Association of Hebrew Catholics Lecture Series The Mystery of Israel and the Church

Fall 2009 – Series 5 Themes from the Early Church Fathers

Talk #10 The Liturgy and the in the Early Church

© Dr. Lawrence Feingold STD Associate Professor of and Philosophy Kenrick-Glennon Seminary, Archdiocese of St. Louis, Missouri

Note: This document contains the unedited text of Dr. Feingold’s talk. It will eventually undergo final editing for inclusion in the series of books being published by The Miriam Press under the series title: “The Mystery of Israel and the Church”. If you find errors of any type, please send your observations [email protected] This document may be copied and given to others. It may not be modified, sold, or placed on any web site. The actual recording of this talk, as well as the talks from all series, may be found on the AHC website at: http://www.hebrewcatholic.net/studies/mystery-of-israel-church/

Association of Hebrew Catholics • 4120 W Pine Blvd • Louis MO 63108 www.hebrewcatholic.net • [email protected] The Liturgy and the Eucharist in the Early Church

What Christian wouldn’t wonder what the liturgy of the commemorate the great event of the Resurrection of Christ Church was like in the early centuries of Christianity, and from the dead, by which death was defeated and the pledge what were the views of the early Fathers on the Eucharist of our heavenly inheritance given. in particular, which is the source and summit of the life The Acts of the Apostles already give witness to the of the Church. Here as in so many other areas, the early importance of the Eucharist and its solemn celebration on Fathers show us a picture of the Church’s liturgy and the “first day of the week” (see Acts 20:7). Eucharistic faith that is essentially one with the faith and practice of the in the Middle Ages and The Didache modern times, although there is an organic development One of the earliest witnesses of the liturgical life of the like the growth of a tree. Church is found in a work known as the Didache. It is a The earliest liturgy of the Church was obviously deeply catechetical work dating from the late first to the mid- impregnated with the spirit of the liturgy of Israel, making second century (c. 70-110 AD3). It clearly shows the signs use of the psalms, the readings from the Old Testament, of originating in a context of Jewish Christianity, with a and the chant of the synagogue. large number of allusions to the Gospel of Matthew, al- There is an interesting book called The Sacred Bridge,1 though other books of the New Testament are also cited. which shows the elements of continuity between Jewish The work begins with a moral catechism in the form of and Christian liturgy, and between ancient Jewish chant the “two ways”: the way of light and the way of darkness. and what later came to be known as Gregorian chant. It It is interesting to note that this catechism condemns abor- shouldn’t surprise us that the origins of Gregorian chant tion and probably alludes to contraception (under the term lie in the ancient synagogue. Furthermore, the Divine Of- “magic” and/or “drugs”)4 as grave sins, common in the fice of the Church has its origin in the daily prayers of the pagan world: “Thou shalt not commit sodomy; thou shalt synagogue and of course in the Psalter of . not commit fornication; thou shalt not steal; thou shalt not Various elements of the Eucharistic liturgy are taken use magic: thou shalt not use drugs; thou shalt not procure from the worship of ancient Israel, such as the “Holy, holy, abortion, nor commit infanticide” (Didache, II, 1-2). holy”; “dignum et justum est”; “in saecula saeculorum,” The work speaks of the celebration of the Eucharist on and many others. Even the Lord’s Prayer shows a great the Lord’s Day (Sunday; see Rev 1:10) and refers to it as similarity with the first petitions of the Kaddish in the a “sacrifice,” identified as the fulfillment of the prophecy Hebrew Prayerbook.2 of 1:11: Nevertheless, despite many elements of continuity, there On the Lord’s own day, come together and break bread is, of course, a fundamental difference. The liturgy of the and give thanks, first confessing your sins so that your Church centers on Jesus the Messiah and His Paschal sacrifice may be pure. Anyone at variance with his neigh- Sacrifice, made present in the Eucharist. In other words, bor must not join you, until they are reconciled, lest your the liturgy of the Church is not simply an organic devel- sacrifice be defiled. For it was of this sacrifice that the Lord said: “Always and everywhere offer me a pure sacrifice; for opment of that of the Temple or synagogue, as the liturgy I am a great King, says the Lord, and my name is marveled of the present day is a development of that of the first at by the nations.” centuries. No, there is of course an essential distinction and discontinuity between the liturgy of Israel and that of This is extremely significant, for it shows that already the Church, because the liturgy of the Church centers on in the first century, the Eucharist was understood as a true the sacrifice of the Messiah, of which all the sacrifices of sacrifice that is pleasing to God, and offered throughout Israel and rites of the Old Covenant were but marvelous the world among the Gentiles, as the acceptable sacrifice of figures and types. 3 See J. Tixeront, A Handbook of Patrology. To mark this element of discontinuity, Sunday replaced 4 See John Hardon, S.J., “The Catholic Tradition on the Morality Saturday as the “day of the Lord” (dies dominicus), to of Contraception,” available online at http://www.therealpresence. org/archives/Abortion_Euthanasia/Abortion_Euthanasia_004. 1 Eric Werner, The Sacred Bridge: Liturgical Parallels in Synagogue and Early Church (NY: Schocken Books, 1970). htm. He writes: 2 “Magnified and sanctified be His great name in the world which “These terms (mageia) and (pharmaka) were understood to cover the He has created according to His will. May He establish His Kingdom use of magical rites and/or medical potions for both contraception and during your life and during your days, and during the life of all the abortion. Moreover, the context in the Didache refers to sex activity house of Israel, even speedily and at a near time, and say ye, Amen.” and the right to life.” See also the Letter of 10.8.

2 AHC Lecture Series 5: Themes From the Early Church Fathers ––­ Lecture 10: Liturgy and Eucharist in the Early Church the Messianic age. As we shall see, St. Justin, St. , speaks against this Eucharistic consequence of Docetism and many other Fathers, connect the Eucharist with the in the Letter to the Smyrnaeans, 7: fulfillment of the prophecy of Malachi. They hold aloof from the Eucharist and from services Some short liturgical prayers are given. Before com- of prayer, because they refuse to admit that the Eucharist is munion, there is the acclamation: “If anyone is holy, let the flesh of our Saviour Jesus Christ, which suffered for our him come. If not, let him repent.” Only the baptized can sins and which, in His goodness, the Father raised. receive Communion, for “Do not give what is sacred to This is a very strong witness. The Docetists are con- dogs.” (Mt 7:6). demned by Ignatius for refusing to believe that the Eu- Again this is very significant, for it shows the practice of charist is the very “flesh of our Savior Jesus Christ,” that the Church in the first century to restrict Holy Communion same flesh which suffered and died on Calvary and was to the baptized faithful who are living in accordance with raised from the dead on Easter, and that same blood which the moral teaching of the Church (as spelled out in the first was poured out for our sins. section of the Didache). Ecclesial Dimension of the Eucharist Baptism is also spoken of, with the Trinitarian formula Another aspect of Ignatius’s Eucharistic teaching is his as given in Matthew 28:19. Baptism is to be prepared for emphasis on the ecclesial dimension of the Eucharist. The through fasting for one or two days. Eucharist unites us with Christ’s physical Body and Blood There is a Christian practice of fasting on Wednesdays precisely to unite us more closely with His Mystical Body, and Fridays, distinct from the Jewish custom of fasting on which is the Church, for the Eucharist is the sacrament of Monday and Thursday. ecclesial unity. Every Eucharistic celebration pertains to the entire Church, and is part of her public worship. The The Real Presence of Christ liturgy, and the Eucharist in particular, is therefore the in the Eucharist act of worship of the whole Christ: Head and members, hierarchically ordered. The liturgy is a prolongation or St. continuation of the priestly worship of Christ. The faith of the age of the Apostolic Fathers with re- For this reason, St. Ignatius stresses the role of the gard to the Eucharist is given in an extraordinarily clear bishop in the liturgy and the Eucharistic celebration. In way by St. Ignatius of Antioch in his letters to the seven the Letter to the Philadelphians, 4, his reference to the churches written on his way to be fed to the wild beasts Eucharist emphasizes the obligation of celebrating it in in the Coliseum in the year 107 AD. union with the bishop. The Eucharist here is presented St. Ignatius refers to the Eucharist as the “medicine of as the source of Christian unity (for the sanctifying grace immortality” in the Letter to the Ephesians, no. 20: imparted through worthy reception of the Eucharist is the At these meetings you should heed the bishop and pres- source of charity, which maintains the unity of the Body), bytery attentively, and break one loaf, which is the medicine a unity which must be liturgically represented through of immortality, and the antidote which wards off death but communion with the bishop: yields continuous life in union with Jesus Christ. Be careful, then, to observe a single Eucharist. For In the Letter to the Romans 7, he speaks of the realism of there is one flesh of our Lord, Jesus Christ, and one cup of the presence of Christ’s Body and Blood under the species His Blood that makes us one, and one altar, just as there is of bread and wine: one bishop along with the presbytery and the deacons, my fellow slaves. My Love has been crucified and there burns in me no passion for material things. I take no delight in corruptible Again in the Letter to the Smyrnaeans, 8: food or in the dainties of this life. What I want is God’s bread, You should regard that Eucharist as valid which is cel- which is the flesh of Christ, who came from David’s line; and ebrated either by the bishop or by someone he authorizes. for drink I want his blood: an immortal love feast indeed! Where the bishop is present, there let the congregation gather, 5 In his letters, St. Ignatius was seeking to combat the just as where Jesus Christ is, there is the Catholic Church. Without the bishop’s supervision, no baptisms or love feasts Docetist heresy, which denied the true humanity of Jesus [the Eucharist] are permitted. Christ. In order to show their error, Ignatius brings in the doctrine of the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist In his Letter to the Ephesians 5, he writes: “For if the as evidence against them. For if Christ did not have a true prayer of one or two possesses such power, how much humanity, then the realism of the Eucharistic conversion more that of the bishop and the whole Church!” would make no sense. If Christ was not true man, then the consecrated host could not be His true human Body. 5 This is perhaps the first use that has come down to us of the expres- The Docetists were thus the first heretics to deny the real sion “Catholic Church.” Catholic means universal. Here it signifies the Presence of Christ’s humanity in the Eucharist. St. Ignatius Church throughout the world.

3 AHC Lecture Series 5: Themes From the Early Church Fathers ––­ Lecture 10: Liturgy and Eucharist in the Early Church St. Justin on Baptism, the Eucharist, with the washing that is for the remission of sins, and unto and the Liturgy regeneration, and who is so living as Christ has enjoined. For not as common bread and common drink do we receive these; St. Justin Martyr, writing about 150 AD, gives a brief but in like manner as Jesus Christ our Saviour, having been account of Christian worship in his First Apology, chapters made flesh by the Word of God, had both flesh and blood 61-67.6 He begins with the liturgy of Baptism, which is for our salvation, so likewise have we been taught that the spoken of as “illumination”: food which is blessed by the prayer of His word, and from Those who are persuaded and believe that the things we which our blood and flesh by transmutation are nourished, teach and say are true, and promise that they can live accord- is the flesh and blood of that Jesus who was made flesh. ingly, are instructed to pray and beseech God with fasting For the Apostles, in the memoirs composed by them, which for the remission of their past sins, while we pray and fast are called Gospels, have thus delivered unto us what was along with them. . . . For they are then washed in the water enjoined upon them; that Jesus took bread, and when He in the name of God the Father and Master of all, and of our had given thanks, said, “This do ye in remembrance of Me, Savior Jesus Christ, and of the Holy Spirit. . . . this is My body;” and that, after the same manner, having taken the cup and given thanks, He said, “This is My blood;” So that we should not remain children of necessity and and gave it to them alone. Which the wicked devils have ignorance, but [become sons] of free choice and knowledge, imitated in the mysteries of Mithras, commanding the same and obtain remission of the sins we have already committed, thing to be done… there is named at the water, over him who has chosen to be born again and has repented of his sinful acts, the name of The realism with which St. Justin speaks of the Eucha- God the Father and Master of all. . . . This washing is called ristic conversion is absolutely clear. Just as Christ took illumination, since those who learn these things are illumined on true flesh and blood for our salvation—in contrast to within. The illuminand is also washed in the name of Jesus the Docetism taught by the Gnostic sects—so the Eucha- Christ, who was crucified under Pontius Pilate, and in the rist contains “the flesh and blood of that Jesus who was name of the Holy Spirit, who through the prophets foretold made flesh.” It can be observed that three conditions were everything about Jesus. [no. 61] stipulated in the second century for receiving Communion: St. Justin then speaks of the Eucharistic liturgy [nos. Catholic faith, Baptism, and life according to the com- 65-66]. He states that after the rite of Baptism, the neo- mandments. The reason given for this restriction is that phytes are brought to the celebration of the Eucharist, in the consecrated bread and wine are no longer “common which prayers are made for the neophytes and for all men bread and drink,” but the “flesh and blood of that Jesus everywhere, “that we may be counted worthy, now that we who was made flesh.” have learned the truth, by our works also to be found good Justin then concludes this account of Christian worship citizens and keepers of the commandments, so that we may with a brief description of the sanctification of Sunday, the be saved with an everlasting salvation. Having ended the Lord’s Day, with the Mass [no. 67]: prayers, we salute one another with a kiss.” And on the day called Sunday, all who live in cities or in After the general intercessions, Justin describes the the country gather together to one place, and the memoirs of Offertory, the Eucharistic prayer, and the distribution of the apostles or the writings of the prophets are read, as long Communion through the deacons: as time permits; then, when the reader has ceased, the one There is then brought to the one who presides over presiding verbally instructs, and exhorts to the imitation of the brethren bread and a cup of wine mixed with water; these good things. Then we all rise together and pray, and, and he taking them, gives praise and glory to the Father of as we before said, when our prayer is ended, bread and wine the universe, through the name of the Son and of the Holy and water are brought, and the one presiding in like manner Spirit, and offers thanks at considerable length for our be- offers prayers and thanksgivings, according to his ability, and ing counted worthy to receive these things at His hands. the people assent, saying Amen; and there is a distribution And when he has concluded the prayers and thanksgivings, to each, and a participation of that over which thanks have all the people present express their assent by saying Amen. been given, and to those who are absent a portion is sent by This word Amen answers in the Hebrew language “so be it.” the deacons. And they who are well to do, and willing, give And when the one who presides has given thanks, and all what each thinks fit; and what is collected is deposited with the people have expressed their assent, those who are called the one presiding, who succors the orphans and widows and by us deacons give to each of those present to partake of the those who, through sickness or any other cause, are in want, bread and wine mixed with water over which the thanksgiv- and those who are in bonds and the strangers sojourning ing was pronounced, and to those who are absent they carry among us, and in a word takes care of all who are in need. away a portion. But Sunday is the day on which we all hold our common assembly, because it is the first day on which God, having And this food is called among us the Eucharist, of which wrought a change in the darkness and matter, made the world; no one is allowed to partake but the man who believes that and Jesus Christ our Savior on the same day rose from the the things which we teach are true, and who has been washed dead. For He was crucified on the day before that of Saturn 6 See Early Christian Fathers, pp. 282-88. (Saturday); and on the day after that of Saturn, which is the

4 AHC Lecture Series 5: Themes From the Early Church Fathers ––­ Lecture 10: Liturgy and Eucharist in the Early Church day of the Sun, having appeared to His apostles and disciples, of His Blood nor is the Bread which we break the partaking He taught them these things. of His Body. For blood can only come from veins and flesh, It is interesting to note that St. Justin connects the cel- and whatsoever else makes up the substance of man, such as the Word of God was actually made.7 ebration of Sunday as the Lord’s Day not only with the Resurrection, but also with the creation. There is a beautiful Interestingly, St. Irenaeus argues from the Real Presence typology here. The Jewish Law sanctified the seventh day of Christ in the Eucharist to the truth of His humanity. This of the week on which God rested. The Christian dispensa- argumentation shows that the faith of the early Christians in tion celebrates the eighth day, which is also the first day of the true Body and Blood of Christ in the Eucharist was no the week, to symbolize that the Passion and Resurrection less vigorous than their faith in the true humanity of Christ. of Christ effects a “new creation,” opening the way to the Unfortunately, for many Christians today this argumen- supernatural order. The change of holy day from the sev- tation would fail, for so many of the faithful are ignorant enth to the eighth day also shows symbolically that Judaism of or reject the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist. was instituted to prepare for the Christian dispensation, However, that clearly was not the case in the Church in and thus its feasts give way to the Lord’s Day. the second century, for St. Irenaeus uses the Real Presence In his Dialogue with Trypho 41, St. Justin asserts the of Christ’s Body and Blood in the Eucharist as proof that sacrificial nature of the Eucharist, citing Mal 1:11, as did Christ truly had flesh and blood in His human nature. the Didache. He thus sees the Eucharist as the fulfillment The fact that St. Irenaeus could argue in this way also of the prophecy of Malachi: shows that the faith of the Church is most palpable for “I have no pleasure in you, says the Lord; and I will the ordinary Christian in the liturgy of the Church, for the not accept your sacrifices at your hands: for from the rising principal contact of the faithful with the Church is through of the sun to the going down of the same my name has been the liturgy. Thus there is the Patristic axiom: the rule of glorified among the gentiles, and in every place incense is prayer is the rule of faith. offered to my name, and a pure offering: for my name is great among the gentiles says the Lord, but you profane it.” He As St. Irenaeus develops this argument against the then speaks of those gentiles, namely us, who in every place Docetists, he also briefly mentions what later came to be offer sacrifices to him, that is, the bread of the Eucharist and called “transubstantiation,” the miraculous conversion also the cup of the Eucharist. of the bread and wine into the true Body and Blood of Christ, through the omnipotent power of the words of St. Irenaeus on the Eucharist consecration, spoken by the in the person of Christ. St. Irenaeus, writing some eighty years after St. Ignatius, St. Irenaeus writes: “When, therefore, the mingled cup and forty years after St. Justin, develops the same themes and the manufactured bread receives the Word of God, ... with regard to the Eucharist. This should not be surprising, [it] becomes the Eucharist, the body and blood of Christ”8 for St. Irenaeus was a of St. , who was The Word of God referred to here by St. Irenaeus clearly an associate of St. Ignatius, a fellow bishop, and a fellow refers to the words of institution that form the center of disciple of St. . the Eucharistic liturgy in all her rites. In his work against Gnosticism, Against the Heresies, St. St. Irenaeus then goes on to speak of how the Body and Irenaeus develops the theme of the Eucharist as being the Blood of Christ in the Eucharist is true although spiritual medicine of immortality. As in St. Ignatius, the Eucharistic nourishment of the members of Christ’s Mystical Body conversion is clearly taken in a completely realist sense, who partake of the Eucharist. It seems that St. Irenaeus and the doctrine of transubstantiation clearly implied. connects the reception of the Eucharist with the future gift by which the faithful will be given a share in the glory of The Gnostics whom St. Irenaeus is combating, like the Christ’s risen Body. Once again, St. Irenaeus stresses this Docetists known by St. Ignatius, rejected the goodness because the Gnostics also denied the true Resurrection of of the body, for they saw matter as the source of all evil. the flesh, since they viewed the flesh as the source of evil. Thus they denied the resurrection of the body, and the true St. Irenaeus writes: humanity of Christ, which forced them to also deny the true presence of that human nature in the Eucharist. St. How can they say that flesh cannot receive the free gift Irenaeus combats all these errors through the doctrine of of God, which is eternal life, since it is nourished by the body the Real Presence: and blood of the Lord, and made a member of him? As the blessed Paul says in the Epistle to the Ephesians, that we are But vain in every respect are they who despise the entire members of his body, of his flesh and bones [Eph 5:30]. . . dispensation of God, and disallow the salvation of the flesh, . And just as a cutting from the vine planted in the ground and treat with contempt its regeneration, maintaining that it fructifies in its season, and as the grain of wheat, falling into is not capable of immortality. If the body be not saved, then, the earth and becoming decomposed, rises with manifold in fact, neither did the Lord redeem us with His Blood; and neither is the cup of the Eucharist the partaking [communion] 7 Against the Heresies 5.2.2. 8 Ibid 5.2.3.

5 AHC Lecture Series 5: Themes From the Early Church Fathers ––­ Lecture 10: Liturgy and Eucharist in the Early Church increase by the Spirit of God. . . , and having received the Callistus, formed an opposing faction, and was elected Word of God, becomes the Eucharist, which is the body and by them as “bishop” of , which makes him the first blood of Christ; so also our bodies, being nourished by it, and anti-. He was finally reconciled with Pope Pontianus deposited in the earth, and suffering decomposition there, just before both men were exiled to Sardinia, where they shall rise at their appointed time, the Word of God granting were martyred in about 235 AD. them resurrection to the glory of God, even the Father, who freely gives to this mortal immortality, and to this corruptible The Apostolic Tradition is the most discussed of Hip- incorruption, because the strength of God is made perfect in polytus’s works, for it consists of a primitive sacramentary, weakness, in order that we may never become puffed up, as giving the liturgical rites for the ordination of a bishop, as if we had life from ourselves.9 well as for and deacons, the Eucharistic prayer, and St. Irenaeus thus makes a parallelism between the Eucha- many other liturgical practices. It presumably reflects the rist and our bodies. As the bread and wine are transformed practice in Rome (or in the East, if it is not by Hippolytus) by the Word of God in the consecration so as to become in the latter half of the second century, for Hippolytus was 11 the Body and Blood of Christ, so the bodies of the faithful not an innovator, but of a traditionalist bent. who have been nourished by the Eucharist will be raised up This work is very significant, for it beautifully shows on the Last Day through the Word of God, so as to share the hierarchical structure of the Church through the well- in the glory of the Body of Christ. developed liturgy for the ordination of bishops. Likewise, Like the Didache and St. Justin, St. Irenaeus also af- it shows the threefold division of Holy Orders, giving firms that the Eucharist is the acceptable sacrifice among separate rites of ordination for presbyters and deacons. It the Gentiles prophesied by Malachi. Indeed, he speaks of also contains a very early form of the Eucharistic Prayer. the Eucharist as the “new oblation of the New Covenant”: Here follows the prayer for the ordination of bishops and He took that created thing, bread, and gave thanks, and the Eucharistic prayer: said, “This is my Body.” And the cup likewise, which is part He who is ordained as a bishop, being chosen by all of that creation to which we belong, He confessed to be His the people, must be irreproachable. blood, and taught the new oblation of the New Covenant; 2When his name is announced and approved, the people which the Church receiving from the Apostles, offers to God will gather on the Lord’s day with the throughout all the world . . . concerning which Malachi, council of elders and the bishops who are present. 3With among the twelve prophets, thus spoke beforehand: “. . . the assent of all, the bishops will place From the rising of the sun, unto the going down, My name their hands upon him, with the council of elders standing is glorified among the Gentiles, and in every place incense is by, quietly. 4Everyone will keep silent, offered to My name, and a pure sacrifice ...”—indicating in praying in their hearts for the descent of the Spirit. 5After the plainest manner, by these words, that the former people this, one of the bishops present, at the shall indeed cease to make offerings to God, but that in every request of all, shall lay his hand upon him who is being place sacrifice shall be offered to Him, and that a pure one; ordained bishop, and pray, saying, and His name is glorified among the Gentiles.10 3 God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Father of mercies and God of all consolation, As the Old Covenant was sealed by sacrifice, which it you who live in the highest, but regard the lowly, commanded to be offered continuously, so the New Cov- you who know all things before they are, enant has a new sacrifice, a new oblation, that is proper to 2you who gave the rules of the Church through the word of it: the Eucharist. The bloody animal sacrifices of the Old your grace, Testament had ceased with the destruction of the Temple in who predestined from the beginning the race of the righ- 70 AD. In their place the Eucharist sacrifice is now offered teous through , in every part of the world. As the mystical (sacramental) who instituted princes and priests, offering of the true Blood of Christ, poured out on Calvary, and did not leave your sanctuary without a minister; it is infinitely more noble than the blood of slain animals. who from the beginning of the world has been pleased to be glorified by those whom you have chosen, St. Hippolytus 3pour out upon him the power which is from you, the princely Spirit, Another important liturgical text from the early Fathers which you gave to your beloved Son Jesus Christ, is the Apostolic Tradition, attributed to St. Hippolytus, which he gave to your holy apostles, and dating from about 215 AD, although the liturgical who founded the Church in every place as your sanctuary, traditions that it contains are certainly much older. St. for the glory and endless praise of your name. Hippolytus was perhaps a disciple of St. Irenaeus who 4Grant, Father who knows the heart, became a presbyter in Rome. Of a severe and rigorist to your servant whom you chose for the episcopate, that he tendency, he opposed the discipline and theology of Pope will feed your holy flock,

9 Ibid. 11 See Johannes Quasten, Patrology, vol. 2 (Westminster, MD: 10 Ibid. 4.33 (MG 7, 1073; ANF 1, 507). Newman Press, 1953), p. 187.

6 AHC Lecture Series 5: Themes From the Early Church Fathers ––­ Lecture 10: Liturgy and Eucharist in the Early Church that he will wear your high priesthood without reproach, Likewise the chalice, saying, serving night and day, incessantly making your face favor- This is my blood which is shed for you. able, 10Whenever you do this, do this (in) memory of me. and offering the gifts of your holy church; 11Therefore, remembering his death and resurrection, 5in the spirit of high priesthood having the power to for- we offer to you the bread and the chalice, give sins according to your command; giving thanks to you, who has made us worthy to assign lots according to your command; to stand before you and to serve as your priests. to loose any bond according to the authority which you 12And we pray that you would send your Holy Spirit gave to the apostles; to the oblation of your Holy Church. to please you in mildness and a pure heart, offering to you In their gathering together, a sweet scent, give to all those who partake of your holy mysteries the 6through your son Jesus Christ, fullness of the Holy Spirit, through whom to you be glory, power, and honor, toward the strengthening of the faith in truth, Father and Son, with the Holy Spirit, 13that we may praise you and glorify you, in the Holy Church, now and throughout the ages of the through your son Jesus Christ, ages. Amen. through whom to you be glory and honor, 4 When he has been made bishop, everyone shall give him Father and Son, with the Holy Spirit, the kiss of peace, and salute him in your Holy Church, now and throughout the ages of the respectfully, for he has been made worthy of this. 2Then ages. the deacons shall present the oblation Amen.12 to him, and he shall lay his hand upon it, and give thanks, with the entire council of elders, saying: Later Fathers on the Real Presence and the 3The Lord be with you. Sanctifying Power of the Eucharist And all reply: St. Hilary, great bishop of Arles in the fourth century, And with your spirit. speaks of the sanctifying (or divinizing) power of the Eu- The bishop says: Lift up your hearts. charist, explaining that it has that power precisely because The people respond: it is the true Body and Blood of Christ: We have them with the Lord. We speak in an absurd and godless manner about the The bishop says: divinity of Christ’s nature in us—unless we have learned it Let us give thanks to the Lord. from Him. He Himself declares: ‘For my flesh is food indeed, The people respond: and my blood is drink indeed. He who eats my flesh and It is proper and just. drinks my blood abides in me and I in him’ (Jn. 6:56, 7). It The bishop then continues: is no longer permitted us to raise doubts about the true nature 4We give thanks to you God, of the body and the blood, for, according to the statement of through your beloved son Jesus Christ, the Lord Himself as well as our faith, this is indeed flesh and whom you sent to us in former times blood. And these things that we receive bring it about that we as Savior, Redeemer, and Messenger of your Will, are in Christ and Christ is in us. Is not this the truth? Those 5who is your inseparable Word, who deny that Jesus Christ is the true God are welcome to through whom you made all, regard these words as false. He Himself, therefore, is in us and in whom you were well-pleased, through His flesh, and we are in Him, while that which we 6whom you sent from heaven into the womb of a , are with Him is in God (On the Trinity, 8.14). who, being conceived within her, was made flesh, By reverently receiving His Body and Blood, we come and appeared as your Son, to partake more and more in His Spirit and divine life. For born of the Holy Spirit and the virgin. 7It is he who, fulfilling your will the Eucharist is not only His Body and Blood, but also His and acquiring for you a holy people, Soul and Divinity. extended his hands in suffering, St. , one of the greatest Greek Fa- in order to liberate from sufferings thers of the Church in the fifth century, likewise stresses those who believe in you. the miraculous conversion of the bread and wine and the 8 Who, when he was delivered to voluntary suffering, realism of the Body and Blood, and the sanctification it in order to dissolve death, imparts. In his commentary on Matthew, he wrote: “Christ and break the chains of the devil, said indicating (the bread and wine): ‘This is My Body,’ and tread down hell, and bring the just to the light, 12 Available online at http://www.bombaxo.com/hippolytus. and set the limit, html. This translation by Kevin P. Edgecomb is based on the work of and manifest the resurrection, Bernard Botte (La Tradition Apostolique. Sources Chretiennes, 11 bis. 9taking the bread, and giving thanks to you, said, Paris, Editions du Cerf, 1984) and of Gregory Dix (The Treatise on “Take, eat, for this is my body which is broken for you.” the Apostolic Tradition of St. , Bishop and Martyr. London: Alban Press, 1992).

7 AHC Lecture Series 5: Themes From the Early Church Fathers ––­ Lecture 10: Liturgy and Eucharist in the Early Church and ‘This is My Blood,’ in order that you might not judge Calvary. The Eucharist thus makes the very sacrifice of what you see to be a mere figure. The offerings, by the Calvary and its efficacy mystically present throughout the hidden power of God Almighty, are changed into Christ’s life of the Church, as the center and heart of her worship. Body and Blood, and by receiving these we come to share Holy Communion, worthily received, enables the faithful in the life-giving and sanctifying efficacy of Christ.”13 to spiritually partake of the life-giving efficacy of Christ’s St. Cyril, instructing the neophytes, also wrote: “We sacrifice. have been instructed in these matters and filled with an The Fathers frequently stress that the words of consecra- unshakable faith, that that which seems to be bread, is not tion, uttered in the person of Christ, have the omnipotent bread, though it tastes like it, but the Body of Christ, and efficacy of God Himself, and are the means of realizing that which seems to be wine, is not wine, though it too the Eucharistic sacrifice. St. Gregory of Nazianzen likens tastes as such, but the Blood of Christ. . . . Draw inner the words of the consecration to a mystical knife used in strength by receiving this bread as spiritual food and your the mystical immolation of the Lamb of God. He writes to soul will rejoice.”14 a fellow priest: “Delay not to pray for me, when you draw St. Augustine wrote: down the Word by your word [of consecration], when with a bloodless cutting you sever the Body and Blood of the You ought to know what you have received, what you are 16 going to receive, and what you ought to receive daily. That Lord with the sacrificial knife of His word.” Bread which you see on the altar, consecrated by the word of In the later fourth century, St. , bishop of Milan, God, is the Body of Christ. That chalice, or rather, what the speaks of the miraculous Eucharistic conversion of the chalice holds, consecrated by the word of God, is the Blood bread and wine into the Body and Blood of Christ. He of Christ. Through those accidents the Lord wished to entrust seems to regard the separate consecration of the Body and to us His Body and the Blood which He poured out for the Blood as sacramentally realizing the sacrifice of Christ on remission of sins. If you have received worthily, you are what the altar, thus “showing the Lord’s death”: you have received, for the Apostle says: “the bread is one; we though many, are one body” (1 Cor 10:17).15 “My flesh is meat indeed, and My Blood is drink” (Jn 6:56). You hear Him speak of His Flesh and of His Blood, The Sacrificial Aspect of the Eucharist in the you perceive the sacred pledges (conveying to us the merits Fathers after Irenaeus and power) of the Lord’s death. . . . Now we, as often as we receive the Sacramental Elements, which by the mysterious The Eucharist is both a sacrament of communion with efficacy of holy prayer are transformed into the Flesh and the Christ, and the sacrifice of Calvary made continually pres- Blood, “do show the Lord’s Death” (1 Cor 11:26).17 ent in the life of the Church. The aspect of the Eucharist as sacrifice is no less important than that of sacrament. St. As we have seen, the early Fathers frequently allude to St. John Chrysostom (“golden-mouthed,” 347-407 AD), the sacrificial nature of the Eucharist by citing Mal 1:11, of Constantinople, , and one which they understood as a prophecy of the Eucharistic sac- of the most famous preachers of the patristic period, has rifice, the sacrifice of the New Covenant in the Messianic some extraordinary texts on the Real Presence of Christ age, which is offered to God as a “pure oblation” among all in the Eucharist, the Eucharistic conversion, and the sac- the nations of the Gentiles in which the Church is present. rificial aspect of the Mass: This sacrifice magnifies the glory of God infinitely more The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not a com- than any other sacrifice or religious rite could possibly do, munion of the Blood of Christ?” (1 Cor 10:16). Very per- for it is none other than the very sacrifice of Calvary by suasively spoke he, and with awe. For what he says is this: which Christ reconciled God with mankind and atoned for This which is in the cup is that which flowed from His side, the sins of the world. and of that do we partake. But he called it a cup of blessing, because holding it in our hands, we so exalt Him in our hymn, The Real Presence of Christ in His Body and Blood, wondering, astonished at His unspeakable gift, blessing Him, realized through the miracle of transubstantiation, is the among other things, for the pouring it out, but also for the basis for the right understanding of the sacrificial nature imparting thereof to us all. “Wherefore if you desire blood,” of the Eucharist. The Eucharist is the sacrifice of the New says He, “redden not the altar of idols with the slaughter of Covenant precisely because it is Christ Himself in His brute beasts, but My altar with My blood.” Tell me, what can Body and Blood, mystically immolated on the altar through be more tremendous than this? What more tenderly kind?18 the sacramental separation of His Body and Blood. It is In other words, St. John Chrysostom is saying that what a “mystical immolation” which sacramentally “shows we receive in the Eucharist is the very same blood which the death of the Lord” (1 Cor 11:26), which occurred on 16 Letter 171 to Amphilochius. 13 Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew 26:27, 428 A.D. 17 To Gratian, On the Christian Faith 4.10 (ML 16, 641; NPNF 14 St. Cyril of Alexandria, “Catecheses,” 22, 9; “Myst.” 4; d. 444 A.D. 10, 278). 15 Sermons, no. 227 (ML 38, 1099). 18 Homilies on First Corinthians, 24:1 (MG 61, 199; NPNF 12, 138).

8 AHC Lecture Series 5: Themes From the Early Church Fathers ––­ Lecture 10: Liturgy and Eucharist in the Early Church poured forth on Calvary, the same Body that was pierced, so as to make us partakers in the fruit of His sacrifice. What greater gift could God give, then His very self, immolated for us and made present in a way that we receive it, under the veils of bread and wine? Later in the same homily, he stresses how the Eucharist is the supreme manifestation of the divine Love: When you see [the Body of Christ] set before you, say to yourself: Because of this Body I am no longer earth and ashes, no longer a prisoner, but free: because of this I hope for heaven, and to receive the good things therein, immortal life, the portion of angels, converse with Christ; this Body, nailed and scourged, was more than death could stand against. . . . This is even that Body, the bloodstained, the pierced, and that out of which gushed the saving fountains, the one of blood, the other of water, for all the world. This Body He has given to us both to hold and to eat; a thing appropriate to intense love.19 He speaks of the sacrificial aspect of the Mass as follows: “We always offer the same Lamb, not one today and an- other tomorrow, but always the same one. For this reason the sacrifice is always only one. . . . Even now we offer that victim who was once offered and who will never be consumed.”20 Martin Luther and other Protestants rejected the Church’s faith in the sacrificial nature of the Eucharist as a corruption of doctrine that would supposedly take away the decisive importance of Christ’s sacrifice on Calvary, once and for all (see Heb 10:10). Obviously, this most serious charge rested on a grave misunderstanding of the Church’s faith in the Eucharist. St. John Chrysostom manifests that the sacrificial as- pect of the Eucharist does not add a new sacrifice to that of Calvary, as if such an addition would be desirable, or multiply sacrifices as in the Old Covenant. No, the sacrifice of the Mass is one, throughout all the centuries and on all the altars in which a valid Mass is celebrated. As St. John Chrysostom says, “We always offer the same Lamb, not one today and another tomorrow, but always the same one. For this reason the sacrifice is always only one.” The sacrifice of the Mass is the same as the sacrifice of Calvary, precisely because the words of consecration make Christ’s Body and Blood truly present on the altar, that same Body and Blood which was immolated for us at Calvary, and which is made present on the altar as the “new oblation of the new Covenant,” in the words of St. Irenaeus.

19 Ibid. 24:4 (MG 61, 203; NPNF 12, 143). 20 In Epistolam ad Hebraeos Homiliae 17,3: PG 63, 131; cited in John Paul II, Ecclesia de Eucharistia, 12.

9 AHC Lecture Series 5: Themes From the Early Church Fathers ––­ Lecture 10: Liturgy and Eucharist in the Early Church

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