ollowing is the presentation by Archbishop Gabriel Malzaire of Castries, St Lucia
The single most important object of faith which Jesus left His Church was Himself, in the form of the communal sharing of His Body and Blood, which we call the Eucharist—the Holy Mass.
We emerge from the Paschal celebration of the Sacred Triduum of Holy Week, which is the commemoration of that single redemptive moment in the life of Jesus celebrated over three days: Holy Thursday, Good Friday, and Easter.
On Holy Thursday, we commemorate the day when Jesus instituted the Eucharist at the Upper Room, according to the method recorded in the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke, and repeated in 11th Chapter of the First Letter of St Paul to the Corinthians.
To get a clear understanding of what I describe as the Magna Carta of the Eucharistic teaching of Jesus, we turn to the 6th chapter of the Gospel of John, which the Church universal has been reflecting on the past week in its liturgy. Here Jesus uses very strong language to communicate the centrality of the Eucharist as spiritual food for the life of the Church—the life of the world.
It is important to consider the context in which this Eucharistic discourse was delivered by our Blessed Lord. It was after the miracle of the loaves, when the crowds sought after Him for food to satisfy their physical hunger. Jesus was prompt to admonish them saying:
“You are not looking for me because you have seen the signs, but because you had all the bread you wanted to eat. Do not work for food that cannot last but work for food that endures to eternal life – the kind of food that the Son of Man is offering you, for on Him the Father, God Himself, has set His seal” (Jn 6:26-27).
Jesus then went on to identify Himself fully with the Eucharistic species saying:
“I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never be hungry; he who believes in me will never thirst” (Jn 6:35).
He continues in John 6:48-51 confirming the life-giving properties of the Eucharist: “I am the bread of life. Your fathers ate the manna in the desert, and they are dead; but this is the bread that comes down from heaven, so that a man may eat it and not die. I am the living bread which has come down from heaven. Anyone who eats this bread will live forever; and the bread that I shall give is my flesh, for the life of the world.”
Then in 6:53-54, He warned His disciples:
“I tell you solemnly, if you do not eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you will not have life in you. Anyone who does eat my flesh and drink my blood has eternal life, and I shall raise him up on the last day.”
And in Chapter 6:55-57, He passionately explains:
“For my flesh is real food and my blood is real drink. He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood lies in me and I live in him. As I, who am sent by the living Father, myself draw life from the Father, so whoever eats me will draw life from me.”
Then Jesus concludes in John 6:58: “This is the bread come down from heaven; not like the bread our ancestors ate: they are dead, but anyone who eats this bread will live forever.”
After all these, it is no surprise that the Church which Christ founded regards the Eucharist as the source and summit of all Christian life. But what does that mean to us Christians practically?
No doubt, the forgoing discourse in John’s Gospel can be viewed as beautiful words that lend themselves to the comfort and safety of the believing Catholic, confirming that we have it all figured out.
However, our Holy Thursday liturgy chooses John’s version of that Upper Room’s Eucharistic experience, seven chapters down from the discourse of Chapter six. There Jesus presents the depth of Eucharistic spirituality in demonstrative terms. John tells us: “They were at supper, and the devil had already put it into the mind of Judas Iscariot, son of Simon, to betray Him. Jesus knew that the Father had put everything into His hands, and that He had come from God and was returning to God, and He got up from the table, removed His outer garment and, taking a towel, wrapped it round His waist; He then poured water into a basin and began to wash His disciples’ feet and wipe them with the towel He was wearing … When He had washed their feet and put on His garment again, He went back to the table. ‘Do you understand,’ He said, ‘what I have done to you? You call me Master and Lord, and rightly; so, I am. If I, then, the Lord and Master, have washed your feet, you must wash each other’s feet” (Jn 13:2-5, 12-14).
This passage is incredibly important for our understanding of the Eucharist and its practical implications for Christian life today. Therein lies, to my mind, one of the greatest challenges for us Catholics, as it pertains to the Eucharist.
That is, to view it as an object of pious devotion rather than the impetus for genuine Christian living. This contributes to the reasons why the Eucharist is so often misunderstood.
The Christian today, I believe, is challenged to hold in tension the significance of what is celebrated at the altar and how that reality is lived in everyday life. Our reverence towards the Eucharist, which demonstrates the quality of our relationship with the real presence, will always be important.
However, Jesus, according to John’s Gospel, tells us that this reverence must translate into practical life; it must engender reverence towards the neighbour. He tells us that unless the Eucharist becomes a part of our daily life, it holds little significance.
It is not without reason that the late Holy Father, Francis, saw it necessary to redirect the Church, and we trust Pope Leo will, on its original Eucharistic path with the theme: For A Synodal Church: Communion, Participation & Mission, all components that depict action stemming from a deep Eucharistic encounter.
Think of it for a moment, brothers and sisters, under normal circumstances, our Eucharistic liturgy is often presented in very elegant terms and celebrated in golden vessels and beautifully rehearsed gestures. These too, have their value. However, on Holy Thursday, Jesus is quoted as presenting this very same nice and clean mystical reality as a foot-washing sacrament. He clearly states in John 13:15: “I have given you an example so that you may copy what I have done to you,” thus making the Eucharist an object of emulation—emulation of a person; His modus operandi, His modus vivendi—His way of acting and His way of living. This, my dear friends, is where Eucharist—the Holy Mass should lead us; that is, to be another Christ in the world.
It tells us that our Christian life is not limited to the avoidance of sin in order to render us worthy of the Eucharist. While these are very important and necessary spiritual achievements in themselves, a genuine Christian life ultimately comes down to the extent to which we genuinely and practically loved each other.
Here, in John’s Gospel, Jesus presents the Eucharist as a sacrament of engagement—a sacrament that compels us to act. Love is not simply an adherence to the Old Law of “Thou shall not.”
Love is about engagement. In his book entitled, The Road Less Travelled, the author, Scott Peck, affirms that “Love is what love does.” Obviously, this contrasts with love as mere feeling, which is likely to quickly fade away.
When we engage, we do something to change the landscape around us: our families, workplaces, the Church, our country, and the like. Jesus Himself, in His encounter with Nicodemus in John 3, alludes to this philosophy when He said: “The wind blows wherever it pleases; you hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. That is how it is with all who are born of the Spirit” (Jn 3:8). This indicates that the Spirit is seen by what the Spirit does; what it engenders in the human person.
Therefore, a false piety towards the Eucharist makes very little movement in the lives of others. While we pray that our Churches will be filled again, true Eucharistic spirituality is not simply about attending church, sitting comfortably, and feeling good about fulfilling our religious obligation. Instead, it begs the question: after being Churched through our beautiful liturgies, what next? How does my religious practice help me to understand the people in my community? How do they help me understand my responsibilities as a father, a mother, and a professional?
How does my being a regular communicant help me to be uncomfortable with injustice of any form being done to my fellow human beings: to migrants, the voiceless, widows, and orphans, and the like? St James, in his Epistle, says it beautifully: “Pure, unspoilt religion in the eyes of God our Father is this: coming to the aid of the orphans and widows when they need it and keeping ourselves uncontaminated by the world” (Js 1:27).
As early as the 4th century, St John Chrysostom, the then Bishop of Constantinople, demonstrated a profound understanding of the direct relationship between the presence of Christ in the Eucharistic species at the altar and in the poor and suffering in the world. He admonished his worshipping community, saying: “You have tasted the blood of the Lord but have not recognised your brother. You dishonour this table by refusing to share your food with him who was considered worthy of sitting at it.”
In another instance, he emphasised the importance of giving to the poor, stating:
“Because he is a poor man, give him to eat; because it is Christ who is nourished, give him to eat” … “Give to the Lord in His hunger, clothe Him in His nakedness, and receive Him in the stranger.”
Strengthening his position on the reverence due to the poor, in whom Christ is present, he stated: “When you see a poor believer, think that you behold an altar. When you see such a one, a beggar, not only insult him not, but even reverence him. And if you see another insulting him, prevent, repel it. For so shall you yourself be able to have God’s favour and obtain the promised good things. Let us make a chest for the poor at home, near the place at which you stand praying, there let it be put. And as often as you enter prayer, first deposit your alms, and then send up your prayer.”
St John Chrysostom didn’t stop there: He continued by saying:
“As you would not wish to pray with unwashed hands, so neither do so without alms. Since not even the Gospel hanging by our bed is more important than the alms. If you hang up the Gospel and do nothing, it will do you no great good. But if you have the little coffer, you have a defence against the devil, you give wings to your prayer, and you make your house holy, having meat for the King, laid up in store” (JC, Homily on 1 Cor 43, 4. pg 61).
St Augustine, too, shared insights into the inseparability of Christ’s presence in the Mystical Body, of which the poor and weak are a part, and the Eucharistic sacrifice at the altar. He stated thus: “If you are therefore the Body of Christ and of His members, then your very mystery lies in the Eucharistic means. Be what you see and receive what you are.”
My dear friends, this is tough stuff. It presents a totally different perspective of the Holy Eucharist which is usually celebrated in neat and clean settings. Here, we are being challenged to bring a certain level of correspondence between what happens within the walls of our beautiful Churches to what is happening on the ground in the streets of ordinary life. This is no small feat.
Even now, I know you may be examining yourself and asking, what have I done all these years in relation to the Eucharist vis-a-vis my home, my neighbour, my community, my work, my Church? How have I improved life because I am a Catholic Christian, believing fully in the real presence of Christ in the Blessed Eucharist?
Don’t be too afraid, a great deal has been happening through the years with organisations such as the St Vincent de Paul Society, the soup kitchens around the cities, the homes for the aged, the home for street children, the rehabilitation centres, hospitals and hospices, our schools, the many other social institutions ran by the Catholic Church and the ordinary activities of our lives.
My challenge, however, is for us to expand on them. By this I do not simply mean building newer and bigger institutions. I mean rather, taking personal responsibility for the Eucharistic mission of the Church, so that as much as we can, through the means granted us by God, we will see to it that nobody is deprived; that everyone has a place around the Lord’s table in some form.
This reminds me of Jesus and His disciples in the feeding of the five thousand with the five loaves and two fish. When the disciples were perturbed that it was a lonely place and there was not enough food to feed the entire crowd, Jesus said to them in Matt 14:16: “Give them something to eat yourself.”
In the varied circumstances of your life, think of the changes you can make if you decide, within your means, to “give something of yourself.” It was the great Mahatma Gandhi who said: “There is enough food in the world to satisfy human need but not enough to satisfy human greed.”
You will agree with me that there is much too much greed in our world today, hence its imbalance, to which we all contribute.
I conclude my reflection with a quote from a modern saint, Mother Teresa of Calcutta, in which she expressed understanding of the Eucharistic mission of the Church.
This is what she said: “The greatest disease in the West today is not TB or leprosy, but being unwanted, unloved, and uncared for. We can cure physical diseases with medicine, but the only cure for loneliness, despair, and hopelessness is love. There are many people in the world who are dying for a piece of bread, but there are many more dying for a little love. The poverty in the West is a different kind of poverty—it is not only a poverty of loneliness but also of spirituality. There is a hunger for love, as there is a hunger for God” (MT, A Simple Path).
My dear friends, the Eucharist which we are about to celebrate in such a big way today is essentially the Sacrament of love—practical love. Let us, therefore, dispose ourselves to spread it. Amen!
