Holy Mass
  Scripture Readings
  St. Joseph
  St. Joseph Novena
  St. Peregrine
  Adoration Chapel
What’s New
  Mass Intentions
  Prayer Requests
  Announcements
  Liturgical Roles
  Calendar
Contacts
  Location
  Mission Statement
  Registration
Parish Commissions
  Pastoral Council
  Finance & Admin.
  Stewardship
  Worship
  School Council
  Communications
  Neighborhood Dev.
  Education
  Senior Citizens
Parish Organizations
The 7 Sacraments
  Baptism
  Confirmation
  Eucharist
  Reconciliation
  Anointing
  Holy Orders
  Matrimony

Eucharist: Sacrifice and Sacrament

In its Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy, Vatican II begins Chapter 2, “The Most Sacred Mystery of the Eucharist,” with these beautiful words:

At the Last Supper, on the night when he was betrayed, our Savior instituted the eucharistic sacrifice of his Body and Blood. This He did in order to perpetuate the sacrifice of the Cross throughout the ages until He should come again, and so to entrust His beloved Spouse, the Church, a memorial of his death and resurrection; a sacrament of love, a sign of unity, a bond of charity, a paschal banquet in which Christ is consumed, the mind is filled with grace, and a pledge of future glory is given to us.

This mystery is the very center and culmination of Christian life. It is the “source and the summit of all preaching of the Gospel. . .the center of the assembly of the faithful.”

In every Mass, Christ is present, both in the person of His priest and especially under the form of bread and wine. In every Mass, His death becomes a present reality, offered as our sacrifice to God in an unbloody and sacramental manner. As often as the sacrifice of the Cross is celebrated on an altar, the work of our redemption is carried on.

At Mass we offer Christ, our passover sacrifice, to God, and we offer ourselves along with Him. We then receive the risen Lord, our bread of life, in Holy Communion. In so doing, we enter into the very core of the paschal mystery of our own salvation -- the death and resurrection of Christ.

Eating the supper of the Lord, we span all time and “proclaim the death of the Lord until He comes (1 Corinthians 11:26). Sharing this banquet of love, we become totally one body in Him. At that moment our future with God becomes a present reality. The oneness for which we are destined is both symbolized and made real in the meal we share. In the Mass, both past and future become really present in mystery.

If you prepare for it with care and enter into it with living faith, the Eucharist can draw you into the compelling love of Christ and set you afire. When you go out from the sacred mystery, you know you were caught up in it if you “grasp by deed what you hold by creed.” And if you return to the place where the Blessed Sacrament is kept, Christ present in the tabernacle, you will regain your sense of the fathomless love His present there silently speaks.