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Well, these stories are always, I mean, propagated as a propaganda means, and it is completely irrelevant because first, it was not a universal practice of the church. Consider was not representative for the entire church because they were not only in Jerusalem or in the Orient, this practice in the first time, or also in North Africa, in some other places. But we do not have a demonstration that it was a clear universal practice. The first consultation, then second, it was, I would say, essentially different from our modern practice today because in the first centuries, they received the Holy Ghost on the palm of the right hand, and they were not allowed to touch the holy host with their fingers as today is the case, and they had to bow down with their mouth and take directly with the mouth from the palm of the hand the holy host, and purify the palm of the hand with the tongue so that no fragment would be lost. And the ladies, they had a white sheet on the palm, covered the hand, and also bowed down and received in a profound bow directly with the mouth without touching the holy host with the fingers. So you see that is a difference today. This practice of taking these two fingers, the host from the left hand, not from the right, is an invention of Calvin, of Calvinists. It's not the tradition of the church.
Third argument, even though this most reverent way of receiving Communion, so-called in the hand, I would say it was with the mouth only, only the priest put down the host on the palm of the hand like a pattern, and you received it directly with the mouth. But even though the church observed that, from her experience, this was not safe enough. Over time, the church perceived that this form must be improved and decided to give it directly in the mouth to avoid any further dangers of losing the fragments of the host. And then the church was growing deeper in the awareness of the greatness of the ineffable greatness of the Holy Eucharist, of the Eucharistic Body of Christ, and then growing deeper, even prescribing kneeling down and using the pattern, and so on. This is a growth of the church. And therefore, the church, in the ninth century, several synods officially forbade this form of placing the host on the hand, even very strictly, with the threat of excommunication.
Therefore, today, this is a Calvinistic Protestant form, and it diminishes the devotion, the reverence, and evidently exposes our Lord to such a great amount of desecration and loss of fragments and so on. This no one can deny. So the church, I repeat, is always growing deeper in the science of reverence, and here she must not step back and diminish the signs of reverence. This is not according to the guidance of the Holy Spirit. But on the contrary, to diminish the reverence for the Lord does not come from the Holy Spirit at all.