Holy Thursday, April 17, 2025

1 Corinthians 11, 23–26

Brothers and sisters: I received from the Lord what I also handed on to you, that the Lord Jesus, on the night he was handed over, took bread, and, after he had given thanks, broke it and said, “This is my body that is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” In the same way also the cup, after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.” For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the death of the Lord until he comes.

The words of institution spoken by the Lord Jesus — those which the Church uses for the confection of the Sacrament of the Eucharist — have great significance and power, so we should examine them closely.

“This is my Body that is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.”  The Lord broke the unleavened bread and, having done so, he declared, “This is my Body.”  It is broken bread that becomes his Body, as a sign of the Passion he was about to undergo.  And this bread did become his Body in fact.  The Lord changed the bread into the substance of his Body while allowing it to retain its appearance to the five human senses.  In this way he answers the question posed after he first announced that those who ate his Body would live forever: “How can this man give us his Flesh to eat?” (John 6, 53).  So necessary is the eating of his Flesh for salvation that Jesus makes it easily palatable for us, with the shape, texture, and taste of bread.  

Further, he commands that this ritual be performed again and again “in memory” of him.  Now, we must distinguish between the Western way of thinking about memory and the past and the ancient Jewish one.  In the West, the past is over; it is no longer happening.  A past event may be recalled vividly so that we may speak of “reliving” the past, but we recognize the event itself as completed, as irrevocably done.  However, for the Jews in the time of Moses and in the time of Jesus, and for religious Jews today, remembering makes the past present so that we are truly experiencing it.  Thus, the Passover meal is no mere reenactment of a past event but making it present so that it can be joined.  When Jesus says to do this in memory of him, he means for us so that he becomes present in the Sacrament of the Eucharist.  At the Last Supper, then, Jesus changed the bread into his Body. (and the wine into his Blood) for the Apostles to consume, and he commanded and gave them the power to do this over and over.  And this power is handed on by their successors, the bishops, to those ordained to the priesthood today.

“This cup is the new covenant in my Blood.”  In ancient times, covenants were made using blood as a seal.  The ancient Hebrew word for making a covenant actually means “cutting” a covenant, for this reason.  Moses sprinkled the Israelites at the time God made a covenant with them in the Sinai (cf. Exodus 24, 8).  After the Israelites broke the covenant through their idolatry over the course of centuries, God said through the Prophet Jeremiah, “Behold the days shall come, saith the Lord, and I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah.  Not according to the covenant which I made with their fathers, in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, the covenant which they made void, and I had dominion over them, saith the Lord.  But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel, after those days, saith the Lord: I will give my law in their bowels, and I will write it in their heart: and I will be their God, and they shall be my people”(Jeremiah 31, 31-34).  At the Last Supper, Jesus inaugurates this covenant and tells them to “drink it”.  This covenant is not ratified by the blood of an animal touching a person’s skin, but the Blood of Christ, sacrificed for our redemption, is drunk so that it is within.  For this reason, each time a Catholic receives the Holy Eucharist, he or she ratifies this covenant anew.

St. Paul says, “For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the death of the Lord until he comes.” The Church proclaims the Lord’s Death through the action of the Holy Mass, which presents it in the sign of the separated Body and Blood of the Lord on the altar, his Body on the paten and his Blood in the chalice.  And each Catholic proclaims his Death by consuming his Flesh and Blood.

(The question arises as to how the faithful receive the Blood of the Lord if they do not drink from the chalice.  But as the Church teaches, the Flesh and the Blood of the Lord truly mingle together as in any living body so that those who cannot consume a Host due to medical problems still consume the Lord’s Flesh when the priest shares the chalice with them.)

On this day we celebrate the Lord’s Supper and the great gift he continuously offers us in the reception of his Body and Blood.