EUCHARISTIC VENERATION AND
VESSELS
. The early church looked upon the eucharist more as an action than as an object.
Veneration of the host in stasis was a distinctively medieval development. It was given
impetus by the controversial views of Berengar of Tours (d. 1088) and the more orthodox
responses that followed. Berengar did not altogether deny the Real Presence but held that
no material change in the bread and wine was necessary to bring it about. The contrary
view, the doctrine of Transubstantiation, was much discussed in the 12th century and
defined as official church teaching by the Fourth Lateran Council of 1215. This
theological ferment contributed to the popular movement of venerating the divine
presence in the consecrated host. A prominent facet of this was an eagerness to gaze upon
the host, which led to the ritual of the elevation. This originated in early 13th-century
Paris, where the priest kept the host carefully concealed until the moment of
consecration, when he held it aloft for all to see. The custom spread rapidly throughout
Europe and became, along with the subsequently introduced elevation of the chalice, the
dramatic high point of the Mass. Closely related was the feast of Corpus Christi,
celebrated on the Thursday after Trinity Sunday; it was fervently championed by St.
Juliana of Mont-Cornillon (d. 1258) and established by Pope Urban IV in 1264. The date
came to be marked by a festive procession involving the entire population of a town as
participants or spectators. The host was carried by the principal clergyman of the area,
who stopped at set points to raise it in blessing over the faithful. This is the probable
origin of the devotional practice known as the Benediction of the Most Blessed
Sacrament. During the late Middle Ages, the ceremony was performed in church each
evening after the singing of the Salve Regina at the close of Compline; this explains the
French term for Benediction, Salut, which was applied also to the chant.
The principal eucharistic vessels are the chalice, ciborium, monstrance, and pyx. The
chalice, used in the celebration of the Mass, was originally a glass cup similar to those in
everyday use but came to be made of precious metal as early as the 4th century. In earlier
centuries, the cup was broad, sometimes with handles, as it was used for the communion
of the faithful, while it took on its familiar elongated shape in the Middle Ages when
communion under the species of wine was reserved to the priest. The ciborium, of early-
medieval origin, was shaped like a more ample chalice and was covered with a lid; its
function was to store and to transport the hosts before and after consecration. The
monstrance, or ostensorium, was used to display the host, as in Corpus Christi
processions and at Benediction. Both its earlier form of a vertical glass cylin der enclosed
in a gothic gable and its later form of a flat glass window surrounded by emanating rays
were derived from reliquary designs. The pyx was a small box of varying shapes used to
house the host. Its most familiar form in later centuries was that of the flat cloth-covered
case in which the priest carried communion to the sick; it can also be seen in miniatures
of 15th-century French books of hours, suspended over the altar beneath a round canopy.
James McKinnon
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