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[[File:Michał Elwiro Andriolli, Święcone.jpg|thumb|Blessing of food in a private house<br>{{small|By Michał Elwiro Andriolli (19th century)}}]]
In Western Europe, the tradition slowly died out due to the Reformation. Protestants criticized the Catholics for treating the food blessing as equally or even more important than the sacraments. The Church had to remind people that the consumption of blessed food is not a substitute for receiving holy communion during Eastertide. Protestant Reformation was doing quite well in 16th-century Poland too until the Catholic Church stroke back with its Counter-Reformation in the 17th. Polish Renaissance-era Lutheran moralist Mikołaj Rej wrote sarcastically of Catholic food blessing:
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