Starting this Sunday, all the priests of the Archdiocese are supposed to preach on the 14th Encyclical of the late John Paul II: Ecclesia de eucharistia. All in all, there will be 6 Sundays to expound on the different aspects of the Eucharist and its relationship to the Church.Today being also Good Shepherd Sunday or vocation Sunday, we think about vocation to priestly and religious life. But the timing does not suit us because there is in a later chapter in the encyclical which works better with the theme of vocation. Be that as it may, let me begin. The matter of my preaching comes from the early part of the encyclical. It starts by telling us that the Eucharist is the promise of Christ to be with us fulfilled. Remember Matthew 28: “Lo, I am with you always to the end of time”. The Eucharist fulfils that promise.
JPII says: “Ever since Pentecost, when the Church, the people of the new covenant, began her pilgrim journey towards her heavenly homeland, the Divine Sacrament has continued to mark the passing of her days, filling them with confident hope”. The Divine Sacrament refers to an enduring presence, the presence of Christ. This presence, which is real in the fullest sense, is the Eucharist and has as its foundation the sacred days from Holy Thursday to Easter Sunday.
The Eucharist stands at the centre of the Church’s life. This is confirmed by the primordial image that was outlined in Act 2:42. “They devoted themselves to the Apostles’ teaching, to the brotherhood, to the breaking of bread and the prayers”.
As Christ’s promise to be with us, the Eucharist is a gift given to the Church but it is not just a gift amongst gifts. Instead, the Eucharist is the very gift of Christ himself. And the Church is entrusted with this sacred duty of making the paschal mystery of the Eucharist present to all times. Therefore, the Eucharist by nature has to transcend time. We live in time and space—yesterday, today or tomorrow, this place and not that place. But this one action of Christ, the offering of Himself from the Last Supper, the Passion, Calvary until the Resurrection is one action which cannot be caught or constrained by time and space.
“This sacrifice is so decisive for the salvation of the human race that Jesus Christ offered it and returned to the Father only after he had left us a means of sharing in it as if we had been present there”. Thus, the priest puts his voice at the disposal of the one who spoke those hallowed words in the Upper Room: Take this all of you and eat. Take this all of you and drink. These words are important because they point us in the direction of what the chapter has been trying to tell us, that is, the Eucharist is the everlasting sacrifice of Christ to the Father.
According to the Encyclical, “the Eucharist is a sacrifice in the strict sense, and not only in a general way, as if it were simply a matter of Christ’s offering himself to the faithful as their spiritual food. Certainly it is a gift given for our sake, and indeed that of all humanity, yet it is first and foremost a gift to the Father”. This is important for us to note.
Firstly, Christ clearly intended the Eucharist to be understood as a sacrifice, because in instituting it, Christ did not merely say: ‘This is my body,’ ‘this is my blood,’ but went on to add: ‘which is given for you,’ ‘which is poured out for you.’ Jesus did not simply state that what he was giving the Apostles to eat and drink was his body and his blood; his choice of words also expressed its sacrificial meaning and his action, in a sacramental way, made present his sacrifice which would soon be offered on the Cross for the salvation of all”. It simply means that Jesus on the Cross, on Calvary was already present in the actions of the Last Supper, the Eucharist.
Secondly, the sacrificial nature of the Eucharist can be understood in the context of how the Son of God became man in order to restore all creation, in one supreme act of praise, to the one who made it from nothing. The world which came forth from the hands of God is returned to Him redeemed, made new by Christ. In this sacrifice directed to God we are offered along by Christ to His Father. [1]
Thirdly, the Eucharist understood as sacrifice is not a repetition of Christ's Passover, or its multiplication in time and in space; it is the one sacrifice of the Cross, which is re-presented until the end of time. According to St John Chrysostom, we always offer the same Lamb, not one today and another tomorrow, but always the same one. For this reason, the sacrifice is always one... Even now we offer that victim who was once offered and who will never be consumed. [2]
Fourthly, at the beginning of the Encyclical, JPII also listed some the shadows that have crept into the celebration of the Eucharist. As I said earlier, the “sacrificial nature of the mass” cannot be underestimated. For some people, the Eucharist is simply a fellowship meal among Christians in which we receive Jesus. As long as it is simply a fellowship meal, then we will run into difficulties because we and what we need will become the measure of how we are to celebrate mass. A good example of “we” as the measure of the mass is expressed by this rule “if it feels good, let’s do it”. A choir in another parish I know of operates along this principle. The choice of music is dictated by this feel-good criterion. When challenged on the principle that the aim of liturgical music is to worship God, the response was: what’s wrong with feeling good when we worship God. Admittedly, there is a thin line to distinguish between feeling good and worshipping God but if “feeling good” is the criterion of our liturgy, then, we have reduced the Eucharist to a celebration of who we are and not an affirmation of God whom we ought to worship. [3]
Against this “we”, this horizontal or community-centred approach taken in many parishes, JPII reminds us that the primary dimension of the Eucharist is vertical or God-centred. [4] This vertical dimension of the Eucharist is critical to our understanding of justice, that is, to our concern for the poor, the widows, the orphans—in short, our horizontal concern. The vertical dimension which focuses our vision on heaven does not actually diminish or lessen our sense of responsibility for the world. Instead, the Christian vision that leads to the expectation of “new heavens” and “a new earth” actually increases our sense of responsibility for the world.
In summary, the implication of the Eucharist as sacrifice actually leads us to centre our vision upon God and it is this focus on God which gives the Christian a direction in life. For example, just because I serve you, does not mean that I love God. [A communist may embrace the concept of “justice” as an expression of solidarity but that doesn’t mean that he loves God]. This is where we need to be aware that just because someone is active in parish does not necessarily mean that he or she loves God. But, when I love God, then it makes sense that I want to serve you. The motivation to give my life for you is because I love God first. Jesus was driven by the love of His Father to try to make the world a better place. Thus, the chapter ends by pointing to the reality of a world in need of hope and in need of justice. It is in this world of darkened horizon that Christian hope must shine forth. For this reason, the Lord wishes to remain with us through the Eucharist, giving us strength and hope to walk the path of a humanity already renewed by his love and sacrifice.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Preface for Easter IV: In Him, a new age has dawned, the long reign of sin is ended, a broken world has been renewed and man is once again made whole.
[2] CCC 1367. The sacrifice of Christ and the sacrifice of the Eucharist are one single sacrifice: “The victim is one and the same: the same now offers through the ministry of priests, who then offered Himself on the cross; only the manner of being is different.” “In this divine sacrifice which is celebrated in the Mass, the same Christ who offered Himself once in a bloody manner on the altar of the cross is contained and offered in an unbloody manner”. This is in response to the Protestant understanding of Heb 9:26 where it says, “But as it is, [Jesus] has appeared once for all at the end of the age to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself”. When Catholics speak of the Eucharist as a sacrifice, without a doubt the Protestants immediately point to Hebrews, which unequivocally explains that Jesus Christ died once and for all to take care of our sins and does not need to be “re-sacrificed” repeatedly on Catholic altars. In actual fact, the Catholic Church has never taught that Jesus is repeatedly sacrificed in the Catholic mass. The Church teaches that the Eucharistic sacrifice in the mass is a participation in the once-and-for-all sacrifice of Christ at Calvary.
[3] If the Liturgy appears first of all as the workshop for our activity, then what is essential is being forgotten: God. For the Liturgy is not about us, but about God. Forgetting about God is the most imminent danger of our age. As against this, the Liturgy should be setting up a sign of God's presence.
[4] The Eucharist as “God-centred” has implication on the relationship between men and women. Men and women are different and the difference between them cannot be reduced solely to cultural or historical accident. It means that it is not simply “patriarchy” which subjugates a woman. It is woman’s nature to be nurturing and as such she seems to be the gentler or the weaker of the two sexes. Man’s basic characteristic, on the other hand, is centred on his strength and his power. As such, he exerts his authority. The confusion between this natural difference is seen when a woman tries to succeed in a man’s world, she is often reduced to being ruthless. So, in the relationship between a man and a woman, if you want a good husband, then pray that your husband is “God-centred”. Why? Because “men” by nature are powerful and are therefore an authority unto themselves. When they do not have to submit themselves to an authority higher than themselves, they become tyrannical. A man, who is God-fearing, who submits himself to this higher authority called God, is one who know what it means to exercise power and authority. The exercise of power and authority is always compassionate, like God is compassionate. A God-fearing husband is one whose love is always strong and yet not overpowering... A man who loves God is a man who loves His justice. So if your husband comes to Church everyday but treats you badly, then pray that your husband will truly come to know and love God even more.
