June 11, 2010
The Christian Journey
Feast emphasizes Christ’s presence
BY FATHER JIM SAUER
Last Sunday’s Feast of the Most Holy Body and Blood of the Lord began in the early 1200s by Juliana of Liege, Belgium, who encouraged a feast to honor Christ’s Eucharistic presence. There was a definite need to include a feast to emphasize Christ’s real presence in the Eucharist at that point in the Church.
The reason comes from a long-standing Church principle — “when a truth of faith is under attack, then a doctrine of the faith is proclaimed.” Great controversies were attacking the Church’s belief in Christ’s real presence in the Eucharist in the 10th century, reaching a climax in the Protestant Reformation in the 1500s. Questions abounded regarding the exact moment when Christ’s presence occurred. The people’s rare reception of Communion at this time gave rise to the church law that the faithful must go to confession (if they were guilty of mortal sin) and receive Communion at least annually before Trinity Sunday. We can easily understand how the people’s desire to see the consecrated host in adoration of Christ in the Eucharist became overwhelming.
Additional devotions developed — such as visits to and processions with the Blessed Sacrament, Eucharistic Exposition and Benediction. We might say that these practices nurtured the people’s Eucharistic spirituality. Unfortunately, they slowly became disconnected with a Mass recited to Latin, a language unknown to much of the uneducated populace. These Eucharistic customs, however, met the needs of God’s people in a particular social, cultural, and religious era.
The Eucharistic customs of those days, however, weakened the unity between the intimate connection between the Eucharistic Body of Christ and the Church as Christ’s Body. The Mass did little to support the assembly expressing itself as the body of Christ. The people passively “watched the Mass unfold before them” with minimal participation. On rare occasions, parishioners did receive communion expressing their good standing in the church.
The Eucharist as the Body of Christ and the Church as the body of Christ were both controversial issues in the 16th century. The Council of Trent reaffirmed Christ’s Eucharistic real presence. Four hundred years later, Vatican II restored the Church identity as the Body of Christ. Sharing the Lord’s Eucharistic Body and Blood deepens our communion with him and with one another.
Vatican II’s Liturgy Document states “The faithful offer the Eucharistic sacrifice with the priest” with the “full, active participation by all the people as the goal of every liturgy” (par. 14). Christ is present in the person of the minister and especially in the Eucharistic species. The Church teaches that Christ is also present in all the sacraments, in his Word, and in the entire gathering Church” (par. 7).
Vatican II has been faithful to these ideas. Receiving the Lord’s body and blood is the normal completion of the Eucharistic Celebration. The Communion Rite’s symbolic actions have a communal meaning. The sign of peace is a plea for unity for the church and the human family, and a sign of mutual love. The breaking of bread “expresses that we, who are many, are one body, by sharing in the one bread of Christ.” Receiving the Lord’s Body from hosts consecrated at the same Mass and sharing in the chalice reveals our participation in the sacrifice offered HERE AND NOW. The communion song shows our communion as we process to receive Christ’s Body.
When St. Augustine (d. 430) held the Sacred Body and Blood before the assembly prior to communion, he would proclaim the great mystery before them in these words “Believe what you see; receive what you believe; become what you receive. Happy are those called to his banquet.”