Faith & Communion
Keeping the feasts with celiac disease
Ways to share Catholic food traditions and celebrate the liturgical year with gluten-free meals.
A family recipe can hold a great deal: the person who taught it, the kitchen where it was first made, the feast that brought everyone home. After a celiac diagnosis, changing that recipe may feel more consequential than changing an ingredient.
There is room to care about these things. The work of preparing a meal, setting a table, and welcoming someone belongs to the life of a household. With some planning, those familiar acts can continue around food you can eat.
Keep the feast in view
The Church’s year returns us to the mysteries of Christ’s life. At Christmas, we celebrate his birth; at Easter, his Resurrection. The Catechism describes the liturgical year as the unfolding of the whole mystery of Christ through the seasons and feasts.
A household celebration can begin there: Mass, the Gospel of the day, a familiar hymn, or a candle lit at the table. These give the meal its setting. A changed menu still belongs to the same feast.
If you will attend Mass at an unfamiliar parish, make your Communion arrangements ahead of time, alongside the arrangements for the family meal.
Give the meal a simple beginning
Start with a dish you already know how to prepare with gluten-free ingredients. A celebration need not depend on learning an unfamiliar baking method that morning. If a traditional cake or bread matters to you, try the adapted recipe before the occasion and keep a note of what worked.
Check the ingredients in the whole meal, including sauces, stocks, stuffing, and decorations. A dish’s familiar name does not tell you everything in it. Gluten can also pass into food during preparation or serving, so plan separate preparation and serving utensils for gluten-free dishes. NIDDK’s guidance on food and cross-contact explains these precautions.
When someone else is hosting, discuss the menu beforehand. Offering to bring one dish gives the conversation something concrete. If you need to bring your whole meal, arrange where it will be stored and served.
Make a place at the table
At a parish celebration, speak with the organizer before the day. Agree who will prepare your food and where you will collect it. Keeping a portion apart from a busy buffet can make the serving arrangements clearer.
Children can take part in the traditions surrounding a meal as well as the cooking: choosing the flowers, learning the hymn, setting out the best plates. An adapted family recipe can be written down beside the original, with the same occasion and the same family names attached to it.
Some years there will be time for an elaborate meal. Other years, a familiar supper after Mass will be enough for the household. The feast gives both their place in the Church’s year.
For the penitential seasons, read When food restrictions make fasting difficult.