A bishop in a neighboring diocese, Rockville Center, has just issued a pastoral letter, and he’s cracking down on how and where the Body of Christ is distributed.

From Newsday (Long Island, New York):

For three decades, students at elite Chaminade High School in Mineola could receive Communion during a 15-minute “Communion Service” just before lunch.

But that practice will end following a pastoral letter Bishop William Murphy is releasing today prohibiting Catholic schools, parishes and other institutions from distributing Holy Communion at most non-Mass events.

Several schools and parishes who take part in the practice said yesterday they would abide by the bishop’s order. Some said they were nonetheless disappointed, while some church analysts such as papal biographer David Gibson suggested it was a move by Murphy to “tighten up” and crack down on nontraditional practices.

But others saw it as an opportunity to reflect on the sacrament of Holy Communion and head off what may be a trend among some Catholics to take it too casually.

“I think it’s positive and something to be embraced,” said the Rev. James Williams, president of Chaminade. “The bishop is the teaching arm of the church.”

In his eight-page pastoral letter, his seventh since becoming the spiritual leader of Long Island’s 1.4 million Catholics in 2001, Murphy said he was ordering the Communion service practice to end by July 1.

That, he said, would bring the Diocese of Rockville Centre “into conformity with the liturgical norms of the Church.” The order will not affect practices such as nonpriests’ giving Communion to sick people at home or in hospitals.

“The Eucharist is the greatest gift Jesus left us,” Murphy wrote. “The celebration of the Eucharist gives us our identity as well as our life.”

During the Communion services, Communion hosts previously consecrated by a priest and stored in a tabernacle are distributed, often by deacons, nuns or eucharistic ministers. The services do not include the Liturgy of the Eucharist, during which a priest consecrates bread and wine and, according to Catholic belief, turns them into the body and blood of Christ though a process known as transubstantiation.

The services originally were intended for use on Sundays only in remote, missionary parishes where priests could rarely visit, and has since been inappropriately adopted to other uses, said Julia Upton, a theology professor at St. John’s University.

Schools such as Chaminade and Kellenberg Memorial High School in Uniondale say they conduct the brief Communion services because they lack the time to celebrate a Mass amid classes. Some schools also lack priests to celebrate Mass.

At local parishes, church workers often hold the services on weekday mornings because no priest is available for Mass. Catholics are not obligated to attend Mass on weekdays.

The Rev. Bill Brisotti of Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal in Wyandanch said the service allows him to take off Sunday night and spend at least one night away from the parish without having to return early Monday.

“People liked” the service, he said. “I’m disappointed but we’ll follow the regulations of the diocese.”