Adsum

August 2002

Vitamin Pills and the Eucharistic Fast

From the book, Father Connell Answers Moral Questions
by Very Rev. Francis J. Connell, C.SS.R., S.T.D., L.L.D., L.H.D.

Question: Can vitamin pills be considered medicine, and hence be taken at any time before Communion, or are they a form of food which is permitted only up to three hours previously? Would it make any difference whether they are taken because of a doctor’s prescription or by one’s own choice?

Answer: Some persons who are perfectly healthy take vitamin pills in order to maintain their health; others take them as a remedy against some form of ailment. In the case of the former group, I believe that vitamin pills are to be considered as food, and hence may not be taken within the three hours before Communion. Such persons cannot be classified as sick people, for whom the concession is granted. Those who use them as a remedy against some ailment may regard them as medicine. This would seem to be the judgment of the average person (the aestimatio vulgaris), which the Church values so highly in deciding questions of this sort. As far as the eucharistic fast is concerned, I do not think it makes any difference whether they are used as a remedy with a doctor’s prescription or by one’s own decision. The motu proprio (papal letter) of 1957 made no statement to the effect that a doctor must prescribe the medicine permitted before Holy Communion.

However, this does not mean that even a person who takes vitamins as a medicine is always permitted to take them up to the time of Mass or Holy Communion. There must be some necessity for taking them within the period when solids are ordinarily forbidden. The Instruction of the Holy Office which accompanied the Constitution Christus Dominus in 1953 allowed medicine to the sick immediately before receiving Holy Communion only if “because of their illness they cannot, without grave inconvenience,, observe the fast completely until the reception of Holy Communion.” No such restriction was added in the motu proprio (papal letter) “Sacram Communionem” in 1957, but certainly there must be some inconvenience involved by not taking the vitamins shortly before receiving Holy Communion. Hence, if it makes no difference when one’s pills are to be taken in the course of the day, I believe he should take them either after Mass or Holy Communion or more than three hours beforehand.

However, I would be lenient in deciding when a sufficient reason is present justifying the taking of the vitamin pills up to the time of receiving Communion. For example, if it is definitely beneficial to space the vitamins at certain definite times throughout the day, one may make use of the concession. Nor would one have to rise before his accustomed time to take the pills three hours previously.

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