The Holy Standing Sydon of the Greek Orthodox Church issued a statement informing the flock about the special care and precautionary measures needed while attending mass and receiving Holy communion.

The statement clarified that people can receive Communion of the Body and Blood of Christ at the Churches, urging, however, that the susceptible groups should stay at home, per the instructions issued by the Greek authorities. The statement says sharing Holy Communion cannot be a cause of contagion of the virus.

“Those who come in the fear of God, in faith and love” and completely free without any compulsion, associate the Body and Blood of Christ, which becomes a “medicine of immortality,” “in remission of sins and in eternal life,” the statement reads.

“For the members of the Church, attending the Holy Communion from the Common Chalise of Life, can in way be a cause for transmitting diseases, because believers throughout the ages know that attending Divine Communion, even through a pandemic, on the one hand, is a willing affirmation of self-surrender to the Living God, and on the other a tremendous manifestation of love, which overrides any human and perhaps justified fear.”

For the purpose of informing the faithful, the Holy Synod decided to print a special brochure with the above instructions and to distribute it to the Churches.