<<Disclaimer: Verify this information before applying it to your situation.>> ========================= News Highlights 1. December Holiday Support Group Meetings and pot luck meals are scheduled for Orlando on the 3rd and Cocoa Beach on the 10th. Tampa will have their meeting at the Lai Thai restaurant on the 9th and the cost is $7.95 per person. Checks should be made out to the Lai Thai 2. Celiac Group Leaders will gather in Chicago on November 4 and 5 for talks on the best way to form a US Celiac Coalition. This coalition will not replace your support group. It will reinforce the common objectives of all celiacs in talking with the Government and Food Manufacturers in identifying ingredients for the best possible quality of life. There has been considerable grass roots support for this concept and a very large representation has submitted their reservation. 3. Bette Hagman's taping of GF South West cooking in Portales, NM will be broadcast in three segments. Check with your local PBS station for availability of KENW-TV's Creative Living. A tape of the show is available for $15.00 from KENW-TV, Attn: Sheryl Borden, 52 Broadcast Center, Portales, NM 88130 4. "Celiac Disease: The Dark Side of the Gastrointestinal Planet" was an exceptional conference held in July. The speakers included gastroenterologists from the USA, Italy, and Finland; a dietitian, and a consumer safety officer from the FDA. The speakers provided a wealth of material on CD for the 300 in attendance. Audio cassette tapes are available from the conference with each speaker on a separate tape. The tapes are offered as a complete set, for $40 plus $5 shipping and handling. Contact Vicky Roach by phone at: Division of Pediatric Gastroenterology & Nutrition, University of Maryland Hospital, N5W70, 22 South Greene St., Baltimore, MD 21201, (410) 328-0812 or by fax at (410) 328-1072. 5. Low-Gluten Altar Breads: *** This item came directly from one or more posts to the CELIAC *** list. It has been deleted here because it already appears *** elsewhere in the archives.i The use of alternate wafer made from gluten-free ingredients or wine only must be addressed with your local priest. Priests and Gluten: The Vatican has provoked fury by issuing a decree banning men who suffer from an allergy to gluten from becoming priests. All communion wafers must contain gluten to be suitable for the celebration of the Eucharist, the Vatican has decreed. Gluten, the protein in wheat, triggers the debilitating coeliac disease. Coeliac disease can cause dramatic weight loss, vomiting and diarrhoea as the gluten irritates the small intestine. Lethargy and breathlessness are also symptoms. The extraordinary ruling would in theory have prohibited one of the most prominent Catholic clerics of the postwar period from being ordained. The Archbishop of Liverpool, Derek Worlock, suffers from the allergy known as coeliac disease. Quoted from the English Guardian). ii