! At a traditional Jewish Seder or Passover meal, the youngest child at the table- capable of asking questions- begins the ritual by asking of the father, Why is this night different from all other nights? What is meant to be exemplified is the simple childʼs awareness that something stands out about the manner in which their family is taking an evening meal. In a similar fashion, it would be fitting for Catholic children around the world to ask the same question about the Mass we celebrate tonight when we recall the Lordʼs Supper.! Two things will markedly stand out about this Holy Mass. First, soon following my homily, we will perform the ritual of foot washing- the only time of the year this is observed liturgically. Secondly, at the conclusion of Mass, we will venerate the Most Blessed Sacrament with the highest of reverence and bring our Lord in procession to a suitable place for adoration. There is no final blessing and dismissal at this Mass because it does not end tonight; tonight is just the beginning of our solemn commemoration of the Lordʼs Passion.! We say that our Lord was dead for three days before the resurrection. But if we remember the crucifixion and death on Friday afternoon and celebrate His resurrection on Saturday night, how does that math add up? For starters, although it is technically Saturday night that we hold the vigil; traditionally, it would not start until after midnight, thereby sanctifying the first minutes of Easter morn with our praises. Yet still, Friday to Sunday is only two days. Therefore, if 1
our calculation of three days will hold, our counting must begin on Thursday; tonight- the night we remember the Last Supper.! Holy Thursday and this Mass of the Lordʼs Supper has always been seen as the commemoration of Jesus instituting both the Priesthood and the Eucharist. We have also now come to see that this night is somehow intricately connected with our Lordʼs death if the scriptural formulation of His rising on the Third Day stands. Hence, there must be a connection between these three: the Eucharist, Priesthood and Christʼs death. To complicate matters further, the gospel passage which the Church assigns to this Mass seemingly has nothing to do with any of the three. Matthew, Mark and Luke all recount the institution of the Eucharist and the command to perpetuate the offering- necessitating priesthood- as being intimately connected with the Lordʼs death. Yet tonight, we have heard from Johnʼs gospel, who makes no reference to this at the Last Supper; however, uniquely among the gospel writers, he recounts the washing of the feet.! Perhaps the key is in regarding the washing of the feet as a gesture with far deeper implications than it would initially seem. In so doing, Jesus was not merely performing a good deed; in fact, it could be said that it was even greater than purely an example to be followed as He does intimate. Such a profound and deliberate act of self-abasement is the incarnation of the scriptural adage that we must die to ourselves. God becoming man and then the man-god becoming a 2
slave to other men- only slaves washed someoneʼs feet- is an explicit act of death to oneself; in this case, Godʼs self. Christʼs washing of His discipleʼs feet is a prefigurement of His death similar to what He set in motion with the institution of the Eucharist; the difference being, in the Eucharist we receive an enduring token of His presence and in the foot washing we receive a life-changing action.! As I previously mentioned, the washing of their feet was not a passively mindless action. For the disciples, it was a being acted upon. If it had no actual consequences, why else would Peter have so forcefully protested it at first? The English grammarians among us will appreciate this insight: the translation from Greek into the English version from which we heard this gospel employs an interesting use of preposition in verse 12. After the washing, Jesus asks, Do you know what I have done TO you? Were what He had done a passive action, the correct preposition would be ʻforʼ- what I have done FOR you; whereas, He says done TO you.! In response to Peterʼs protest in verse 8 our Lord replies, If I do not wash you, you have no part in me thereby indicating that this action was much more than symbolic. He intended it to have an effect upon the Apostles which would grant them a share in His very person. What does it look like to have an actual part in Christʼs personhood? This [point to priests]. In a sense, perhaps we could say that in Johnʼs gospel, the investiture of power with which our Lord entrusts 3
the Apostles granting them a share in His eternal priesthood is performed in the washing of their feet. It is a figure of sacred ordination.! We must not forget, however, what else we have already established the washing of the feet to stand for: a prefigurement of Jesusʼ death. In the washing of the feet, our Lord brings together both the act of His self-sacrifice as well as the institution of His ministerial priesthood by which the merits of His death would continue to take effect. It is the holding together of these two which make the washing of the feet also Eucharistic.! In the Eucharist we encounter Christ who has made Himself present in a real, true and substantial way by representing the sacrifice He made of Himself by the laying down of His life. The reason bread and wine are consecrated separately at Mass is to show the radical separation of Jesusʼ Body from His Blood; in other words: death! Furthermore, His sacred Body and Blood do not just appear to us out of thin air- they come to us from the hands of the priest; that minister who, having submitted himself entirely to the sacrificial death of Christ, now has a part in His person. To be a priest is, quite literally, to die; over and over again through the offering of himself for the sanctification of his people.! It is not for narrative purposes that, during the consecration, the priest utters the words this is MY body; this is MY blood. He is not recounting a story; he is standing in the person of Jesus Christ Himself who meant precisely that He 4
was giving up His Body and Blood. He is able to say this because of that share in Christʼs Person which has been infused in him through ordination. He desires to live the Eucharist by the continuous laying down of his life for his people following the pattern of his Master and Lord.! Soon, your priests will divest themselves of their official clothing and, on bended knee, wash your feet. We do so because Christ has first done so to us and it is our only joy as priests to serve you with our lives. Indeed, this night is different from all other nights. This night Jesusʼ death is made present in His priests; in His Body and Blood; in the washing of the feet. 5