Sacramental bread

The expression host ( Latin Hostia, victims ', ' sacrifice ' or ' offering ') referred to in the churches of the Catholic tradition of the West, the New Apostolic Church and the Armenian Orthodox Church, as well as that used in some Protestant churches the Eucharist or the Lord's Supper unleavened bread.

The consecrated in the conversion of the holy Eucharist is fair according to the faith of the Roman Catholic Church is the Body of Christ. In most other liturgies, the Eucharist is also served as a "body of Christ " in the gifts of the Holy Supper, in which there is disagreement about the nature and duration of the real presence between denominations.

Originally, these were to everyday bread that was brought by the faithful to celebrate the Lord's Supper. The most common was a divisible with cross notch rotund bread ( panis quadratus, panis decussatus ). The cross notch was interpreted soon as a Christian symbol and called this ornament.

The custom of using wafers of wheat flour and water at the Eucharist, developed in the Western Church since the Carolingian period (8th / 9th century ) and was with the unleavened bread ( the matzo ) of the Jewish Seder founded, also out of concern for profanation of the Eucharist in the use of lighter ends crumbs of leavened bread be lost during distribution of the particles could .. This solved because of the biblical parable of the leaven (Matthew 13.33 to 35 EU) the Azymenstreit with leavened bread used in the Byzantine Church who became one of the pretexts for the great Oriental schism of 1054.

Gradually, you began in the Latin Church with the baking of thin wafers (from Latin oblata " offerings " ) for handing out to the faithful, in order to avoid the multiple breaking of bread. These were in a metal mold, the host iron, baked. On the slightly larger wafers for the priest was brought to a decorative embossing, preferably one depicting Christ or of the crucified and increasingly other representations, including home and transcriptions ( imago Domini cum litteris, "Portrait of the man with the text "). Even Francis of Assisi worried about beautiful host iron in the churches.

The jaws of the hosts was subject to strict regulations. At times, they could be baked only by clerics, wore liturgical vestments; baking had to be conducted under a silent or accompanied by the singing of psalms. The concern for the observance of ecclesiastical legislation has led in modern times to that communion wafers were prepared generally in convents.

In the Catholic Church consecrated communion wafers to be strictly distinguished from unkonsekrierten and kept in the tabernacle, especially for Communion for the sick and dying, but also for silent adoration of the faithful. This form of storage is an expression of the opinion that the transformed host - as the true body of Christ - the highest reverence that, contrary to accommodate. The special devotion is also used in the Corpus Christi procession to the expression in which a consecrated host is carried in a monstrance by a priest or deacon to an outdoor altars. Most Eastern Churches also know such storage, but usually in less complex form than in the Catholic Church, outside of the public accessible area of the church, and without worship. Martin Luther distinguished between consecrated and unconsecrated also strictly communion wafers, but rejected the use for purposes other than direct human consumption. The Independent Evangelical Lutheran Church leftover communion wafers from the priest at the altar to be consumed immediately or in the sacristy.