August 4, 2020 (LifeSiteNews) — A couple weeks ago, I had the great pleasure of sitting down with my good friend Alexander Tschugguel for the “Love and reverence to Our Lord: Let’s always receive Holy Communion on the tongue” conference.
It was an amazing conference I was happy to be a part of. If you haven’t been able to watch it yet, click here to watch it in full.
Because Alexander is Austrian, I wanted to ask him about the famous Habsburg dynasty that ruled Europe for so many centuries. We also talked about the devotion in his country to the Blessed Sacrament and how he himself receives Communion.
“As Austrians, especially traditional Catholic Austrians, we all have a great devotion to the House of Habsburg itself. So it's a great honor to be able to speak a little bit about this,” he said.
He proceeded to tell me a remarkable story about King Rudolf, the first Habsburg to be named king of the Holy Roman Empire. He said that King Rudolf gave his horse to a priest who was on his way to administer the Eucharist to someone who was about to die. The priest wanted to return the horse to the king but he said he was not worthy to ride it because it had carried Our Lord.
“This story shows which ideals were carried through the centuries by this family,” Alexander said.
He also shared a story about how Blessed Emperor Karl of Austria received Holy Communion on his deathbed. Alexander also went into detail with other examples of Catholic rulers in Austria and Europe.
“In every generation, there was someone with at least tried to be a little bit more faithful than…what the average was.”
He commented that the lives of his countrymen show that “it is possible to maintain the faith, even though everyone wants to abolish it.”
Alexander also said that when he was converting to Catholicism he was fortunate to have a conservative priest teach him to only receive Holy Communion on the tongue.
“Since becoming a Catholic in 2009, I never received communion any other way than kneeling on the tongue.”
Alexander, you may recall, was stricken with the coronavirus several months ago. He said that a priest gave him Communion on the tongue and that the priest did not contract the virus.
Alexander recounted how in the past priests in Europe found creative ways to administer the Eucharist during times of plagues, but never to the point of giving Communion on the hand.
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