Can You Get Sick from Shared Greek Orthodox Communion? | Greek Orthodoxy Fact vs Fiction 

2:24 - Wait, 1887-2019? Are we just going to ignore that this man is “healthier than he has ever been” at 133 years old? Never underestimate the power of Holy Communion.

And this right here is why I'm now exploring Orthodoxy. Faith still means something to the Orthodox.

I have been receiving Holy Communion for all the years of my life and I've never been sick from the same spoon . Glory to Christ in the highest , We Thank Him for His Passion .

"I will not speak of Thy Mysteries to Thine enemies. Neither like Judas will I give Thee a kiss.But like the thief will I confess: Remember me O Lord in Thy Kingdom." ❤️🗣☦️🎶🎶🎶🎶🎶🎶

The holy mysteries cannot transmit anything other than healing.

There are many accounts of the healing power of the Holy Mysteries. St. John of San Francisco once tried to commune a person dying of rabies (which can be transmitted by saliva). The person spit the Sacred Gifts out onto the floor. To the shock of everyone else in the room the saint without hesitation picked it up and consumed it. He was of course perfectly fine afterward.

If you’re afraid of getting sick, you’re not in a state of grace to take communion! The communal sharing is a leap of faith!

The best time to commune is when one is sick, either physically or spiritually or even both.

Excellent answer to this question. I really appreciate this especially during a pandemic.

To those with the thumbs down, that is sad. I can't imagine why.

I'm loving this series of videos. God bless you all.

I have had to ask GOD to build my faith in this area. Previously when I was in a charismatic church, everyone got their own plastic vial, and that was that. When I began to embrace orthodoxy, EVERY TIME I think of sharing the communion cup, I have anxiety and the fear that I'll vomit in front of everyone, yet I'm not even a germaphobe.

I love Orthodoxy ☦️

Lol thanks for the laugh! And the great teaching!!!

We will be visiting your church from South Carolina the first Sunday of October!

The spoon is made of silver, argent. So it’s a metal rich in antibacterial and antiviral properties

Very informative.

Thank you father for telling people they should have common sense and be respectful when they’re sick. I’ve seen too many people hacking cough and snot dripping come up to the communion line and I’m just like really. Now I do believe and I do know that it is truly the body and blood of Christ, but that is why to me it’s so much more disrespectful to go up there and hack all over and cough all over it. And if I’m wrong Or have said any blasphemies at all, please Lord Jesus Christ son of God have mercy on me and forgive a sinner.

This is very strong wine. Silver is also antimicrobial.

I'm a Catechuman right now and my spiritual father told the congregation, if you think you can get sick from taking communion then don't take communion because you have a spiritual sickness. I believe that to be true, if you believe that you can get sick from communion then how can you believe in communion, or any of the mysteries for that fact?

Very interesting

This Prist crack me up, I can see he is not uptight but funny too. I saw his video on the sing of the cross, Jimmy Herring style😅. I wish I could take communion with my orthodox brothers but I found in person while queuing in the Holy Sepulcher the priest asked me if I was orthodox and I said no, which he replied: sorry. I am seeking and learning about orthodox faith and I wish I could be part of one but here in Israel everything is nationalistic and some politics too, not to mention masses are either in Greek or Arabic which I know nome of them.

Beautiful explanation

This all seems so unnecessary, in the Ukrainian Catholic Church near my home, people just tilt their heads back and open their mouths and the priest drops/flicks Jesus in, somewhat similarly to Catholics receiving unleavened Jesus on the tongue, you just tilt your head back more in the Divine Liturgy. Closing your lips on the spoon and treating it like the Eucharist is yoghurt or something isn’t going to make the sacrament any Holier. This seems like an easily avoidable problem.

It is the blood of christ and the body of christ our lord and you are afraid it will get you sick ? Its the most pure and most holy ☦️

As a Roman Catholic now, we accept the body of Christ at mass, and accept His blood at home 🍷The wine is no longer given at mass.

In the West (In my case Anglican) we use silver (vessels) we also use real wine.

From the LA Times, Nov 2020: 'The 82-year-old head of the Church of Greece, Archbishop Ieronymos, was hospitalized last week, with doctors saying Monday he was in stable condition for the fifth day. The death of a bishop in northern Greece earlier this month revived controversy surrounding communion, which in the Orthodox Church is given using one spoon shared among the entire congregation. In Greece, the powerful Orthodox Church has insisted that the practice couldn’t transmit the disease as it is the body and blood of Christ. Metropolitan Bishop Ioannis of Lagadas, 62, was an outspoken advocate of continuing communion during the pandemic. He was buried last Monday after dying of COVID-19.'

And if you have a Cold then you should stay at home and pray instead but if you’re seriously ill then you should call a priest holy communion to you.

Doctors everywhere would like to have a word...

Id like to say that I've neved gotten sick before, I have never asked but i understand Our Lord Jesus Christ Son of God cures all so I do have faith and is strengthened each time I receive Holy Communion before i don't smoke my Cigars or eat when the day changes from Saturday to Sunday but afterwards i do. For him not me for them not me.

I am interested to know if Orthodox priests either here in the USA or in other places are still hearing confessions or moving ahead with baptisms and chrismations? The RC church has shut down all the sacraments except for the dying. I understand that the Divine Liturgy is a problem because of the gathering size and the danger that represents, but it seems to me that baptisms, confessions, chrismation can all be done safely. I'm wondering if the prelates of the EO churches have been more courageous that their RC counterparts.

Evangelizing the Catholics is crucial.

My church is closed. The novel coronavirus has spiked to everywhere and many people are dying including irenaeus just last week

background music is too loud and annoying but the topic is interesting in these Covid19 times...I'm surprised this video dates from 1 year before the outbreak of the pandemic

I was wondering about that but after his explanation it kinda makes sense but still even if I were Orthodox I would still won't receive communion with a shared spoon.

💜

The material of the spoon and the alcohol content is not enough to do anything to the germs in a short period of time

🌺☦️🕊️🙏🏽

Fr. Angelo, With the Corona Virus that's been spreading like wildfire, are you and your parishioners concerned about the epidemic? And if any of your parishioners caught the Corona Virus, what would you recommend for any of your sick parishioners? My hope is that neither you or your parishioners get it.

If we share germs with other people, it is not something bad. We have immunity. But the consumer society wähnt us to be afraid of everything in order to use tons of chemicals

Eventhough, that we eat body of Christ in the holy communion hygene is a must is required..

What is the reason for communion on the spoon if that isn’t the way Jesus did it?

The answer is NO!!! HOLY COMMUNION IS CHRIST HIMSELF!!!

Love holy communion body and blood pressure blood Jesus who died for love it in the Lutheran Church

I kept taking shared communion in my East Orthodox Church for years and nothing happened to me, despite that, I think is better to have The Blood communion be separated just to make doubters have peace of mind.

The music is distractingly irksome.

Lutheran communion is not the same but it difficult

What if someone has tuberculosis (?) 👁

Interesting that the priest should wear a Roman style clerical waistcoat.

My son will have anaphylaxis reaction if he shares a spoon with a peanut eater. I don't have enough faith for this practice yet.

The mere explanation of why we don’t get sick because it’s gold plated or because the communion contains alcohol is infuriating and blasphemous to say the least, this is Christ Jesus our God. How could he ever make you sick. 🤦‍♂️

I guess dipping the spoon in some sort of sanitizing solution between serves would eradicate the question, eh?

Where is your cassock?

The problem with this is that it is not explicitly mandated in the Scriptures that everybody has to share the same spoon. It is a way to do this born of tradition, in times when there was not scientific knowledge about bacterias and viruses. In my opinion faith doesn't mean to blind ourselves to scientific facts, and expose ourselves to unnecessary risks that can damage our health. This is called tempting the Lord. But if you are an Orthodox Christian, and this is the only way you have to receive communion, then you have no choice but to have faith and do it according to your belief. God bless the Orthodox brothers.

I'm pretty sure Jesus didn't use no spoon, he just split the thing and let the apostles take it for themselves. I really don't get it why we have become so obsessed over using the same cup, the same spoon, this is no were to be found in scripture.

Why isn’t anyone asking this question about the black rock the Muslims all kiss at Mecca

No not in any Christian Church not important in which church (Orthodox, Roman Catholic, Protestant and so on ) you cant get sick by communion

Those who say "no one ever got sick from Holy Communion" contradict the Apostle Paul who said, "The one who eats and drinks unworthily, eats and drinks judgment upon himself, not discerning the Body of the Lord. For this reason, many are weak and sickly among you, and many sleep." When he said "sleep," he wasn't talking about sleeping during the Divine Liturgy; he was talking about sleeping the sleep of death. Saint Paul was saying people can die from receiving Holy Communion. He teaches that the recipient must "discern the Body of the Lord" and, in chapter two of the same book (1 Corinthians), he writes, "The natural man does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God. For they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned." Just as no one can say in prayer that the LORD God of Israel is Jesus (1 Corinthians 12:3), except by the Holy Spirit, Paul is indicating that no one can discern the Body of the Lord in Holy Communion, except by the Grace of the Holy Spirit. No one can presently recognize and acknowledge Jesus of Nazareth as God the Word except by means of the work of the Holy Spirit.

Well there is no worry’s because you’re not supposed to eat or drink before attending the Devine liturgy so you wouldn’t really share someone else’s germs or bits of food stuck in their teeth of anything.

“Gerbaphone?” Some one who communicates with gerbils? Just a reminder that this was the intellectual underpinning that gave us the Plague of Justinian. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plague_of_Justinian Looking forward to hearing comments on this from Tom Hanks & Rita Wilson.....

Why not wipe the spoon between serves

Defining why we don't get sick isn't orthodoxy, it's rationalism.

I bet a microbiologist would disagree, I take a personal spoon and give to my priest to use for me, God gave us the common sense and intelligence we have and we do a disservice to him when we don't use it✌🏽✌🏽

Hahaha @2:17

This video was made pre-COVID. It's a whole different ballgame now.

The communion is wine which has anti bacterial properties but the believers should understand that they are not only drinking communion, which they believe is Christ’s blood, but are in fact drinking communion mixed with a lot of other people’s Saliva...

The people are not supposed to close their mouth on the spoon, but in this video they were

Without COVID19, RC does not use Chalice, and with COVID19, even the body of Christ is taken out, and left with Spiritual Communion. Fortunately, we are restored back to norm in some countries. I hope that we can work towards restoring the Chalice and taking in the lessons from the Eastern Orthodox, consider the current Pope Francis is also Ordinary of the Orthodox, thus he would be able to understand it better.

Whoever asks this doesn’t truly believe that the chalice we all share from is the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of our Lord God and Saviour. They lack faith, and need to be reminded of Whom it is we are receiving.

Do you think people are fools to believe in all that he's saying.. he meant to say that no priest has died of contagious disease ? I mean even if not fear of infection also.. Sharing the same spoon is gross 🤮

Believe what you will! I no longer want to partake in it. I’m Greek n grew up doing this n I had gotten sick from communion. It was winter time & people lined up. Little kids& Old folks go in line first that’s the rule. Old ladies coughing n hacking in the line literally ahead of me. I was about 17 & I had gotten the worst flu ever & was super sick after that night!! No one knows where that mouth has been before going in there. Did they brush? Are they sick? The alcohol thing makes sense to a degree, but no thanks I’ll pass on sharing germs! It’s disgusting! It still makes no sense to put your mouth on something everyone else did! Unsanitary & not safe you can catch a virus or infection. Would u go to a restaurant n share same utensils n cup with 50 people there n not have it washed? The gold spoon excuse does not mean it’s 100% bullet proof. Maybe you won’t keel over n die right then n there but if someone is sick you have a good chance of catching it. A lot of people are not conscious of what they do & they cross contaminate crap all the time because they do not know or think. Or maybe their culture where they were raised it’s normal to them. Example the way their food practices/preparation are? Did they prepare food safely? Did they wash their hands or not? Not washing after the bathroom. You don’t know who really washed their hands or not unless u visibly see them come out of bathroom stahl then walk out without washing. There’s tons of disgusting people out there that are too lazy or don’t care n do that. Maybe they picked their nose? They put the red towel up on your chin then move it over, but they probably only have 2 red towels and for a room full it’s not enough for them to change towels so your lips are wiped w the same towel. So would I trust having that spoon in my mouth no way! Nasty nasty nasty 🤮

That was a joke in the video right? No way this man was born in 1887

I can’t . Sorry. 😟 Simply, I can’t accept this kind of communion.

Is this guy really born in 1887?!

Do you believe in alcohol, gold and air? Or do you believe in God?

Loved the fake keeling over.

It could be grape juice... It does NOT matter. It's the blood of Christ when we consume it. it's sad to me that you even had to go there.

Born 1887? Hahahahahaah🤣🤣🤣🤣

If i come to your house asking for bread, i will await your reply before taking the bread. Not just take it immediately. You can pray and believe that God will give you the bread of Christ without physical germs. However, before you take the gift, check that God has given it to you. 1) Ask, 2) await reply 3) take. Not ....1) ask 2) take. The orthodox church has cut out 2), Jesus' reply. Remaining is Orthodox Christians asking and taking. No reply from God is considered. You are literally cutting Jesus out of the communion.

Old video before the Corona virus. Now bye-bye.

I would not take Communion in an Eastern Rite church, Orthodox or Catholic, especially in these times. Anyhow didn't the Lord say "Take and eat, take and drink" not "take and dunk."

Giving Communion to unbelivers is a sin which your church doing still now. God will punish your church for this.

Now the Coronavirus.

The real problem is that people believe the wine in the chalice is actually the blood of Jesus. Let me ask you, does it taste like blood or wine? Are you going to believe your senses or some dogma invented by men? Please THINK people!