A Catechism on the Blessed Sacrament

From my seminary days...

CATECHISM ON THE BLESSED SACRAMENT: THE HOLY EUCHARIST

By what names is this Sacrament called? What is it?

The Blessed Sacrament, the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ under the form of Bread and Wine, is also known as the Holy Eucharist, the Holy Communion, the Mass, the Holy Mysteries, the Divine Liturgy, the Holy Sacrifice, the Lord's Supper, the Lord's own Service... and all these titles refer to the same Act of worship in the Church and the same Sacrament: the Sacrament instituted by Our Lord on the night in which He was betrayed, when he took bread and consecrated it to be His Body, and wine and consecrated it to be His Blood. Our Lord instituted the Eucharist to be celebrated 'in remembrance of Him,' to make-present the effects of His Life-giving Incarnation, Life, Passion, Death, Resurrection and Ascension. The Eucharist is the Christian Passover, the Memorial or Making-Present of the Sacrifice of the Cross of Calvary— Our Lord's One Perfect Sacrifice for us. See 1 Corinthians 11.23ff. The Eucharist, which means 'thanksgiving,' is the most important Sacrament of all, the heart and centre of the Christian Life and the supreme, ultimate Act of Worship in the Catholic Church, because it is the Sacrifice of Jesus Christ Himself, the divine Service which He Himself instituted to be celebrated in remembrance of Him.

The Eucharist is different from all other Sacraments, in that all other Sacraments convey or communicate the grace or life of Christ to those who receive them— but in the Blessed Sacrament, we do not simply receive grace but Christ Himself. Jesus Christ is the Blessed Sacrament, for It is His Most Blessed Body and Blood, present really, truly, and objectively (that is, apart from our faith, in reality present), under the form and elements of Bread and Wine. The Eucharist is the Lord Jesus, Body, Blood, soul, and divinity, True God and True Man, the whole and entire Christ, present in a heavenly, supernatural, glorified manner, truly present in the Sacrament. Jesus Christ is present in the Eucharist in His glorified Body and Blood, the Resurrection-Body, which is beyond space and time, eternal, and given to us as heavenly food and drink, as spiritual nourishment for our souls and bodies, to unite us, as men, with Himself in His own incarnate human life.

This of course (again!) is a total Mystery, beyond our understanding. But, even though we cannot understand Our Lord's Presence in the Eucharist, it is nevertheless true because it is promised by Our Lord. Anglican Catholics, unlike other Catholics in other branches of the Church, do not attempt to describe or define these Holy Mysteries in terms of human reason or philosophy. With the ancient and undivided Church, Anglicans simply accept the truth of the Real Presence, that Our Lord's Body and Blood are present and given in the Eucharist, without trying to define or explain the 'manner' or 'way' of the Presence. We can never in this life understand how Our Lord transforms Bread and Wine into His Body and Blood in the Mass, but we must believe the truth that He does, and celebrate and receive this Sacrament faithfully.

Various theories have been suggested which may explain the mode of Christ's Real Presence in the Blessed Sacrament: Anglicans do not officially accept any of them, though they may be believed as pious opinion. The most controversial and best known theory is called transubstantiation, (which means 'change of substance') the official view of the Roman Church, which teaches that the substance (or inner reality) of the Bread and Wine is converted into Christ's Body and Blood while the outward 'accidents' or physical effects or appearances of bread and wine remain. No Anglicans must believe any particular theory of the manner of Christ's Presence, but all Anglicans are committed to the article of the Faith that the Body and Blood of Our Lord are present in the Eucharist under the veil of the elements.

Anglican Catholics do believe that the elements of bread and wine, by means of consecration, are 'changed' in some way— they become Something that they were not before the Prayer of Consecration. It is not a material change. What were Bread and Wine, are, by Christ's Words and the power of the Holy Ghost, now Christ's glorified Flesh and Blood, the same Body and Blood incarnate and born of the Virgin May, crucified on Calvary, and risen from the dead, the whole and complete Christ made-present - Christ being the One Sacrifice and now given to us to unite us to Himself, literally. The best example of Anglican teaching concerning this truth is the beautiful Prayer of Humble Access (BCP p.82), which unambiguously and clearly teaches the Real Presence of Christ's Body and Blood in the Eucharist, and that the Real Presence is given so that we may have 'organic,' physical and spiritual union with Jesus Christ. In short, the Blessed Sacrament, the Eucharist, is Christ, making-present His One Sacrifice in His Church and uniting His People, His Body, with Himself, by joining them to His One Sacrifice and feeding them with Himself, the Bread of Heaven, the Bread of Life. Christ, the Head of the Body, makes Himself one with His Body the Church, pleading the whole Body, Head and members together, to the Father in His Sacrifice. The Holy Mysteries are both a Sacrament and a Sacrifice, the Holy Sacrament and Sacrifice of the Altar.

Why is the Holy Eucharist the Sacrament of the Altar?

Because it has an outward sign, a Thing signified and a benefit or virtue. The outward and visible Sign of the Sacrament is Bread and Wine, taken and consecrated according to Christ's command by His Bishop or Priest in Apostolic Succession, using His own Words and the Invocation of the Holy Spirit, in the Prayer of Consecration (BCP p. 80). The Thing signified is the Body and Blood of Christ, given, taken, and eaten, after an heavenly, mystical, mysterious, supernatural manner. The benefit? The Blessed Sacrament is given to us to refresh and strengthen our bodies and souls, to renew and make complete our union with Jesus Christ, that 'He may dwell in us and we in Him,' as we become One Body and One Blood with the Lord. Our Lord, present in the Sacrament, feeds us with His own Incarnate Life, truly joining His Person (God-made-Man) to our persons, uniting His Manhood to our manhood, making us, by our common humanity, to share in the Divine Life of God the Son, to be 'partakers of the Divine Nature.' The Eucharist, as Sacrament, conveys to us the Incarnation itself, making us share in the God Who became Man by receiving His life-giving Flesh and Blood.

The Blessed Sacrament makes us one with Christ and His Sacrifice; it is the 'continuation’ or 'extension' of the Incarnation, applying to us as men the effects and benefits of Christ the God-Man and His Sacrifice on the Cross. The Incarnation and the Eucharist are one, being the One Lord Christ; the Incarnation is given to us in the Eucharist, that Christ may make all His members One Body and One Blood, One Life, in Him. We receive all the benefits of Calvary in the Mass, as we are actually made to be present with and in His one true Offering on the Cross, pleaded for eternity in Heaven; in the Eucharist, Jesus Christ truly re­-presents Himself, Crucified and Risen, the One Sacrifice, to the Father, as He does forever in Heaven. The Eucharist is the earthly pleading, time and time again, of the Eternal Sacrifice of Christ (Hebrews 9, 10).

The Eucharist is the means by which Jesus Christ makes us one with Him, in our bodies and souls— it is real communion with Christ by receiving His Real Body and Blood, the Real Presence. 'Is not the Bread which we break a PARTICIPATION in the Body of Christ?... is not the Cup which we bless a PARTICIPATION in the Blood of Christ?' (1 Corinthians 10). We literally participate or partake in Christ through feeding on His Body and Blood under the forms of the Eucharistic elements. The Blessed Sacrament is not a symbol or figure, but a Sacrament, a concealed Reality causing us, by our reception of the Holy Gifts, to live in Christ.

Why is the Holy Eucharist the Sacrifice of the Altar?

The Eucharist is a Sacrifice because, as noted above, it is the Commemoration, the Memorial, or the making-present, of the One Perfect and Eternal Sacrifice which Our Lord offered once-for-all on the Cross and pleads for eternity in Heaven before God the Father. Christ's Passion, Death, and Resurrection are together a once-for-all, complete, all-sufficient Act, the perfect offering of the perfect Sacrifice of God-made-man in perfect obedience to the will of the Father. Our Lord instituted the Eucharist to be the means by which we can receive and share in this one complete and finished Sacrifice. In the Christian Church, there is truly only One Priest and One Victim who was offered— Jesus Christ, Who is our great high Priest. Our Lord is the One Priest of the New Testament, having an eternal and unchanging Priesthood, that is, the Priesthood of our One Sacrifice, God incarnate, who in Himself re-united God and man, offering His Incarnate Life in order destroy death and restore mankind to the divine communion.

Our Lord instituted the Eucharist on the night before He was betrayed, and handed it to the Apostles who would offer it according to the authority given to them (they were consecrated by Christ to be participants or sharers in the One Priesthood of Christ through the Sacrament of Orders) in order to make it possible for the Church, redeemed by Him, to have access to the One Sacrifice of the Cross. The Eucharist is not a symbolic or figurative offering, nor a simple meal remembering in the sense of the past a dead Christ of long ago: the Mass is literally a 'making-present', an ANAMNESIS, of Christ's One Offering. The word used by Our Lord for remembrance, in Greek ANAMNESIS, actually means, 'to make present before God and man,' to 'bring back from the past to the present.' Our Lord, when He instituted the Mass, actually said, 'Do this to make Me present again.' And exactly this happens when the Priest, ordained in the succession of the Apostles who were given the power to offer this Mystery, consecrates the Bread and Wine during the Canon, the official prayer of consecration, of the Mass.

In the Eucharist, Our Lord comes to us and, under the form of Bread and Wine, re-presents, makes present, pleads, manifests before God and man alike, His Passion and Death upon the Cross and His Resurrection from the Dead - which are eternal in their effects — in such a way that we are actually united to Christ, in our prayers and intentions, in ourselves, as He, with us, carries His Offering into Heaven before the Father.

Saint Paul teaches us that the Eucharist 'shows forth' the Death of Christ, truly exhibiting for us and for our salvation the Cross of Calvary, enabling us to experience and share in that Cross. The Eucharist and the Cross are one and the same Sacrifice. In the Holy Communion, Christ offers Himself as our Great High Priest, our heavenly and eternal Priest and Victim, making-present on earth the One Sacrifice He eternally pleads for us before the Father in Heaven. This Sacrifice makes it possible for us to be perfectly joined to the Cross of Calvary and the Third-Day Resurrection, and to claim the Sacrifice of Christ for our very own, receiving as we do all the fruit, the benefits of what Jesus did for us in dying for us and rising from the dead: forgiveness of sins, union with the Lord, and life eternal.

Jesus is not 're-crucified' or 'sacrificed again' in the Mass— the one, complete, unique offering of Our Lord on Calvary is mystically, mysteriously made present, without any repetition or renewal. The Eucharist is, for all these reasons, the greatest of all Mysteries, the 'Holy Mysteries.' Thus, the Eucharist is the supreme Act of Worship in the Church, the Lord's own Service, by which we avail ourselves of Christ our Sacrifice. The Mass is the heart of all worship, the most important Christian liturgy, and the Act around which all Church teaching and practice is focused— for in it Christ Himself is the One who offers worship and is offered as our perfect offering of worship. 'All things come of thee, O Lord, and of thine own have we given thee.' The Eucharist is a propitiatory Sacrifice (meaning the Sacrifice which takes away sins) and is offered for the living and the dead in Christ; it benefits those for whom it is offered, and therefore we can offer the Mass for special intentions or purposes, and for people both alive on earth or departed in Christ. This is because it is nothing other than Christ, the eternal Offerer and Offering, present and active for His People, through the Holy Spirit.

What is required of those who come to the Holy Communion?

'To examine themselves, whether they repent them truly of their former sins, steadfastly purposing to lead a new life; have a lively faith in God's mercy through Christ, with a thankful remembrance of his death; and be in charity with all men.' We must approach Christ's Body and Blood only with sincere Faith, Hope, Love, and repentance, confessing our sins, amending our lives from sin, and seeking love, peace, unity with all men. To approach the Blessed Sacrament knowingly and deliberately in a state of sin is a grievous blasphemy, an affront to God; only in a real state of repentance and after serious self-examination of our lives should we approach Our Lord in Holy Communion.'Whosoever shall eat this bread and drink this cup unworthily, shall be guilty of the Body and Blood of the Lord' (1 Cor. 11.27). If one is conscious of having a committed a serious sin against God, one should seek a Priest, receive the Sacrament of Penance (Confession), and be assured of the promise of forgiveness through Absolution. This Sacrament of Penance or Confession, which we will discuss later, assures us that we are in a state of grace, and that we can therefore receive the Holy Communion properly and reverently, as Our Lord will us to do.

We must always approach Our Lord's Body and Blood, 'in love and charity with our neighbours, and intending to lead a new life, following the commandments of God, and walking from henceforth in His holy ways.' All communicants, those who receive the Eucharist, must absolutely be baptised. In the Holy Catholic Church, only those who have received the Sacrament of Confirmation, and are thus full members of the Church, should receive Holy Communion. 'None shall be admitted to the Holy Communion, until such time as he be Confirmed, or be ready and desirous to be Confirmed' (BCP p.299).

When do the Bread and Wine become the Body and Blood of Christ in the Mass? In what way is Christ present in the Eucharist?

Important points: In the Prayer of Consecration, the Canon of the Mass (BCP p.80), Anglicans affirm, with the ancient and undivided Church, that the Bread and Wine are consecrated by the Priest, who represents Christ at the Altar as His 'living icon', through the recitation of the entire Consecration Prayer: there is really no such event as a 'moment or spot of consecration.' In other words, at the beginning of the Canon, the elements are simply Bread and Wine; at the end of the Canon, the elements have been transformed in the Body and Blood of Christ. At a minimum, the Words of Christ, the Oblation (offering of the gifts to God), and the Invocation of the Holy Ghost are absolutely necessary, according to the rubric of the Prayer Book. Only a male Priest or Bishop of the Church Catholic in Apostolic Succession, ordained in the line of the Apostles who were given the authority to celebrate the Eucharist, can validly or truly offer the Holy Eucharist, causing it to convey the Gift promised. Our Lord is present fully and entirely under both forms of Bread and Wine: we receive Our Lord whole and entire and total under each separate sacred kind. Therefore, one can receive the Eucharist in the form of Bread only or Wine only and receive the whole Christ. This doctrine is called concomitance, 'with-one-ness.' Wherever Jesus Christ, who is God, is present, he must be worshipped as God. Because He is truly present in the Eucharist, we, as faithful Christians, should adore, offer divine worship to, the Blessed Sacrament.