communion, or that we could truly say that it is not necessary to advertise Christians to avoid that so horrid Sacriledge, because it is im∣possible for a man professing himself a Christian ever to be guilty of so enormous a crime against our Saviour Jesus Christ.

But Alas! the contrary is too true: and this crime tho' a thousand times greater, yet is much more common amongst Christians then that of Paricide: They have an horror (and with good reason) to deprive those of breath, from whom they receiv'd their life; yet they are not appre∣hensive to Murder and Crucifie again, as much as in them lies, our Saviour Christ, by receiving

him into an impure & perfidious Breast. Nature hath imprinted in them a profound and lasting respect for those from whom they have received only a Mortal and fading life; But they easily forget the Reverence they owe to Jesus Christ, notwithstanding he nourisheth them with his own substance, his pretious Blood, and offers them by his presence a Spiritual and immortal, and a pledge of everlasting life.

O God, Theotime, is it possible then that there should be found Souls capable of so black a deed, so horrible a Crime? Surely they are only those, who either have no Faith; or such as have never considered the enormity of the Sin, who can commit it; for he must surpass the very Devils in malice, who falls into such a Sin, if he have but the least knowledge, how grievous and great it is; and what dreadfull consequences do follow from it. Two points I therefore design to dis∣course of in this place.

I will set forth the enormity of this Sin from three heads.

1. From that remarkable saying of our Lord himself, Mat. 7.6. Do not give that which is Holy unto Dogs. If it be a great Sacrilege to give to Dogs things consecrated to God; what Crime must it needs be to give the Holy of Holies unto a Soul an enemy of God, more impure and filthy then the very Dogs? and what Sin must it be in those to receive the Body of our Lord, who being no better then Dogs, as it is said in the A∣pocalypse, and under this notion excluded from the Sanctuary: Foris canes & impudici, yet have the impudence to eat the Bread of Children, the Bread of the very Angels themselves. Ecce panis Angelorum,

vere panis filioram non mittendus canibus.

2. From that so famed Doctrine and signal admonition of St. Paul, 1. Cor. 11.27. Whosoever ones the Bread, and drinks the Chalice of our Lord unworthily, shall be guilty of the Body and Blood of our Lord. This Sentence is a Thunder, which ought to terrify all those who are so miserably unfortumate as to Communicate in Mortal Sin: For he saith they are guilty of the Body and Blood of the Son of God: that is, they despise and treat in juriously this adorable Body and Blood, whilst they receive it in a profane place, in the Temple of Satan, in a Soul polluted with Mor∣tal Sin.

It is particularly verified in this occasion what St. Paul relates elsewhere, Heb. 6.6. this is to Crucisy Jesus Christ again; to scoff at him, to trample him under ones feet, and contemn his Blood in that very action by which one ought to sanctify his holy name. Can we think of these things without trembling and horror? We ne∣ver call to mind without a certain horror and eversion the inhumane methods the Jews and Sol∣diets a sed against our Saviour Jesus Christ in the time of his bitter Passion; and can we be so in∣sensible in our own case, as not to detest those affronts we offer him even worse then the Jews did whilst we unworthily receive him? For be∣sides, that they Luo. 23.34. knew not what they did; we know and confess him to be the Son of God, whom we offend.

St. Chrisostome explaining these words of St. Paul. 1. Cor. 11. Whosoever shall eat the Bread or drink the Cup of our Lord unworthily, shall be guilty of the Body and Blood of our Lord. Why so? suith

this Holy Father, hom. 27. and his answer is, be∣cause he hath spilt the Blood, and by that action he hath not offered a Sacrifice, but committed a Mur∣ther; for he who approaches unworthily to this Divine Table and receives no Fruit from thence, resembles them, who formerly pierced the Body of our Lord, not to drink but to shed his Blood. And, hom. 60. Consi∣der, saith he, what just Indignation you conceive a∣gainst him who betrayed Jesus Christ, and against those who Crucified him: therefore consider lest you also be equally culpable and guilty of the Body and Blood of the Son of God. It is true, they kill'd his most Sacred Body, but you after so many and so often re∣peated benefits bestowed upon you, receive him into an unclean and polluted Soul.

St. Cyprian before him had said that unworthy Communicants offer Violence to the Body of Jesus Christ, and that this sin is a more grievous offence in the sight of God, then it is for a Chri∣stian to abjure him in the presence of Infidels.

The Third from hence, which you ought ne∣ver to forget, that the sin of an unworthy Com∣munion is the sin of Judas. It was he who first committed it, and those who fall into it since imi∣tate his Example and become his Disciples. They receive him, as he did, in a Criminall and guilty Soul: They betray him not indeed to the Jews, but which is worse to the Devil, who in∣habits in them. What punishment ought they not to dread from such an Enormous Crime? Ought they not to remember how that perfidi∣ous Apostle was immediately possessed by the De∣vil in the moment, that be received Jesus Christ? for since they imitate him in his Sin, they cannot avoid being partaker of his punishment, as we are about to shew you.

The dammages which follow from an unworthy Communion.

SUch a mischievous cause cannot but produce most fatal effects.

The death of the Soul, which infallibly it brings with it, is the first evil which follows from it: Mors est malis, vita bonis. This death is an en∣crease or extension of that other, wherein the Soul lay buried before by the Sin in which he re∣ceiv'd the Sacrament: It is a further banishment from the grace of God, and a further disheart∣ning and exposing her to the Power of Satan.

From this Death follow other most dismal & lamentable effects: as the fall into new Sins; the blindness of Spirit; the encrease of vices and passions, which makes a Soul to groan under the Yoke of her Captivity, and hinder her from re∣turning again to God by true Repentance.

The Prophet hath comprised these effects in few words, Psalm. 68.23. when speaking a∣gainst the enemies of Jesus Christ, he prays to God, that their Table may prove a snare to them, and an occasion of scandal: That they may become blind, so that they may not see their own good: That they may always stoop under the Yoke of a miserable Servitude.

If those, who persecuted Jesus Christ without knowing him, are punished so severely, what ought not Christians to expect, when they treat him so ill in his own Person whom they know?

Histories are full of examples of divers pu∣nishments which God hath laid upon this so de∣testabie a Sin.

Saint Paul the first of all 1. Cor. 11.30. attri∣butes, as the effects of unworthy Communions, the great number of distempers, Sicknesses, and Deaths with which the Corinthians were afflicted.

Saint Cyprian delapsis, affirms that in his time there were many, whose bodies were delivered over to be possess'd by the Devil, for that they had Communicated unworthily; and also that many had lost their judgment, and become distracted and mad upon the same account.

And Saint Chrisostome also assures us that the same thing happen'd in his time.

The same St. Cyprian reports that a Christian woman having partaken in private of the Sacri∣fices of the Idols, and coming not long after to Communicate with the Christians, she had no sooner received the Son of God, but she found her self tormented, as if she had taken poyson, and dyed in the presence of all there.

He speaks of another who being willing to re∣ceive the precious body of the Son of God, her self being in an evil state, as she open'd the ves∣sel in which it was enclosed, there issued out a flame of fire, which hindred her, so that she was not able to receive it. And another Christian go∣ing about to do the same, instead of the Con∣secrated host, which he expected to have found in the place, where he had reserved it, he found nothing else but ashes.

He himself also recounts this Passage, how that a little Child, to whom his Pagan nurse had caus'd a little wine consecrated to the Idols to be given, being afterwards carried by his mother unto the Church at the time of the holy Sacrifice of the Mass, was not able to swallow one drop of the

consecrated wine, which the Deacon had put in∣to his mouth. The Sacred Eucharist, saith this ho∣ly Father, ibid. could not endure to stay in a body and mouth defiled and profaned, by the only touch of a forbidden drink. But if it could not stay in this body, whose Soul was altogether innocent; what may we say of those, whose Souls are altogether guilty and polluted.

I could relate a vast number of other examples; but it would be too long & tedious, & these are sufficient to make every one reflect, as the same St. Cyprian considers, that if he have not as yet received the same punishment for his unworthy Communion (if he have been guilty of it) he hath nevertheless deserv'd it, as much as they. Let every one consider, saith this Holy Father, not so much the punishment, which another hath received, as what he himself hath deserved; and that he do not believe he hath avoided the chastisement, because as yet it is something delayed; since he ought rather to be much more afraid, to whom God in his just judg∣ment hath deferred the punishment of his Sins to a longer time.