The Paschal Mystery in the Eucharistic Prayer. Regular readers of this column will by now have become familiar with a recurring

Transcription

1 1 The Paschal Mystery in the Eucharistic Prayer Regular readers of this column will by now have become familiar with a recurring theme in it--the paschal mystery. To explore the presence of the paschal mystery within the eucharistic prayer, the central action of the Mass, is the purpose of this article. Before that is done, however, especially for the sake of those readers who may not have been following the series, let it be said briefly that the paschal mystery refers not just to Jesus' death and resurrection, nor even additionally to his incarnation, public ministry, ascension, sending of the Spirit, and second coming, but also and very importantly to our participation in that mystery as the central, ongoing reality in the life of the Church. 1 Christians' engagement in the paschal mystery is both a lived reality and a symbolic, ritual celebration of that reality in the sacramental life and worship of the Church. With respect to its being a lived reality, The Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World (Gaudium et Spes) of Vatican Council II offers this: The Christian is certainly bound both by need and by duty to struggle with evil through many afflictions and to suffer death; but, as one who has been made a partner in the paschal mystery, and as one who has been configured to the death of Christ, [that person] will go forward, strengthened by hope, to the resurrection. 2 As to the expression of the paschal mystery in symbolic, ritual forms, the Constitution on the Liturgy says:... [T]he Church has never failed to come together to celebrate the paschal mystery: reading those things "which were in all the Scriptures concerning 1 For further explanation of this meaning of "paschal mystery," see the initial "Liturgy Notes" columns by Jeffrey Kemper and Joyce Ann Zimmerman in Liturgical Ministry 8 (1999) 46-51, For a good, succinct description of the meaning and significance of "paschal mystery," see James L. Empereur's article on the same in The New Dictionary of Theology edited by Joseph A. Komonchak et al. (Collegeville: The Liturgical Press, 1990), For the centrality of the Christian paschal mystery in the Church's life and worship, see for example Catechism of the Catholic Church (Washington, DC: USCC, 1994) n Austin Flannery, ed., Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World, n. 22 in The Basic Sixteen Documents. Vatican Council II. Constitutions, Decrees, Declarations, revised edition (Northport, NY: Costello Publishing Co., 1996) 186.

2 2 him" (Lk 24:27); celebrating the eucharist, in which "the victory and triumph of his death are again made present"; and at the same time giving thanks "to God for his inexpressible gift" (2 Cor 9:15) in Christ Jesus, "in praise of his glory" (Eph 1:12), through the power of the Holy Spirit. To accomplish so great a work, Christ is always present in his Church especially in liturgical celebrations. 3 The Eucharist is the central action of the Church's life and of each Christian's life. Furthermore, within the Eucharist, the most important action is the eucharistic prayer. The General Instruction of the Roman Missal attests to the centrality of the Eucharist in the Christian life: The celebration of Mass, the action of Christ and the people of God arrayed hierarchically, is for the universal and the local Church as well as for each person the center of the whole Christian life. In the Mass we have the high point of the work that in Christ, his Son, we offer to the Father." 4 As to the primacy of the eucharistic prayer among all other actions of the eucharistic liturgy, the General Instruction says: "Among the parts assigned to the priest, the eucharistic prayer is preeminent; it is the high point of the entire celebration." And again, some paragraphs later: "Now the center and summit of the entire celebration begins: the eucharistic prayer, a prayer of thanksgiving and sanctification." 5 If the paschal mystery is the central reality in Christian life and if the Eucharist, and within it, the eucharistic prayer, are the central ritual actions in the Church's life, then the eucharistic prayer and the paschal mystery must be intimately related. In fact, we should expect to find the richest, most intense symbolization of the mystery in the eucharistic prayer if that prayer is the "center and summit" of the entire eucharistic 3 Flannery, ed., Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy, nn. 6-7 in The Basic Sixteen Documents General Instruction of the Roman Missal (1975 edition), n. 1 (n 16 in the recently issued, revised 2000 edition). See also Catechism of the Catholic Church, nn General Instruction nn. 10 and 54 (nn. 30 and 78, revised edition). See also Catechism of the Catholic Church, n

3 3 action, and the Eucharist itself is, as claimed, central to the whole life of the Church. We will see that what today we call the paschal mystery has indeed been the symbolic content of the eucharistic prayer from the earliest days of the Church, but the understanding of how that mystery is present in the eucharistic prayer has taken differing forms. Let us focus on two, major, contrasting views of how the paschal mystery is present in the eucharistic prayer. The first of these views, which we will call objectivistic, developed in the medieval period of the Church's history and held sway well into the 20th century. It would appear that even today some form of this view, whether consciously or unconsciously held, underlies the faith and eucharistic practice of many Catholics. It might be termed the more static of the two views in that it focuses on the institution narrative of the eucharistic prayer and on the "real presence" of Christ under the eucharistic species, acknowledging the presence of the paschal mystery, if it even uses that term, in the action of the priest-presider and under the eucharistic species. The second view, which we will call participatory, more ancient than the first, was recovered in the 20th century through liturgical scholarship. It found limited expression in Pope Pius XII's encyclical, Mediator Dei and in the Second Vatican Council's Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy, and it gained fuller expression in the postconciliar reform of the Eucharist as well as in commentary on that reform and in contemporary sacramental theology. 6 As the more dynamic view, it focuses on the action of Christ and of the Holy Spirit actualizing participation in the paschal mystery as this occurs throughout the entire eucharistic prayer itself, in the agents of the prayer, as well as in the eucharistic elements. 6 See Pope Pius XII's extensive development of the participation of the faithful in the Eucharist, Mediator Dei, nn ; The Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy, nn. 7, 10, 11, 48; General Instruction (1975 edition), n. 1 (rev. ed., n. 16) and especially n. 54 (1975 ed.; n. 78, rev. ed.): "The meaning of the [eucharistic] prayer is that the entire congregation joins itself to Christ in acknowledging the great things God has done and in offering the sacrifice". For commentary on the reform, particularly as it pertains to eucharistic prayer, see, for example, Ralph Keifer, To Give Thanks and Praise (Washington DC: The Pastoral Press, 1980)

4 4 An Objectivistic View: The Paschal Mystery Actualized by the Institution Narrative and Anamnesis Section of the Eucharistic Prayer and Signified by the Eucharistic Elements Since the twelfth century in the West, Catholic sacramental theology has, when discussing the Eucharist, tended to narrow attention to the institution narrative of the eucharistic prayer and to the eucharistic species. This narrowing was due in part to a growing lack of understanding and appreciation of the nature and of the unity of the eucharistic prayer, to the perceived need to defend the real presence of Christ under the eucharistic species, and to an increasing emphasis on the role of the presbyter-presider. While the term "paschal mystery" was not used, of course, the presence in the Eucharist of Christ's sacrifice, understood particularly as his self-offering on the cross, was the object of discussion and debate. The study and exchange of theologians since the 12th century has led, in the words of Edward Kilmartin, to "the average modern Catholic synthesis of eucharistic theology." 7 This synthesis, which owes much to the theology of St. Thomas Aquinas, maintains that the once-for-all "sacrifice of Christ," the transitus of Jesus Christ from suffering to glory, or the mystery of the death-resurrection-glorification of Jesus Christ, is rendered present in the context of the eucharistic celebration. Moreover it implies that the objective presence of the past historical redemptive acts of Christ is located "on the altar." 8 7 See Edward Kilmartin, "The Catholic Tradition of Eucharistic Theology: Towards the Third Millennium," Theological Studies 55 (1994) Kilmartin, 437. The expression "on the altar" does not seem to be that of Thomas Aquinas, but see the idea in his Summa theologiae 3, q. 83, ad 2. The modern synthesis of eucharistic theology may have misinterpreted Aquinas. See Edward Kilmartin, The Eucharist in the West: History and Theology (Collegeville: The Liturgical Press, 1998)

5 5 In this view the part of the eucharistic celebration in which the transitus is rendered present is the institution narrative of the eucharistic prayer. By virtue of the priest's recitation of the institution narrative and the separate consecration of bread and wine, Christ's body and blood are rendered sacramentally and separately present. 9 Thus Christ's sacrificial death, in which his body and blood were separated, is sacramentally represented, and the paschal mystery, considered here as centered in Christ's dying, is sacramentally present "on the altar." A modern Thomistic synthesis would add that a priest, acting in persona Christi when uttering the words of institution, is at the same time and by the same mode (in persona Christi) sacramentally offering the one sacrifice of Christ not only as Christ's sacrifice but also as the Church's sacrifice in Christ because he represents Christ, the head of the Church. 10 This view of the presence of the paschal mystery in the Eucharist is one which sees the presence more as an effect of a portion of the eucharistic prayer, viz., the institution narrative, than a presence of the mystery in the action of the prayer itself. Yet it is the perenniel view acquired by countless older Catholics and younger, neoconservative Catholics through their catechetical formation relying so heavily on instruments such as the Baltimore Catechism. One has only to peruse those questions of the Catechism having to do with Eucharist to see that of the fourteen questions concerning the Eucharist, eleven are directly related to Christ's real presence under the eucharistic species. The other three are questions about the origin of the Eucharist. All these questions, too, are entirely separated from the nine on "The Sacrifice of the Mass." 11 Furthermore, only one of these nine questions, with its respective answer, 9 In this view, while Christ's body is sacramentally signified by the consecrated bread and his blood, by the consecrated wine, the whole Christ is present under each species since all elements not sacramentally represented are present by virture of concomitance. 10 It is disputed that Thomas Aquinas himself held this view. In fact, evidence exists that he did not subsume the ecclesiological role of the priest, i.e., to offer Christ's sacrifice as the sacrifice of the Church, into his christological role. See Kilmartin, "The Catholic Tradition,"

6 6 indicates that people attending Mass, other than the presiding priest, could have any sort of intimate participation in what is transpiring in the performance of the rite. 12 One of the great difficulties of this view of the presence of the paschal mystery in the eucharistic prayer is that it objectifies the presence "on the altar," apart from the people. Another is that it confines the "production" of this presence to the words of the institution narrative uttered by the priest--words which are his exclusively. The eucharistic prayer, consequently, while perhaps seen as a prayer of thanksgiving, is "simply a more hospitable or festive setting for the consecration" as Edward Foley has observed. 13 Furthermore, even if those who are held in this view take seriously the words of the anamnesis or memorial prayer following the institution narrative and participate in the offering of the sacrifice, it is more than likely that what they offer is considered to be Christ, the Victim, himself only without reference to themselves as one with him. Unfortunately, the overly precise formulation of the anamnesis prayer in several of the Roman eucharistic prayers supports this perception. In Eucharistic Prayer III we have Look with favor on your Church's offering, and see the Victim whose death has reconciled us to yourself. 14 In Eucharistic Prayer IV sections of both the anamnesis prayer and the following epiclesis suggest this perception:... [L]ooking forward to his coming in glory, we offer you his body and blood, the acceptable sacrifice which brings salvation to the whole world. 11 See Lessons 26 and 27 of Baltimore Catechism No. 3, Revised Edition (New York: Benziger Brothers, 1952; reprinted by The Seraphim Co., Inc., 1995) 12 Baltimore Catechism, qq Question n. 364 asks, "What is the best method of assisting at Mass?" The answer: "The best method of assisting at Mass is to unite with the priest in offering the Holy Sacrifice, and to receive Holy Communion." 13 Edward Foley, "The Eucharistic Prayer: An Unexplored Creed," Assembly 23 (1997) Emphasis added.

7 7 Look upon this sacrifice which you have given to your Church; Finally, in Eucharistic Prayer II for Masses of Reconciliation the anamnesis prayer reads in part We celebrate the memory of his death and resurrection and bring you the gift you have given us, the sacrifice of reconciliation. 16 "Victim," "body and blood," "the sacrifice... you have given," "the gift you have given" all suggest that what is being offered is Christ alone without inclusion of the Church. 17 These overly-precise formulations contrast sharply with those of Eucharistic Prayers I and II in which what is being offered is suggested by richly ambiguous phrases, "the bread of life and the cup of eternal salvation" (Eucharistic Prayer I) and "this life-giving bread, this saving cup" (Eucharistic Prayer II). Here what is offered is stated metaphorically so that it can be inclusive of all those engaged in the action of the eucharistic prayer as they offer themselves to God through, with, and in Christ. The original signification of the bread and the cup of wine as all those offering is not lost in the transformation of these gifts into the body and blood of Christ. 18 The Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy assures us that the Eucharist involves a self-offering of all in Christ, not just a sacramental offering of Christ himself by the ministry of the priest/presbyter: 15 Emphasis added. 16 Emphasis added. 17 It is true that other parts of the eucharistic prayers from which these phrases are taken contain richer expressions of what is being offered. See, for example, "May he [the Holy Spirit] make us an everlasting gift to you... " (Eucharistic Prayer III); "... gather all who share this one bread and one cup into the one body of Christ, a living sacrifice of praise" (Eucharistic Prayer IV); "[t]herefore, we ask you, Father, to accept us, together with your Son" (Eucharistic Prayer for Masses of Reconciliation II). The fact remains, however, that the overly precise expressions, taken in themselves, do not immediately allow for that breadth of vision regarding the nature of the offering. 18 Recall the famous words of Augustine, "If you, therefore, are Christ's body and members, it is your own mystery that is placed on the Lord's table! It is your own mystery that you are receiving!" Translation by Nathan Mitchell in Assembly 23 (1997) 14.

8 8 They [the faithful] should be formed by God's word and be nourished at the table of the Lord's body. They should give thanks to God. Offering the immaculate Victim, not only through the hands of the priest but also together with him, they should learn to offer themselves. Through Christ, the Mediator, they should be drawn day by day into ever more perfect union with God and each other, so that finally God may be all in all. 19 These latter reflections provide a segue into another view on the presence of the paschal mystery in the eucharistic prayer, one which considers the mystery as the dynamic action at the core of Christian life expressed symbolically in the Eucharist, preeminently in the action of the entire eucharistic prayer. Such a view does not exclude the mode of presence of the mystery embraced by the first view but integrates it into its more compelling dynamism. A Participatory View: The Paschal Mystery Engaged by All Throughout the Entire Eucharistic Prayer The rediscovery of the Jewish roots of Christian eucharistic prayer has contributed to an understanding of the entire eucharistic prayer as memorial of the paschal mystery. To whatever extent Christian eucharistic prayer is derived from Jewish prayer forms known as berakah and todah, it is indisputable that eucharistic prayer, like its Jewish antecedents, springs from an overwhelming sense of awe and gratitude in the face of God's unbounded love manifested in creative and salvific deeds. The form of the berakah used at Jewish ritual meals is fundamentally a prayer of praise and thanksgiving. Starting with the realization that all things making human existence possible are God's gifts and moving to the consideration of those historical actions, also God's gifts, which have been salvific for God's people, the leader of this prayer proclaims these creative and salvific deeds before the assembled people, acknowledging God as the 19 Flannery, ed., Constitution on the Liturgy, n. 48 in The Basic Sixteen Documents, 135. Emphasis added.

9 9 author and giver of these gifts and providing, thus, the motivation for the simultaneously uttered praise and thanksgiving which constitute the first part of the prayer: Blessed are you, O Lord, our God, ruler of the universe, who nourishes the world in kindness, friendship, and compassion. Blessed are you, O God, who nourishes the world.

10 10 We thank you, O Lord, our God, because you have made us to inherit a good land (that we may eat of its fruits and be filled with your kindness). Blessed are you, O Lord, our God, for the land, and for our food. 20 Following the recall of God's marvelous deeds (mirabilia or magnalia Dei), the prayer moves into petition for continuing divine action that will lead to the fulfillment of God's creative and salvific work, ending usually, as it began, on a note of praise: Have mercy, O Lord, Our God, on your people Israel and your city of Jerusalem and Zion, the place of your glory, your altar, and your sanctuary. Blessed are you, O God, who builds up Jerusalem. Blessed are you, O Lord, our God, ruler of the universe. You are good and you give us all good things. 21 Christian eucharistic prayer is similarly structured, but the first part usually climaxes or consists solely in the recounting of God's ultimate self-gift in the life, death, and glorification of Jesus--the paschal mystery--as all this is accomplished in Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit. This proclamation occurs for the most part in that section of the eucharistic prayer called the preface. We can see this, for example, in the preface given for Eucharistic Prayer II which is a slight reworking of the oldest eucharistic prayer extant, that from Hippolytus' Apostolic Tradition (c. 215): Father, it is our duty and our salvation, always and everywhere, to give you thanks through your beloved Son, Jesus Christ. He is the Word through whom you made the universe, the Savior you sent to redeem us. By the power of the Holy Spirit he took flesh and was born of the Virgin Mary. For our sake he opened his arms on the cross; he put an end to death and revealed the resurrection. In this he fulfilled your will and won for you a holy people. The institution narrative, or what is more widely known as the words of consecration, is the culmination of this proclamation. While the wording of most of the institution 20 From the Birkat ha-mazon as translated and quoted in J.H. Emminghaus, The Eucharist. Essence, Form, Celebration translated by Linda M. Maloney from the 1992 German edition (Collegeville: The Liturgical Press, 1997) 24. Note that the first paragraph focuses on divine creative actions with respect to the entire universe whereas the second paragraph focuses on divine salvific actions with respect to the Jewish people. 21 Emminghaus, The Eucharist, 24.

11 11 narrative is the same in all the eucharistic prayers, each begins uniquely. Perhaps the first part of the narrative in Eucharistic Prayer III best highlights Jesus' stunning selflessness in the face of betrayal, the unbounded divine agape represented in this culminating mirabilium (marvelous deed): On the night he was betrayed, he took bread and gave you thanks and praise. He broke the bread, gave it to his disciples, and said: Take this, all of you, and eat it: this is my body which will be given up for you. Following the institution narrative, the section known as the anamnesis prayer states explicitly that the mystery is being memorialized and that those participating are engaged in the self-offering of Jesus. In Eucharistic Prayer II that section reads: In memory of his death and resurrection, we offer you, Father, this lifegiving bread, this saving cup. We thank you for counting us worthy to stand in your presence and serve you. Then, in the section following known as the epiclesis, the prayer explicitly asks that the Holy Spirit may bring about that final unity of all in Christ which is the goal of the paschal mystery. Again in Eucharistic Prayer II, the epiclesis reads: May all of us who share in the body and blood of Christ be brought together in unity by the Holy Spirit. Finally, in the concluding doxology, the awe, praise, and thanks evoked by the remembrance of the mirabilia proclaimed at the beginning of the prayer find final expression and call forth the faith-filled, ratifying "Amen" of the assembly. To be noted in both the Jewish and Christian prayer forms are two dynamics of the prayer, on the one hand, and the presence of those identical dynamics in Jesus' living-dying-rising, on the other hand. One should note, also, that the two dynamics operative in the prayer are the dynamics of the paschal mystery. One dynamic is a movement from God to humanity and the rest of creation. The other dynamic is a movement from the human race and all other created reality to God. The first dynamic is evident in Christian eucharistic prayer in that the prayer begins in the preface with a

12 12 proclamation of the mirabilia Dei in the context of expressions of praise and thanksgiving for these same wondrous deeds. The prayer then moves to petition in the epiclesis for completion of God's designs, and there it is acknowledged that this is possible only through the action of the Holy Spirit, God's Gift to us through the paschal mystery. Similarly, Jesus in his life, dying, and rising can be considered as God's greatest and culminating mirabilium. Often enough in the text of eucharistic prayers, the proclamation of Jesus' life, death, and glorification as this culminating mirabilium follow the explicit proclamation of some of the prominent creative and salvific deeds of God leading up to him. His life, implicitly or explicitly, is presented as one moving from his being sent into the world by the Father, implying a realization that all was gift of his abba, then as a life of complete reliance on and fidelity to his abba throughout his public ministry, and finally as a doxology wherein his total surrender in death and concurrent transformation in resurrection, besides giving perfect worship to God, seminally realize the transformation of all creation. Jesus' life, death, and glorification, in other words, constitute the culmination of the mirabilia Dei both historically and in the sequence of their proclamation in the eucharistic prayer. They are the fulfillment of all of God's gracious, saving acts toward the human race and the rest of creation. But Jesus' life and death are also his human response to the mirabilia Dei--an action towards his abba in praise, thanksgiving, self-surrender, and trustful invocation springing from the awe he had in the face of God's overwhelming love manifested in the creative and salvific deeds acknowledged by his people, the people of the covenant. 22 That action, then, is also a dynamic of the paschal mystery, and the movement of the eucharistic prayer includes that dynamic as well. In the memorable words of Gregory 22 The Christian Scriptures give us glimpses of this. See, for example, Luke 10:21: "At that very moment [Jesus] rejoiced in the holy Spirit and said, 'I give you praise, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, for although you have hidden these things from the wise and the learned you have revealed them to the childlike. Yes, Father, such has been your gracious will,'" and John 11:41-43: "And Jesus raised his eyes and said, "Father, I thank you for hearing me. I know that you always hear me; but because of the crowd here I have said this, that they may believe that you sent me.'" New American Bible. Revised New Testament (Washington D.C.: Confraternity of Christian Doctrine, 1986).

13 13 Dix, "[t]he eucharist is nothing else but the eternal gesture of the Son of Man towards His Father as He passes into the Kingdom of God." 23 The two dynamics described here as integral to the paschal mystery and the eucharistic prayer are not independent, unconnected realities. The second is dependent on the first. God's outreach, so to speak, in creative and salvific deeds culminating in Jesus' life, death, and glorification evokes the response of awe, thanksgiving, selfoffering, and petition which constitutes Jesus' response throughout his life and our response in him throughout our lives to that outreach. Edward Kilmartin has put it succinctly: In modern Catholic theology the sacred character of the Eucharist is grounded on more than the Christological basis. Its sacredness is not merely based on the fact of originating in a historical act of institution by Christ. Rather what grounds the holiness of the Eucharist is the initiative of the Father: the self-offering by the Father of his only Son for the salvation of the world. Here we touch on the unique New Testament understanding of the "true sacrifice" as that which is based on the movement of God to us. The death of Jesus is ultimately the expression of the turning of God to us. The love of the Father is the origin of the self-offering of Jesus. The classical Eucharistic Prayers were constructed with this background in mind, and represent the response of the sacrifice of praise to the Father for what the Father has done in Jesus Christ for the salvation of the world. 24 The presence of the paschal mystery in the eucharistic prayer, however, is not just a matter of the presence of dynamics identical in both the mystery and the prayer. It is also and most importantly a matter of the action of the Holy Spirit. According to Hebrews 9:14 the Holy Spirit is the agent of Jesus' self-offering on the cross. Jesus' selfoffering, as we have seen, must be considered both as the ultimate salvific gift of God and as the grateful response for that salvation. The Holy Spirit, as the gift of the risen Christ to his disciples and to all believers, enables them to participate in his salvific and 23 Gregory Dix, The Shape of the Liturgy (London: Adam and Charles Black, 1945) Kilmartin, "The Catholic Tradition,"

14 14 sacrificial activity rendering that salvific and sacrificial activity one in Christ and in believers since the agent of it, the Holy Spirit, is the same in Christ and in his members. 25 Edward Kilmartin has stated the importance of this consideration: The pneumatological dimension of the mystery of the Church--the identity of the one Spirit in Christ and in the believers--furnishes the theological basis for avoiding the danger of constructing a monophysitic ecclesiology, i.e. the overdrawn identification of the Church with Christ. Consequently it supplies the basic theological argument against the narrow Thomistic explanation of the relationship of the ecclesiological dimension of the eucharistic sacrifice to the Christological dimension. For it shows that the ecclesiological dimension of the eucharistic sacrifice is grounded on the divine activity of the Holy Spirit through whom Christ offered himself on the cross and through whom the faithful offer themselves in union with Christ. 26 In this view the Spirit who is the agent of Jesus' faith, i.e., his human living as grateful and committed response to the saving action of his abba, is also the source of believers' faith which the Spirit activates in them in such a way that the Spirit's activity is modified by the historical faith-attitudes of Christ himself. What this means is that the Spirit's action in the faithful must be conjoined with the faith-attitudes of Christ, i.e., the thoughts and actions constituting his personal ongoing, grateful, committed response to his abba throughout the totality of his life culminating in his death on the cross. The conjoining is necessary because the historical life and death of Jesus constitute the necessary way of salvation for the entire human race. 27 The Spirit, in other words, does not act independently of the presence of the historical reality of the paschal mystery as lived by Jesus of Nazareth, but enables the faithful to be present to that reality, to the faith-attitudes of Christ inherent in that reality, so that these attitudes take ever deeper root in those who constitute the Body of Christ. 25 See John 20:22-23 and Romans 5: Kilmartin, "The Catholic Tradition," See, e.g., 1 Timothy 2:4-6.

15 15 When celebrating the Eucharist, then, and especially in praying the eucharistic prayer, Christians through the priest-celebrant verbally express those faith-attitudes of Jesus Christ. In so doing they remember the historical events constituting the core of the paschal mystery, wherein Jesus himself expressed those same attitudes. They do this by letting the Spirit bring them to the mystery, i.e., make them present to those historical events (Jesus' living and dying) constituting the sensible expression of the mystery. 28 In the discussion of the objectivistic view of the presence of the paschal mystery in the eucharistic prayer, it was stated that the participatory view integrated the mode of presence of the mystery found in the objectivistic view with that embraced by the participatory view. In other words, the presence of the paschal mystery in the eucharistic species is integrated with its presence in the action itself of the eucharistic prayer. It remains for us to see how that is so. By emphasizing the presence of the mystery in the action itself of the eucharistic prayer, the participatory view does not deny its presence also in the visible gifts over which the prayer is said. The gifts represent visually what is uttered verbally in the prayer. As the prayer narrates the creative and salvific mirabilia Dei culminating in the paschal mystery itself, so the gifts of bread and wine symbolize those same creative and salvific mirabilia culminating in Christ himself. As the prayer also expresses the awe, gratitude, and self-offering of the recipients of the mirabilia, so the visible gifts represent those same attitudes visually. Such an understanding was operative in formal Jewish ritual even before Christian eucharistic practice subsumed it: 28 Ibid., 450, This view goes beyond that problematic view of Odo Casel and some of his followers who held that the sacramental rites themselves make present the events constituting the paschal mystery in so far as these events continue to exist in the glorified Christ. Christians participate in these events by virtue of their union with Christ in whom the historical events of the mystery have been "eternalized" by reason of Christ's divinity. See Odo Casel, The Mystery of Christian Worship edited by Burkhard Neunheuser (London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 1962), Chapter 2, and Kilmartin, "The Catholic Tradition,"

16 16 After the ritual act of blessing and offering of the bread and wine at the Jewish meal, the elements are considered to be signs in which the offerer places his interior dispositions of praise and thanksgiving. The bread and wine have become blessed, offerings made to God. The table companions appropriate to themselves the ritual acts of the leader by the verbal assent, "Amen." Thereby they make the offered bread and wine signs of their personal sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving. 29 The "Amen" uttered at the conclusion of the Christian eucharistic prayer fulfills the same function, and the gifts over which the prayer has been proclaimed, besides symbolizing all God's gifts fulfilled in Christ's self-gift, embody the awe, gratitude, and self-offering of all the participants in the eucharistic prayer. The gifts, of course, are returned to those offering in the communion rite. The consumption of the eucharistic species must not be seen as an appendage to the action taking place in the eucharistic prayer. The act of communion is an essential part of the eucharistic ritual action since the Eucharist was instituted in the form of a ritual meal and remains incomplete without the consumption of the consecrated food and drink. 30 The eucharistic prayer, as the blessing said over the food and drink, indicates not only what those elements signify in themselves but what the act of consuming them signifies. The act of consumption really confirms in a visual, kinetic mode what is affirmed verbally by the "Amen" at the conclusion of the prayer, that is, personal adhesion to and participation in the paschal mystery: [T]he eating and drinking is a positive act of adhesion to the blessing and 29 Kilmartin, "The Catholic Tradition," See Kilmartin, "The Catholic Tradition," Peter Fink laments the statement in the Catechism of the Catholic Church that "[i]nstituted in the context of a meal, the eucharist is not itself a meal" (2413). "This is more than a failure of nuance," he says; "the statement as it stands is simply false. "True, the Eucharist is not merely a meal, and that is surely what the author intended to write.... Vatican II insisted that human sanctification in regard to the Eucharist occurs precisely because it is a meal. According to Vatican II, human sanctification is made manifest in signs perceptible to the senses and accomplished in ways proper to each of the signs (Sacrosanctum Concilium, no. 7). The fullness of eucharistic faith is not served by once again separating the meal element from the sacrificial. The two dimensions of eucharistic faith are intimately related: Eucharist is sacrificial meal." "The Liturgy and Eucharist in the Catechism" in The Universal Catechism Reader. Reflections & Responses edited by Thomas J. Reese, S.J. (San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1990)

17 17 ritual offering of the elements. It is a religious act that denotes the grateful acceptance of the blessings of God and at the same time connotes the commitment to be a living sacrifice offered to God. 31 The eucharistic prayer, then, like the paschal mystery itself, proclaims God's gracious, wonderous gifts or mirabilia to humankind culminating in Jesus Christ himself. At the same time it expresses, again like the paschal mystery itself, the human response to God for these gifts--a response made perfect in the oblation of Jesus to his abba culminating in his dying-rising. Christians are made recipients of God's mirabilia and participants in Jesus' very response by the Holy Spirit poured out on them in baptism. The Spirit it is who inspired Jesus' awe, gratitude, self-offering, and petition in the face of God's mirabilia and who inspires the same in Christians both in their Christian living and in their eucharistic prayer as one in, with, and through him. That prayer, proclaimed over bread and wine, signifies these elements as sacramental symbols of the same paschal mystery whose dynamics are operative in the eucharistic prayer itself, in the Church's corporate life, and in every individual Christian's life. Paschal life finds symbolic expression in eucharistic prayer. Eucharistic prayer gives rise to more profound paschal living. The eucharistic prayer, then, as expressing the paschal mystery symbolically and ritually as the central action of the Eucharist becomes most significantly what the Constitution on the Liturgy (n. 10) describes all liturgy to be- -"the summit toward which the activity of the Church is directed;... the fount from which all the Church's power flows." Stanislaus Campbell, FSC September, Kilmartin, "The Catholic Tradition,"