“The cup of blessing that we bless, is it not a participation in the blood of Christ? The bread that we break, is it not a participation in the body of Christ?” (1 Cor 10:16). Last week, we celebrated the central mystery of our faith – the Blessed Trinity. Today, as we celebrate the Solemnity of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ and join with all parishes throughout our country in initiating the parish phase of the Eucharistic Revival sponsored by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, I would like to explore with you other important mystery of our faith: the transubstantiation of bread and wine into the sacred Body and Blood of Christ.
At the Last Supper, when Jesus shared his last Passover meal with his apostles, he made several startling proclamations as he passed bread and wine. It was customary for those participating in the Passover to pass around a loaf of unleavened bread and several cups of wine. The unleavened bread recalled the Israelites’ Exodus from Egypt when they prepared this bread because they did not have time to allow the bread to rise. The cups of wine were seen as signs of blessing from God. When Jesus passed the loaf of bread around, however, he told his disciples, “Take this, all of you, and eat of it, for this is my body, which will be given up for you” (Roman Missal; Eucharistic Prayer). Whereas God had instructed the Israelites to eat unleavened bread so that they could be strengthened in preparation for their escape from Egypt and their journey to the Promised Land, Jesus offers his own body to nourish us on our life journey to our eternal Promised Land – heaven!
As he shared the cup with his disciples, he made an even more startling pronouncement: “Take this, all of you, and drink from it, for this is the chalice of my blood, the blood of the new and eternal covenant…. Do this in memory of me.” It must have taken a tremendous act of faith for the disciples to drink of this chalice. They were forbidden to drink blood since it represented the life force of the creature from which the blood was drawn. And yet, they drank of the chalice because they put their trust in Jesus. The cup of blessing, which was associated with the Old Covenant at Mt. Sinai had become the cup of the New Covenant which Jesus Christ was to ratify by his crucifixion and resurrection!
From the time of the first Christians, belief in the consecrated bread and wine as the Body and Blood of Christ has been the foundation of the Eucharistic celebration; we hear that in our first reading this Sunday from St. Paul’s Letter to the Corinthians, written just a few years after our Lord’s death and Resurrection. The two questions that people frequently ask about this mystery are: first, what happens to the bread and wine when it becomes the body and blood of Christ and second, how can it happen? The Council of Trent declares that “by the consecration of the bread and wine there takes place a change of the whole substance of bread into the substance of the body of Christ our Lord and of the whole substance of wine into the substance of His blood. This change the holy Catholic Church has fittingly and properly named transubstantiation” (DS, 1642). In other words, although the bread and wine continue to appear and taste like bread and wine, they are substantially changed and are no longer bread and wine but the body and blood of Christ! And how can this happen? As St. Ambrose explained so well, “it is no less a feat to give things their original nature than to change their nature.” Jesus Christ is the creative Word of God. The universe was created through the Word of God. If the Word of God can give everything their original nature in creating them, he can certainly change their nature by his word as well!
The reality of the Body and Blood of Christ is also very important to our understanding of the Church, which, among other names, is called the “Body of Christ” (1 Cor 12:27). We who are baptized into the mystical Body of Christ and who receive the Body and Blood of Christ become the Body of Christ! When the faithful come up to receive Holy Communion, the priest, deacon, or extraordinary minister of Holy Communion declares: “The Body of Christ.” He/she does not say, “This is the Body of Christ,” as if to indicate that the consecrated host alone is the body of Christ. Rather, as he/she presents the consecrated host to the communicant, he/she declares “The Body of Christ,” recognizing that the Body of Christ resides in both the consecrated host being presented and those in the faithful community who receive it.
Whenever we receive Holy Communion, we do well to reflect on this sacred mystery, the “source and summit” of our faith and our worship. As we join with all parishes throughout our nation in the initiation of the parish phase of this three-year National Eucharistic Revival, let us strive to live this reality worthily, for we are, indeed, the Body of Christ! Let us renew the Church and the world by enkindling a living relationship with our Lord, Jesus Christ in the Holy Eucharist. He is truly present to us and longs for us to come to him as he leads us through the power of the Holy Spirit back to the Father!