What if an animal snatches a eucharistic host and runs off with it?

I recently found out about a document issued by Pope Pius V soon after the Council of Trent, sometime in the late 1560 and early 1570s called De Defectibus. In it, almost every imaginable scenario is presented with regards to the validity and laicity of the Mass if certain events. I will look at these from time to time on this blog.

Under the section Defective Materials, it explains what should happen if a gust of wind or an animal carries away a consecrated host, which Catholics believe to be the body, blood, soul, and divinity of Jesus.

Here is what the document spells out:

III. 7. If the consecrated host should disappear, either from some chance cause such as wind, or by a miracle, or from being consumed by some animal, and cannot be recovered; then another must be consecrated, after first being offered, beginning at the passage: Qui pridie quam pateretur.

A simple solution to a very uncommon situation.