Frequent Communion

{{Short description|Eucharistic practice}}

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Frequent Communion is the Roman Catholic practice of receiving the Eucharist frequently, as opposed to the usual medieval practice of receiving it once or a few times a year, by going to mass on Sundays.[http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/06278a.htm Frequent Communion] - Catholic Encyclopedia article

Although it is argued that in the early church the norm was communion of all Christians present at Mass,{{cite book | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=E3ZaJeZj-AsC | isbn=9780810870925 | title=From Altar-Throne to Table: The Campaign for Frequent Holy Communion in the Catholic Church | date=16 April 2010 | publisher=Scarecrow Press }} before the Twentieth Century communion among the Catholic laity tended to be quite infrequent, sometimes only once a year. This was partly informed by the Jansenist fear that frequent communion would erode the faith.[https://books.google.com/books?id=rgkWCgAAQBAJ&dq=mirae+caritatis&pg=PA419 Casarella, Peter J., "Eucharist and Sacrifice: Spiritual Renewal in Early Twentieth Century", The Oxford Handbook of Sacramental Theology, (Hans Boersma, Matthew Levering, eds.), OUP Oxford, 2015] {{ISBN|9780191634185}}

In the early Twentieth Century this began to change. Pope Leo XIII in his encyclical Mirae caritatis in 1902 argued for frequent communion as a source of renewal of faith with his successor Pius X arguing in his motu proprio Sacra TridentinaA Decree on Frequent and Daily Reception of Holy Communion

- https://www.catholicculture.org/culture/library/view.cfm?recnum=5195 that the laity should receive communion as frequently as possible. In his encyclical Quam singulari Pius also relaxed restrictions on reception of Communion for the sick[http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/04174a.htm Communion of the Sick] - Catholic Encyclopedia article and children.[http://www.papalencyclicals.net/Pius10/p10quam.htm QUAM SINGULARI] - Papal Encyclical

Regarding weekly versus daily communion, St. Francis de Sales encouraged weekly communion, but he neither encouraged nor discouraged daily communion.{{cite book |last1=St. Francis de Sales |title=Introduction to the Devout Life |date=2002 |publisher=Random House, Inc. |isbn=0-375-72562-8 |pages=79–80}}