Contrary to popular opinion, wine, and other beverages of
antiquity produced through fermentation, were probably more
important in providing disease-free drinking fluids than in
their tendency to intoxicate. Ancient Greeks drank their
water mixed with wine, and also used wine to cleanse wounds
and soak dressings. More recently, military physicians of
the last century observed that during epidemics of cholera,
wine drinkers were relatively spared by the disease, and
troops were advised to mix wine into the water.
Wine has been shown to be an effective antiseptic even
when the alcohol is removed. In fact, 10% alcohol is a
poor antiseptic, and alcohol only becomes optimally
effective at concentrations of 7;0%. The antiseptic
substances in wine are inactive in fresh grapes because
these molecules are bound to complex sugars. During
fermentation these antiseptic substances are split off from
the sugars and in this way become active. These molecules
are polyphenols, a class of substances used in hospitals to
disinfect surfaces and instruments. The polyphenol of wine
has been shown to be some thirty-three times more powerful
than the phenol used by Lister when he pioneered antiseptic
surgery.
Same year wines can be diluted up to ten times before
beginning to show a decrease in their antiseptic effect.
The better wines gradually improve with age over the first
ten years and can be diluted twenty times without a
decrease of the antiseptic effect. This effect then
remains more or less constant over the next twenty years
and becomes equivalent to a new wine after another
twenty-five years. (Modern antiseptics and antibiotics for
disinfecting wounds have surpassed wine effectiveness
because the active ingredients in wine are rapidly bound
and inactivated by proteins in body tissues.)
In preparing communion, the hot water that is added to the
wine will increase greatly the antiseptic effect of the
polyphenols. Disinfection occurs more rapidly and more
effectively at 45 degrees centigrade than at room
temperature (22-25 degrees). Another contribution to the
antiseptic effect comes from the silver, copper, zinc that
make up the chalice itself, ensuring that microbes are
unable to survive on its surface.
Throughout the centuries, no disease has ever been
transmitted by the taking of Holy Communion. Diseases,
such as Hepatitis B, known to be transmitted by shared
eating utensils, have never been acquired from the
communion spoon. HIV is known not to be transmitted
through shared eating utensils, and considering the
antiseptic qualities of the Holy Communion received by the
faithful, there is no likelihood of acquiring HIV infection
through the Common Cup.
reprinted from: Canadian Orthodox Messenger, Spring 1995 by permission of the author...
http://catholicparish.netfirms.com