[Not an easy text! It illustrates the ceremonial role of bread and wine at the most remote origins of our tradition. Here, bread and wine celebrate a victory and climax a feast. They bring together persons with very different understandings of God, and they are the focus of blessing]
Melchizedek king of Salem brought bread and wine; he was a priest of God
Most High. He pronounced this blessing:
Blessed be Abraham by God Most High, creator of heaven and earth,
and blessed be God Most High for handing over your enemies to you.
And Abraham gave him a tithe of everything.
[Paul reminds his Corinthians of the true nature of what happens when they celebrate the Eucharistic meal. This is my body – given for you / my blood – poured out for you. He gave his life for us and in the eucharist, we enter into a giving of ourselves.]
This is what I received from the Lord, and in turn passed on to you: that on the same night that he was betrayed, the Lord Jesus took some bread, and thanked God for it and broke it, and he said, 'This is my body, which is for you; do this as a memorial of me.' In the same way he took the cup after supper, and said, 'This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Whenever you drink it, do this as a memorial of me.' Until the Lord comes, therefore, every time you eat this bread and drink this cup, you are proclaiming his death.
[All of the gospels narrate at least one miraculous feed of the crowd – Mark has it twice. They may not strike us Eucharistic stories as they do not resemble what we do at mass today – vast crowds informally gathered to hear Jesus teach. Multiplication of bread and fish (no mention of wine) and leftovers more abundant than the food available at the beginning. On the other hand the stories follow the shape of the mass: we gather, we are taught, we eat, we are dismissed. Jesus blesses, breaks and gives]
Jesus made the crowds welcome and talked to them about the kingdom of
God; and he cured those who were in need of healing.
It was late afternoon when the Twelve came to him and said, 'Send the
people away, and they can go to the villages and farms round about to
find lodging and food; for we are in a lonely place here.' He replied,
'Give them something to eat yourselves.' But they said, 'We have no more
than five loaves and two fish, unless we are to go ourselves and buy
food for all these people.' For there were about five thousand men. But
he said to his disciples, 'Get them to sit down in parties of about
fifty.' They did so and made them all sit down. Then he took the five
loaves and the two fish, raised his eyes to heaven, and said the
blessing over them; then he broke them and handed them to his disciples
to distribute among the crowd. They all ate as much as they wanted, and
when the scraps remaining were collected they filled twelve baskets.
A
1. What word or phrase stands out for you? Why?
2. With whom in the readings do you most identify? Why
3. Do you feel attracted to anything in today’s readings? Do you feel
resistant to anything? Do you know why?
4. In what way do these readings affirm you?
5. In what way do these readings challenge you?
6. What can you do to respond to this challenge?
B
1. Why do people celebrate important occasions with meals? How is a meal
more than just nutrition?
2. What is our Eucharistic responsibility? What does partaking of the
eucharist commit us to do? (2nd reading reminds us)
3. Jesus tells the apostles: "Give them something to eat yourselves."
Do you think that statement might have implications for us?
4. Meals in the New testament have Eucharistic overtones. What meals/
talk of banquets do you remember from the gospel?
5. Christ related to all kinds of people. Who are the people who do not
feel welcome in our Church? How might we welcome them?
“Today, when people speak of the Real Presence they normally mean the sacramental presence of Christ in the Eucharist under the form of bread and wine. And when they speak of the Mystical Body they normally mean the Church. For more than half of the Church’s history – that is until the twelfth – the very opposite was true. The ‘real’’ body of Christ was the Church. And the ‘mystical’ body of Christ was the sacramental bread and wine. We can see this image in operation in the passage from St John Chrysostom which John Paul quotes in his encyclical on the Eucharist:
‘Would you honour the body of Christ? Do not despise his nakedness; do not honour him here in church clothed in silk vestments and then pass him by unclothed and frozen outside. Remember that he who said, ‘This is my body’, and made good his words, also said, ‘You saw me hungry and gave me no food’, and, ‘in so far as you did it not to one of these, you did it not to me’… What is the use of loading Christ’s table with gold cups while he himself is starving? Feed the hungry and then if you have any money left over, spend it on the altar table.’ (Ecclesia de Eucharistia 20, footnote 34)
Some unhealthy consequences flowed from this change of language in
the twelfth century. As Sarah Beckwith puts it: ‘The emphasis was
increasingly on watching Christ’s body, rather than being incorporated
into it’ People ‘attended’ Mass, rather than ‘participated’ in it. It
was something to be ‘present at’, rather than an ‘action to be shared’….
The Mass is not ‘my’ Mass (i.e. not the priest’s) but ‘our’ mass. We
celebrate together , each participating in our own different ways. The
Mass is not a place for spectators or observers.
Whenever I deal with First Communion children, one key point I like to
make is the richness of their response ‘Amen’ when the priests holds up
the host and says: ‘The Body of Christ’. The child’s ‘Amen’ (‘Yes, I
believe’) is not just, ‘Yes, I am truly receiving Christ in this host.’
It is also saying, ‘Yes, I am the body of Christ.’
And it is saying, ‘Yes, all people, especially those in need, are
the body of Christ.’
In a sense, in this act of committed faith, the child is ‘re-membering’
the body of Christ, that is, drawing together into unity the members of
Christ’s body.
Obviously, this rings bells – whole peals of them – with John Paul’s
words about the ‘spirituality of communion’….. (pp465/466 of article)
….”My second question is:
Does the Church need to revisit its restrictive law and practice with
regard to inter-communion and Eucharistic sharing?
Our current practice of excluding from the Eucharist (with some
apparently grudging exceptions) seems to many to fly in the face of our
deepest instincts.
To invite someone to share our table and encourage him or her to share
fully in the companionship and table-talk and then deny the person any
share in the meal itself would seem to be an extraordinary thing to do.
All the more so when we are not actually the host at the table. And
especially so when the host is notorious for welcoming everyone at his
table, and has actually caused scandal by the kind of company he keeps.
If the Church claims to be the sacrament of the unity of the human
family, perhaps the Eucharist should not be a meal at which the presence
of outsiders is tolerated within certain strict limits, but rather a
meal at which their presence is treasured and accepted as a gift.
Communion will then be more truly Communion. (pp 469/470)
• Pray for the grace to realize that by receiving the body and blood of
Christ we become members of Christ and of each other.
• Pray about how the Eucharist may become a greater sign of unity in your parish
and daily life.
• Reflect on times when you experienced that God was with you. When did you
realize that God was for you?