Who can serve as a eucharistic minister?

“The person who has been appointed to be an extraordinary minister of Holy Communion is necessarily to be duly instructed and should distinguish himself by his Christian life, faith, and morals. Let him strive to be worthy of this great office; let him cultivate devotion to the Holy Eucharist and show himself as an example to the other faithful by his piety and reverence for this most holy Sacrament of the altar.”

Instruction on Facilitating Sacramental Eucharistic Communion in Particular Circumstances, Sacred Congregation for the Discipline of the Sacraments, 25 January, 1973.

The above document is from discussions began about our Sacred Liturgy, or the mass, at the Second Vatican Council. These discussions outlined how the new method of celebrating our Catholic Liturgy--also called the Novus Ordo Missae, or the “New Ordinary of the Mass”--ought to function in the various Dioceses throughout the world. This particular document deals with, among other things, extraordinary ministers of Holy Communion.

An extraordinary minister is “out of the ordinary” or an exception to the norm. The Priest or Deacon assigned to a local parish is the Ordinary Minister of Holy Communion. That is, when it is at all possible, the priest or deacon should distribute communion.

However, due to time constraints, it isn’t practical for one priest to distribute communion to approximately 5,000 people, so the priest can appoint someone to help him (see Luke 9:10-17)--this person would be called an extraordinary minister of Holy Communion, or what we commonly call a “Eucharistic minister.”

This person (or persons) could be a lector, a seminarian, a male or female religious, a catechist, or a Catholic male or female. The judgement of whom to select rests upon the priest or someone appointed by him. There is, however, one stipulation: “an extraordinary minister of Holy Communion is necessarily to be duly instructed and should distinguish himself by his Christian life, faith, and morals.”

The reason for such a stipulation is because what we receive at mass is not merely a symbolic representation of Christ, nor is it merely a symbol of Christian unity. To quote the late Pope John Paul II, “through the changing of the bread and wine into the body and blood of the Lord” we rejoice in the real and actual presence of Jesus Christ (Ecclesia de Eucharistia 1), fully present in each species--that is, fully present in the consecrated bread and fully present in the consecrated wine. In the Eucharist, Jesus Christ “makes himself wholly and entirely present”: body, blood, soul, and divinity--everything about who Jesus is (fully God, fully human), is really present in the gift of the Eucharist (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1374). 

Therefore, the knowledge and devotion expected from an Extraordinary Minister is intended to highlight the precious gift of the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist.