he merely touches its lips with the reserved (intincted) form of bread. People are supposed to go to Communion (and Confession) five times a year — at the Epiphany, Easter, Falling-asleep of our Lady, Transfiguration and Exaltation of Holy Rood. Communion is administered to lay people by intinction. The priest puts the holy bread, dipped in the chalice, on their tongue, saying: "The body and blood of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ be to thee for salvation and for a guide to eternal life."[1] Whoever goes to Communion must be fasting since he went to bed the night before, and in a state of grace. Married priests live celibate for several days before celebrating. They reserve the Holy Eucharist (intincted) in a tabernacle either on the altar or behind it. A lamp burns before the tabernacle; but they do not show much other external reverence to the Real Presence. Ordination is giving by imposition of hands with long and very definite forms.[2] The ordained is anointed with chrism[3] and receives his vestments from the ordainer. We have already noted that only a Katholikos may ordain bishops (p. 430), and that they have special ordinations for a Katholikos[4] and vardapet (pp. 428, 431). Married people are crowned, as in the Byzantine rite. The anointing of the sick, though taught as a Sacrament in their books, is no longer practised by the Gregorians (p. 426). Instead, they have a service of prayers only.[5] Only a Katholikos may bless the holy chrism (meron). This is done with great solemnity every three or four years; all the other bishops send for some of it.[6] Like the Byzantine chrism, it contains a great quantity of ingredients.
- ↑ Brightman: Eastern Liturgies, p. 452. Priests who assist receive either kind separately (the deacon receives as do the laity). They have no spoon for Communion.
- ↑ Quoted in Tournebize: op. cit. pp. 600 (priest), 605 (bishop), etc.
- ↑ Only priests, bishops, katholikos.
- ↑ Lynch describes the consecration of the late Katholikos, Mekertich Khrimean, which he saw at Etshmiadzin on October 8, 1893 (Armenia, i. 251-256). At the banquet which followed they had first to drink the health of the tyrant who persecutes them.
- ↑ Descriptions of the Armenian rites for the Sacraments will be found in Tournebize: op. cit. 575-618; Issaverdens: The Armenian Ritual (iii. "The Ordinal," 1875; iv. "The Sacred Rites and Ceremonies," 1888); Dowling: The Armenian Church, 112-137.
- ↑ As with the Orthodox, to apply for chrism to a Patriarch is a sign of recognizing his authority.
