Where Should the Offertory Bread be Placed?

Faith Q&A › Many Years with People's Questions › Part IV

The question

In some churches the plate containing the offertory bread is placed inside the sanctuary on a shelf or chair, and sometimes it is put on the altar after the Mass until the end of the prayer of blessing. Is this right?

The answer

The only kind of bread that is permitted to enter the sanctuary is the Host which is the offering of bread which the priest prays over in the Mass to consecrate it in order to transubstantiate it for the believers to receive in the Communion.

If any other offering of bread should enter the sanctuary, that is a clear mistake. Or to put it more precisely, it is an even greater mistake if the plate of this unconsecrated bread is placed on the altar. The laws of the Church have defined what may be placed on the altar, since it is not an ordinary table !

The plate of the unconsecrated bread is to be placed outside the sanctuary, in a suitable place, since the sign of the cross is to be made over it outside the sanctuary. Then one is chosen to be consecrated, outside the sanctuary before the offertory is being presented.

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Thrice-Blessed Pope Shenouda III of Blessed Memory

Thrice-Blessed Pope Shenouda III of Blessed Memory, Many Years with People's Questions, Part IV: Dogma and Ritual Questions. Coptic Orthodox Patriarchate. Translated by Mrs. Glynis Younan, London. Revised by Mrs. Wedad Abbas. First edition, August 1992. Revised COEPA 1997. ISBN 977-5319-0-2-1.