The Eucharist
I think for
most Catholics the Mass or as we call it now, the Eucharist, or the Liturgy
of Celebration of the Eucharist is the high point of our faith experience.
Throughout the centuries Christians have gathered to do what Jesus ‘told
them to do,’ ‘Do This in Memory of Me.’ It has always been a source of
inspiration and self identity for Christians. When we do this we are doing
what Jesus told us to do to remain in Him and with one another.
We may not have
understood the theology or ‘why’ gathering for Eucharist does feed and
encourage us, but we feel it. Sometimes it is as simple as saying, ‘You
know, I had a headache when I got to Church, but after the Mass I felt so
much better.’ That is the experience of the Eucharist sustaining and
healing us. It has a power to change us and make us more who we are meant
to be, whole persons in Christ.
I think there
are two realities at work in every Eucharist. The first reality is the very
Person of Christ whom we meet in every Eucharist. We meet Christ in the
very act of giving himself to us. We meet him in his sacrifice of himself
to the Father on our behalf. It is His person we encounter at this level.
It is the essence of why he came, the moment in his life when he gave all
and emptied himself completely in love. It is the sacrifice that redeems
the world. That is why we say we are not ‘repeating’ the sacrifice when we
gather to celebrate, but we are continuing the one eternal sacrifice
initiated in the Upper Room, enacted on Calvary and ratified and endorsed in
His Resurrection in the Garden.
The second
reality we encounter is that of the Body of Christ itself, we the members of
Christ, who celebrate this mystery with him, who are caught up in the same
offering, so that we say the Eucharist is the ‘Whole Christ offering the
Whole Christ to the Father.’ We the members of Christ with him are the
whole Christ and together with him we offer ourselves to the Father. We who
are baptized into him offer the sacrifice with the priest and with Christ to
the Father. So, our part is significant. We become like Christ in the
Eucharist, we are placed in a stance of giving of ourselves to one another
in sacrifice in union with Christ.
This second
reality, our part, is very important in understanding the full impact of why
and how the Eucharist sustains us. If we do not realize or emphasize our
part then a major part of the Eucharistic experience is diminished for us.
Before the renewal of our liturgy we didn’t stress our part. The emphasis
was on ‘receiving Jesus in Holy Communion.’ There was little awareness of
emphasis on how our presence there or what we did together affected anyone
else. We had little sense of Eucharist as worship of the whole Body of
Christ and we as members of it.
The renewal of
our understanding of what Eucharistic Liturgy and indeed, all celebration of
Liturgy and Sacraments, enables us to see that we together offer this
sacrifice and that each of us contributes to the full impact of the
celebration. If we are not aware of this and do not see ourselves as
affecting the impact of the celebration then we diminish that impact. For
example, if we come in a passive way, thinking that we are just there to
receive, then we do not understand that we are all meant to see ourselves as
active participants and celebrants of the Eucharist. How we participate,
actively, enthusiastically, contributes to the impact of the celebration and
affects those there with us.
Father Michael Burke, OP
Submitted 12/07/2005
Email: michael@mburkeop.com
