Note 121 — CHAP. VI.
Reading edition
Footnote 121:
(return)
According to the Ordo Romanus, children after baptism on this day were to take no food or milk before Communion "and on all days of Easter-week let them go to Mass, and let their parents offer for them, and let all communicate". As Cabassutius proves in his notitia Ecclesiastica sæculi primi, they used to receive the B. Sacrament under the form of wine alone. The bishop dipped his finger into the sacred blood, and then put it into the mouth of the child a practice observed in modern times in some parts of the East, according to the learned Maronite Abraham Ecchellensis; afterwards a little milk and honey was put into their mouths, as an emblem (according to John the deacon) of the promised land, to which they were called. This custom of giving communion to children was not of necessity for salvation, as Cardinal Noris proves in Vindiciis Augustinianis § 4, and the Council of Trent observes. In some places an abuse crept in of putting the milk and honey into the consecrated chalice, but it was prohibited by an African Council.