Cardinal's Column 4/11/04

The faith that tells us of the Church also tells us of the Eucharist, another “mystery of faith,” and makes connections between the two mysteries, Eucharist and Church. The Holy Father makes the connection explicit in his letter when he writes: “…the Church draws her life from Christ in the Eucharist” (no. 6). Both the Church and the Eucharist are “from Christ.” Christ is present to the Church because he is present completely and perfectly in the Eucharist; and the Church can celebrate the Eucharist because she is the Body of Christ, his new creation.

Both the Church and the Eucharist have their source and receive their present vitality from the events celebrated in Holy Week: the Last Supper of Jesus with his apostles, his atoning passion and death on Good Friday and his bodily resurrection on Easter Sunday. These events, seen as a whole, are called “the paschal mystery.” The Church finds their initial meaning in the “passover of the Lord” in the Book of Exodus, in which God rescued his chosen people from slavery in Egypt and brought them to freedom in the Holy Land. In every generation, the paschal mystery is made present sacramentally in the Church, in local space and particular time, until Christ returns in glory. “In this gift (the Eucharist), Jesus Christ entrusted to his Church the perennial making present of the paschal mystery.”

Both the Eucharist and the Church, as gifts from Christ, are one, holy, catholic and apostolic. When the Lord transforms bread and wine into his sacred body and blood, he invites us into a relationship of unity with him through the apostles, to whom he entrusted the Eucharist. Jesus made the apostles the foundation of the Church, her nucleus, in giving them authority and power to do what he did at the Last Supper and in commissioning them after his resurrection to gather disciples into the Church and shepherd them. No one may decide to celebrate his or her own Eucharist, just as no one can rightly decide to form an assembly in the name of Jesus and declare it the Church. We encounter the Church and Christ her head as we celebrate the Mass in parishes and dioceses in communion with the universal Church.

In celebrating and receiving the eucharistic presence of the risen Lord, a local eucharistic community receives the whole Christ, the communion of saints of every time and place, putting us in touch with Christ’s kingdom, which the Church makes present locally. “Communion in the teaching of the apostles, in the sacraments and in the Church’s hierarchical order” is the necessary context for the authentic celebration of the Eucharist. The spiritual unity of the whole Church, in which each diocese and parish participates, is brought about by the Eucharist celebrated in communion with the successor of Peter, who is the perpetual and visible source and foundation of the unity of the bishops and the multitude of the faithful” (Second Vatican Council, Lumen Gentium, 23). This truth of faith is the reason why the Pope and the local bishop are always named in every celebration of the Eucharist. The ministry of Peter ensures the authentic catholicity of each local Church, headed by its bishop as a successor of the apostles.

At the Last Supper, Christ gave us in an unbloody manner his self-sacrifice, to be consummated the next day on Calvary. He also gave us the apostolic college to make visible the communion that, with the Eucharist, constitutes the Church. From ecclesial communion in the Eucharist comes the impulse for the Church’s mission. By the grace of the Holy Spirit, the Church announces everywhere the work of the Son, testifying to him, making him truly present in the celebration of the Eucharist in all the languages of the earth. Each time the Eucharist is celebrated, the world changes. The love of God, mediated in the Eucharist, has the power to shape right order and harmony in all other relationships, both personal and social, strengthening them in anticipation of heaven.

At the end of Mass, we are sent forth “to love and serve the Lord.” The Holy Father invites us “to become for everyone witnesses of hope” (no. 62). The Church, despite the sinfulness of her members, is to be everywhere “one, holy, catholic and apostolic; the people, temple and family of God; the body and bride of Christ; enlivened by the Holy Spirit; the universal sacrament of salvation and a hierarchically structured communion” (no. 61).

“Witnesses of hope” best describes disciples of Jesus in the world today. For many today, life is short of hope. Some look for hope in all the wrong places, because the disciples of Jesus are not always effective in pointing to him, speaking of him, inviting others to come to know and love him in the Church. May the celebration of the paschal mystery this year and the reception of your Easter communion in the Church fill your hearts with hope and give you courage to be witnesses to Christ in our place and in our time. May the blessings of the risen Christ bring joy to you and those you love.