The Holy Eucharist is the very 'heart' of the Church
Last 17 April during the Mass of the Lord's Supper (Cena Domini),
the Holy Father John Paul II signed the Encyclical Letter Ecclesia de
Eucharistia on the sacrament of the Eucharist and its relationship
to the Church. This is an outstanding ecclesial document due to its
importance and the impelling timeliness of its full doctrinal and
pastoral content. It should be considered as a new gift of the Pope to
the Church at the dawn of the new millennium, on the 25th anniversary of
his fruitful Pontificate.
This new Encyclical offers excellent ideas for reflection and
reliable guidance to those who wish to deepen their knowledge and live
with ever greater intensity the Misterium fidei which the Lord
bequeathed to us as his most precious testament.
A new Encyclical on the Holy Eucharist
1. The Eucharist is the saving presence among his people of Christ,
who died and rose. He wanted to stay with us in a special way in the
sacrament of the Eucharist. For this very reason, the Eucharist has a
central place in the life of the new messianic people. This centrality
is strongly emphasized in the Encyclical Ecclesia de Eucharistia.
We read in it that as the sacrament par excellence of the Paschal
Mystery, "the Eucharist... stands at the centre of the Church's
life" (n. 3); and again, "the Eucharist is the centre and
summit of the Church's life" (n. 31). This means that "the
Eucharist builds the Church and the Church makes the Eucharist" (n.
26).
The centrality of the Sacrament of the Altar in the life of the
Church explains her solicitous attention to the Eucharistic sacrament.
Let us remember in this regard, for example, the doctrinal decrees of
Trent which guided theological thought and catechesis in successive
centuries and are still a valid dogmatic reference point today in the
field of the renewal and growth of the faithful in devotion to the
Eucharist (cf. n. 9). Then, the three great Eucharistic Encyclicals
published in times closer to our own should also be mentioned: Mirae
Caritatis of Leo XIII, Mediator Dei of Pius XII and Mysterium
Fidei of Paul VI. Their content was later to converge in the
documents of the Second Vatican Council, especially Lumen Gentium
and Sacrosanctum Concilium.
The Eucharistic magisterium of the current Pontiff fits into this
context. Already in the first years of his Petrine ministry, in his
Apostolic Letter Dominicae Cenae of 24 February 1980, Pope John
Paul II addressed certain aspects of the Eucharistic Mystery and their
effects on the life of those who administer them. In this Encyclical, he
takes up the thread of that discourse to clarify certain points and
dispel certain doubts that have arisen here and there concerning the
Eucharistic Mystery.
It is certain that today there are many positive signs of faith and
of love for the Eucharist, Indeed, the noticeably better informed and
more active participation of the faithful in the celebration of the
Eucharist is a fruit of the liturgical reform introduced by the Second
Vatican Council: more and more time is devoted daily to the adoration of
the Eucharist; and a growing number of people take part in the
Eucharistic procession for Corpus Christi which, every year,
makes this adoration a moving public profession of love for Jesus in the
Eucharist.
However, it is necessary to admit that "alongside these lights,
there are also shadows" (n. 10), and among them the Pope highlights
the following: the steady decline in some places of the practice of
Eucharistic adoration; certain abuses, in some contexts, which
contribute to confusion with regard to the genuine Catholic teaching on
the Eucharist; at times, an extremely reductive understanding of the
Eucharistic Mystery which tends to strip it of its sacrificial meaning
and celebrates it instead as if it were simply a fraternal banquet.
Then, in addition, the nature and necessity of the ministerial
priesthood is at times obscured. Nor in some ecclesial contexts is there
any lack of ecumenical initiatives which albeit well-intentioned,
indulge in Eucharistic practices contrary to the discipline by which the
Church expresses her faith" (ibid.).
However, the direct and immediate purpose of the new Encyclical is
precisely to "effectively help to banish the dark clouds of
unacceptable doctrine and practice, so that the Eucharist will continue
to shine forth in all its radiant mystery" (ibid.).
The Church draws her life from the Eucharist
2. The central place of the sacrament of the Eucharist in the life of
the ecclesial community which, as has been stated, is the key idea of
Encyclical, is expressed in the irrefutable fact that "the Church
draws her life from the Eucharist" (ibid., n. 1). It is
especially significant that the text opens with these words which then
become the actual title of the document. This assertion is repeated
later: "The Church draws her life from Christ in the Eucharist; by
him she is fed and by him she is enlightened" (ibid., n. 6;
cf. n. 7).
What Ecclesia de Eucharistia is talking about is, of course,
the Eucharist considered in its two fundamental aspects of sacrifice and
nourishment, which, moreover, are absolutely inseparable because they
are inherent in the very nature of the Eucharist. It is a banquet of
sacrifice, or, if we prefer, a sacrificial banquet. The Eucharist, by its
nature, is "Supper" and "Cross", "Table"
and "Altar". An Altar that is a Table. A Table that is an
Altar. To separate the two elements in order to disregard or undervalue
either one would be totally to distort the Eucharistic Mystery. The Catechism
of the Catholic Church reminds us of this when it says: "The
Mass is at the same time, and inseparably, the sacrificial memorial in
which the sacrifice of the cross is perpetuated, and the sacred banquet
of communion with the Lord's body and blood" (Catechism of the
Catholic Church, n. 1382). This is also what the Pope says in the
Encyclical when he observes that Jesus "did not simply state that
what he was giving them to eat and drink was his body and his blood; he
also expressed its sacrificial meaning and made sacramentally present
his sacrifice which would soon be offered on the Cross for the salvation
of all" (n. 12).
On her pilgrimage through time and history, the Church possesses
nothing more valuable than the Eucharistic sacrifice and banquet; it is
the most precious gift, "par excellence, for it is the gift
of himself, of his person in his sacred humanity, as well as the gift of
his saving work" (n. 11), since it is "the source and summit
of the Christian life" (Lumen Gentium, n. 11; Ecclesia de
Eucharistia, n. 1).
Indeed, the Eucharist is the source of every grace that God bestows
upon us. It is true that all the sacraments, as acts of sanctifying
worship of Christ and of the Church, are inexhaustible sources of grace
for those who approach them with faith. But it is also true that the
Eucharist is the source of every grace, since every grace, in the
present economy of salvation, is always related, explicitly or
implicitly, to the Eucharist. St Thomas Aquinas, the supreme theologian
and passionate eulogist of Jesus in the Eucharist, says so expressly: (ibid.,
n. 62); "nec aliquis habet gratiam ante susceptionem huius
sacramenti nisi ex aliquali voto ipsius" (Summ.
Theol., III q. 79, a.1 ad 1), a vow contained in the reception of
the other sacraments which are ordered to the Eucharist as to their
goal. Therefore, in the actual economy of salvation, one can say that
every grace is Christian, sacramental and Eucharistic, since it is
linked, at least implicitly, with Christ, with the sacraments and with
the Eucharist, the true centre of gravitation of the new messianic
people.
Moreover, the Eucharist is the source of every grace since it
"contains the Church's entire spiritual wealth: Christ himself, our
passover and living bread. Through his own flesh, now made living and
life-giving by the Holy Spirit, he offers life to men" (Presbyterorum
Ordinis, n. 5; Ecclesia de Eucharistia, n. 1). In other
words, the One who is the very author of grace, who is "full of
grace and truth" (Jn 1:14); the One, in short, who is the source of
original grace.
The Eucharist, the 'creative force' of ecclesial communion
3. The Eucharist, in which the action of the Son and of the Holy
Spirit is at work (cf. Ecclesia de Eucharistia, n. 23), is also
the source of the Church's unity. The Encyclical speaks in this context
of the "unifying power of participation in the banquet of the
Eucharist" (ibid.) and of the "unifying power of the
body of Christ" (ibid., n. 24).
Expressed in this way, the text does no more than take up and
emphasize the thought of the Council which says that, "at the same
time in the sacrament of the Eucharistic bread, the unity of the
faithful, who form one body in Christ, is both expressed and brought
about" (Lumen Gentium, n. 3; Ecclesia de Eucharistia,
n. 21; cf. I Cor 10:17). Thus, the Eucharist is the sacrament of
Christian koinonia, the "sacramentum unitatis"
[sacramental unity], as the Doctor Angelicum calls it (Supplementum,
q. 71, a. 9).
The Last Supper, of which the Eucharist is but the
reactualization in time, certainly took place in an atmosphere of unity,
of an intimate communion of love. This emerges clearly from the
circumstances in which it occurred, as well as from the words and acts
of Jesus on that solemn occasion: his deep desire to eat the paschal
lamb with his disciples before his Passion, the example of humility and
charity shown in the washing of the feet, his prayer for the unity of
his disciples and for all who would believe in him.... All these things
express Christ's wish that his last supper would be enlivened by sincere
love, by an intimate union of hearts. The gravity of Judas' sin was
precisely that in betraying Christ, he not only distanced himself from
the Messiah but also from communion with the entire messianic people,
and at the very moment in which it was about to become definitive.
The atmosphere of the Last Supper must also be the atmosphere of
every Eucharistic celebration; the Last Supper was the first Christian
Eucharist. In fact, the Church does no more than repeat what occurred in
the Upper Room through the ministry of priests, from generation to
generation, faithful to the commandment received, "Do this in
remembrance of me" (cf. ibid., nn. 5, 21); and by repeating
it she makes him mysteriously but really present, so that all may share
in him.
More specifically, the Eucharist is the source of Christian unity,
because in this unity it is not only represented but produced (ibid.,
n. 21). Unity is its principle, its root. The Church is one, because the
Eucharist is one. St Paul is most explicit on this. Writing to the
faithful of Corinth, he says, "The bread which we break, is it not
a participation in the Body of Christ? Because there is one bread, we
who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread" (I
Cor 10:16-17).
Unity as an effect of the Eucharist also emerges from The Bread of
Life Discourse which John records. In Eucharistic communion, Christ
communicates his own life to those who receive it under the appearances
of the bread and the wine: "He who eats my flesh and drinks my
blood abides in me, and I in him.... he who eats me will live because of
me" (Jn 6:56-57). Now those who live one and the same life, the
life of Christ, cannot but be united with one another, forming a single
body: the body of Christ, which is the Church.
The "unifying power" of participation in the Eucharist is
forcefully affirmed by the Fathers; to this end they used particularly
beautiful and vivid images and expressions. However, perhaps no one has
been so insistent on this vis unitiva (unifying power) of the 'sacramentum
amoris' (sacrament of love) as Augustine. "The virtue proper to
this food", he says, "is unity: a unity such that we, joined
together in his body and having become his members, become what we
receive.... We should therefore see in this food and in this drink, the
associating of his Body and his members, that is, the Holy Church"
(Augustine, Sermo 57: PL, 38, 389).
Before leaving this world, Christ prayed to the Father for the unity
of all his disciples (Jn 17:21). This is fully brought about in the
Eucharist. The early Christian communities had "one heart and one
mind" because they partook of "the banquet of the Lord"
(I Cor 10:21) and in the "breaking of bread" (Acts 2:42; Ecclesia
de Eucharistia, n. 3).
Let us remember the words on this topic of De La Taille, a great
theologian of the Eucharist: "Christ", he says, "after
the Institution of the Last Supper, left the precept of fraternal love
as his own new commandment, because he himself in the Eucharist is a new
principle that gives life to fraternal love and a new binding reason
that he asks for himself and his members, by virtue of incorporation,
one love. If you injure love, you will offend the Eucharist. If you seek
love, you will find it in the Eucharist. This is the law of the New
Testament, founded... on the Host-Body, consecrated to God at the Last
Supper and given to the disciples" (De La Taille, Mysterium
Fidei, 487).
A thanksgiving banquet, the beginning of the fullness of grace
4. The new Encyclical of the Supreme Pontiff underlines the essential
paschal dimension of the Eucharist. It was instituted in the Upper Room
during the Last Supper (cf. Ecclesia de Eucharistia, n. 5). With
it, Jesus wanted to celebrate the Jewish or Exodus Passover with the
Twelve. So it was his Passover meal.
The Exodus Passover was a mystery that involved all the Children of
Israel who gathered to commemorate their deliverance from Egyptian
bondage and to thank Yahweh for his gift of freedom. In the Haggadhah
("narration", a Jewish ceremony on the evening of the
Passover), introducing the hymn of the Hallel, it says, "In
every generation it is the duty of each person to think of himself as
though he himself had just come out of Egypt... because the holy One — blessed be he — did not only set our fathers free but
also sets us free with them. It is therefore our duty to give thanks and
praise, to celebrate, glorify, exalt and magnify... the One who worked
all these miracles for us and for our ancestors, who brought us from
slavery to freedom, from subjection to redemption, from sorrow to joy,
from mourning to festivity, from the darkness to the shining light. Let
us therefore say 'Alleluia!' to him" (Haggadhah, 34, 40).
Joy, praise and thanksgiving for the gift of liberation were
therefore typical notes of the Jewish Passover. These are also, in a
totally new context, the proper sentiments of the Christian Easter,
starting with the Passover celebrated by Jesus with his disciples in the
Upper Room.
Indeed, as we can see from the accounts of the institution of the
Eucharist, Jesus "took a cup, and when he had given thanks he gave
it to them" (Mk 14:23).
The reason why Jesus gives thanks to the Father in that solemn hour
(cf. Jn 7:30) is clear: the redemption of those who were entrusted to
Him, the gift of messianic salvation, foretold by the prophets, was
finally and definitively bestowed upon humanity. He gives thanks,
therefore, because what he was expecting has happened, what had been
promised has come true, what was prefigured in the Old Testament has
come about. The last times of fullness, of grace, of intimacy with God
have henceforth begun. Human history has been radically renewed. A new
world, deeply marked by the presence in it of the Word of God incarnate
has begun. For all these things Jesus gives thanks at the Last Supper,
which was the first celebration of the Eucharist (cf. Ecclesia de
Eucharistia, n. 2).
Still today, this is the Eucharist that has been celebrated down the
ages in the churches of Christian communities. As a reactualization of
the Last Supper, it is essentially a banquet of joy and thanksgiving to
the Lord for the gift of deliverance from the slavery of sin. The
liturgy itself heavily underlines this fundamental aspect of the
Eucharist. The celebrant invites the faithful: "let us give thanks
to the Lord our God"; "it is right to give him thanks and
praise". "Father, all-powerful and ever-living God, we do well
always and everywhere to give you thanks and praise..." (Roman
Missal, Eucharistic Prayer I, Preface).
The entire People of God gather with love to give thanks, in deep and
uncontainable joy, for the longed-for event of messianic redemption. And
by so doing, they prolong in time and in history Christ's thanksgiving
at the Last Supper with his disciples "priusquam pateretur"
(before the Father) [sic].
From what has been said above, emerges the intimate and deep,
indissoluble bond between the Eucharist and the Church. The Eucharist is
truly her vital nerve centre, her very "heart". Yes, the
Church has an essentially Eucharistic heart. The Eucharist, as the
commemoration of the Passover of Christ, is part of her life, it is part
of her very identity. "The Eucharist" really "builds the
Church and the Church makes the Eucharist" (ibid., n, 26).
This is the Mysterium fidei that the ecclesial community is
called to live with renewed enthusiasm at the dawn of the new
millennium, ever more conscious that it is the greatest treasure of the
Church, because in it she possesses everything: the redeeming sacrifice
of Christ, his Resurrection, the gift of the Spirit; for in it, in the
form of the humble elements of the Eucharist, Christ himself walks with
his Bride, still a pilgrim on this earth, enlightening her and making
her a witness of steadfast hope for his children and the world; for it
is the pledge of the fulfilment for which each man and woman, even
unconsciously, yearns (cf. ibid., nn. 59 and 62). The Eucharist
has in fact an essentially eschatological dimension, which is strongly
emphasized in the Encyclical.
To live the Eucharistic mystery with ever greater depth and
intensity, the Supreme Pontiff invites us to take our place "at the
school of the saints, who are the great interpreters of true Eucharistic
piety. In them the theology of the Eucharist takes on all the splendour
of a lived reality; it becomes 'contagious' and, in a manner of
speaking, it 'warms our hearts'". But the Pope invites us above all
to "listen to Mary Most Holy, in whom the mystery of the Eucharist
appears, more than in anyone else, as a mystery of light. Gazing upon
Mary, we come to know the transforming power present in the
Eucharist" (ibid., n. 62), which is nothing other than the
transforming and renewing power of the One who came "to make all
things new".
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