Holy Thursday
Happy Holy Thursday to all of you! Holy Thursday begins the Easter Triduum.
Holy Thursday is significant for two reasons. First, Christ instituted the Eucharist which is also connected to the birth of the priesthood (at lunch time, we had our annual celebration in thanksgiving of our priests of the Archdiocese).
Secondly, Christ visibly expresses what love means for his disciples. He shows them visibly by kneeling down and washing the feet of his disciples. He then gave them a commandment to love. "You call me teacher, you call me, Master. But it is I who washed your feet. Now you must do the same for one another." There will be a reenactment of the washing of the feet today, to recall Christ command to love. It was once said that The washing of the feet is very awkward to the person who have their feet washed, it is awkward to the person who is washing the feet, and also awkward for the spectators who are seeing this event. But the action within the liturgy will speak for itself. One thing is if you find it difficult to get along with someone, imagine Christ washing their feet, and you yourself kneeling down and washing their feet, imitating Christ. That is the Gospel!
When we hear the words "Institution of the Eucharist", what does it mean and how is it expressed?
In the Catechism paragraph 1341, it says that Christ doesn't just ask us to remember him and remember what he did. But The Lord gives a command: "do this in memory of me." In other words, Christ wants the Apostles and followers to repeat his actions and words.
So, It is not enough just to say I love Christ and I know him and I'm familiar with the things that he did. It's not enough just to say I read the Bible, or I saw the movie Passion of the Christ, or the newly released Son of God, so I'm good.
Because we have to take it one step further as the Catechism says: to repeat his words and actions. And that is why Eucharistic celebration is significant. The Early Church kept faithful to the command to repeat his words and actions.
For example, In Acts 2:42, "they devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching, fellowship, breaking of bread and prayers. Day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they partook of food with glad and generous hearts." Throughout the generations, they remained faithful to his command to celebrate the Eucharist: "do this in memory of me."
In regards to the The Eucharist, we have to look closer to the two species, bread and wine, and what they mean. Certainly, after consecration, the bread and wine become his body and blood. But the Church recalls John 6, when Jesus says: "unless you eat my body and drink my blood , you will have no eternal life."
Many people who were following him said: this is a hard teaching. And as a result many people left him. Can you imagine 5000 people walking out on you, and that's what happened to Jesus. And Jesus turns to his apostles and says: are you leaving me too? But St Peter says: to whom shall we go because you have the words of everlasting life.
The Catechism expresses in this manner: the Eucharist as well as the Cross are stumbling blocks. It is the same mystery and it never ceases to be an occasion of division, for the Early Followers and for us today. It will causes division because the mystery is difficult to fully grasp and understand. What requires is fidelity.
We are called to reflect upon the words from St Peter, "to whom shall we go because you have the words of eternal life." To receive the Eucharist is to receive The Lord himself.
Bread and wine, the two species used in the Eucharist are good elements to reflect upon. To make bread means to knead and beat the dough. A way to see how Christ was treated as he carried his cross to Golgotha. And wine can be described as the blood of the grapes, signifying recalling Christ's blood, poured forth from the cross.
There was a French Jesuit priest and theologian in the early 20th century named Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, who was known for his work in paleontology. His visionary writings on the reconciliation of faith and evolutionary theory aroused the suspicions of the Vatican and he was forbidden to publish on religious matters during his lifetime.
After his death - on April 10, 1955, which happened to be Easter Sunday that year - the publication of his many books marked him as one of the most influential Catholic thinkers of this century - a mystic whose holistic vision speaks with growing relevance to contemporary spirituality.
Once, in China, without bread and wine for Mass, he expressed his deep love for the Eucharist in a Mass on the World. It begins thus:
Since once again, Lord — though this time not in the forests of the Aisne but in the steppes of Asia — I have neither bread, nor wine, nor altar, I will raise myself beyond these symbols, up to the pure majesty of the real itself; I, your priest, will make the whole earth my altar and on it will offer you all the labors and sufferings of the world.
This is beautifully expressed because bread represents our labor, the things that come together in life, that which builds up. Bread represents our successes, our victories, our triumphs, our conquest.
And at the same time, wine represents our sufferings, things that fall apart, when life is bitter and sour. Wine represents our failures, our losses, our grief, our pain and sufferings. The wine must also be offered to God.
It is not enough just to remember what Jesus' words and actions, but to repeat his words and actions.
It is not enough just to view the Eucharist as a reward for good behavior. Because it empowers the receiver of Christ's body and blood to observe the commandment of love, to wash other's feet, to love one another as Christ loves us.
It is not enough just to partake in the Eucharist without also offering our labors and sufferings to be united to Christ, the things that come together , but also when things began to fall apart. To offer our bread and wine, united to The Lord.
Jesus says: love one another as I have love you. And Jesus says: "Do this in memory of me."
No comments:
Post a Comment