Sacred Stones, Sacred Stories

Sister Rebecca is the potter….

…and Sister Jane is the decorator.

These two Sisters are good friends and work together to create lovely gifts for our gift shops.

This is not the only thing they do together.  They are also the two who are in the Low Gluten Production Room, meeting the needs of customers who desire to participate in the Eucharist but need a special bread to do so.

With the low-gluten altar breads in high demand, Sisters Rebecca and Jane make every minute count in the pottery shop and in the Low Gluten Production Room.  They are our dynamic duo!

It is with sincere gratitude we thank the Kansas City Star Magazine for featuring our low-gluten altar breads in their Sunday food issue! You can see it here.

We thank God for our blessings and for those who help share our Eucharistic ministry with the world.

Many thanks to Our Sunday Visitor for its wonderful article that features our low-gluten altar breads!

It is through partners like Our Sunday Visitor that we can share our story and let others know of this ministry. We’ve received so many beautiful letters over the years from those who use our low-gluten breads due to a wheat allergy or Celiac Sprue Disease. Just last week we received another note from a mother whose son will be using them for his First Communion!

It is our honor and blessing to be able to provide a place for them at the Lord’s table.

Our low-gluten hosts are helping so many people participate in the Eucharist

We feel that God has blessed us in so many ways, but few are as rewarding as our low-gluten altar bread ministry.

When we receive a phone call or letter or note on our Facebook or Twitter accounts from those who use our low-gluten breads, it brings nothing but pure joy to our hearts. Recently we received a beautiful letter from Gretchen in Seneca Falls, New York. In part, it reads:

“My life changed for the better nearly a year ago. Thanks to the careful planning of Marie Leo, faith formation coordinator, and the willingness of Father Jim Fennessy, my dream came true. It was my son Samuel’s First Holy Communion. Although my First Communion took place as a child, this Commnion was like receiving for the very first time.

Samuel and I have Celeac Disease, and in order for us to safely receive Communion we needed a low-gluten host made by the Benedictine Sisters of Perpetual Adoration.”

She continues, “I pray that all those who suffer from Celiac Disease – or those who cannot have wheat – receive these wafers. To do so is truly life changing! Every time we receive these low-gluten Communion wafers I thank God for His Greatness, the Benedictine Sisters for creating these wafers, the Catholic Church for accepting these wafers and for Father Jim, Father Roy and Marie Leo for making it possible for my son and I to safely receive the Body of Christ.”

To Gretchen, her son, Samuel, and to the thousands of other low-gluten patrons of many faiths, we are humbled by your gratitude and are blessed to help you all sit at Christ’s table.

Our lives have been in transition these past few weeks, bringing with it exhaustive preparation, working and sleeping in new places and – yes – more than a little stress. However, something always happens that brings a smile to our faces and reminds us of all the blessings our Lord has given us.

We received an e-mail from a grateful mother whose daughter recently celebrated her First Communion thanks to our low-gluten altar breads. It is stories like these and smiles like Uriel’s that help us realize our ministry is a special one.

Uriel was just a baby when her family first visited our monastery in Tucson, Ariz.

“We had a meal with the Sisters, and she had her first taste of ice cream then,” recalled her mother, Sonya. “That was before we learned we had Celiac disease.”

Celiac Sprue Disease is an autoimmune disease that involves the inability to eat foods with gluten, a name for proteins found in wheat and related grains such as rye and barley. It involves a major lifestyle change in that certain foods must be cut from the diet or else a toxic reaction can occur in the small intestine. Gluten is often found in bread, pizza, cookies, ice cream…and altar breads.

With a rising number of people being diagnosed with Celiac Sprue Disease, it means they cannot tolerate communion hosts made of wheat without becoming sick. In the past, they could either take the host and get sick, bypass the host and only take the wine or skip the Eucharist completely.

Thanks to the Benedictine Sisters’ invention of low-gluten breads in 2004, Celiac Sprue Disease sufferers have another option. There is enough gluten in the Sisters’ breads to satisfy the Church’s cannon law, but not enough to cause sickness in a majority of those with a wheat intolerance.

The low-gluten altar breads recently allowed young Uriel to celebrate her First Communion a few years after that first meeting with the Benedictine Sisters.

“She carried her pix and the special low-gluten altar breads in it for communion,” her mother said. “I was very worried about how we would manage it, but everything went smoothly. It was a wonderful and positive experience for our daughter.”