Body and Blood of our
Lord Jesus Christ – June 6, 2021
Today’s
gospel gives us Mark’s account of the Last Supper. Many
great artists over the last two thousand years have attempted to express that
moment on canvas. Our imagination probably pictures the fresco by Leonardo da
Vinci from the 1490s for the Dominican monastery Santa Maria delle
Grazie in Milan. It depicts the dramatic scene
described in several closely connected moments
in the Gospels. The scene is not
a frozen moment but rather a representation of successive mome-nts. Jesus has
declared his forthcoming betrayal, and the Apostles react. Philip, who stands
in the group to Jesus’ left, gestures toward himself and
seems to say, “Surely not I, Lord?” Jesus seems to reply, “The one who has dipped his hand into
the bowl with me will betray me”
(Matthew 26:23). Simultaneously, Jesus and Judas, who sits with the group to
Jesus’ right, reach toward
the same dish on
the table between them, an act that marks Judas as the betrayer. Jesus gestures
toward a glass of wine and a piece of bread, suggesting the establishment of
the sacrament of
Holy Communion. (Encyclopedia Britannica-Alicja Zelazko)
We are all mindful of the significance
of tables in our lives. We have our own memories of shar-ing table with people.
And now with virus restrictions dropped or diminished, we can have more
people
around our table. Many memories will be very happy ones. We remember
celebration and lau-ghter at tables, love given and love received. Though some
of those memories of table friendship may be sad. We might remember table
experiences when we were more aware of the person who was
absent than of those
who were present.
The last meal Jesus shared with his
disciples stood out in their memory and captured the imagin-ation of subsequent
generations of disciples, because of what Jesus said and did at that meal.
At
the last supper, Jesus did more than share his vision with the disciples. In a
way he had ne-ver done before, he shared himself with them. He took the bread and
the wine that were two of
the staple ingredients of every Jewish meal,
including the solemn Passover meal, and he blessed the bread, broke it, and
gave it to his disciples saying, “This
is my body,” and then blessed
the cup of wine and
gave it to his disciples saying, “This
is my blood, the blood of the new co-venant, which is poured out for many.” These were momentous actions and
words.
By means of them Jesus was giving
himself as food and drink to his disciples, and, through them, to all of
humanity. The gift of himself that he made at that last supper anticipated the
gift
of himself to all that he would make on the cross the next day. There was
a real self-emptying
element to that final meal, which had implications for the
disciples. In calling on them to take and eat, to take and drink, he wasn’t only asking them to receive him as
their food and drink;
he was also asking them to take their stand with him, to
give themselves to him in the same gen-erous way as he was giving himself to
them and to all. This is our “Amen” to “The
Body of Chri-st,” spoken by the Eucharistic minister.
In saying “Do
this in memory of me,” Jesus was showing that he wanted this
last supper to be,
not just the last in a series of meals, but the beginning of
a new series of meals. As a result, the last supper was also the first
Eucharist. As Jesus gave himself to his disciples at the last supper, the risen
Lord would continue to give himself to his disciples at every Eucharist. As
Jesus entered into a very personal communion with his disciples at the last
Supper, he would en-ter into an equally personal communion with all future
disciples at every Eucharist. Saint Paul, writing only a little over twenty
years after the event of the last supper, said to the church
in Corinth, “The cup of blessing that we bless, is
it not a communion in the blood of Christ?
The bread that we break, is it not a
communion in the body of Christ?”
Jesus wants to enter int-o communion with us. In saying to those disciples at
the last supper and to each of us today,
“Take
and eat,” “Take
and drink,” he is calling on us to enter into
communion with him. At the
Eucharist we state that we want to be in communion
with the Lord and with all that he professe-
s and values. We also state that we
want to be in communion with each other, because there can
be no communion with
the Lord without communion with one another and with all of creation. Just as
the last supper was significant for Jesus and his disciples, so each Eucharist
is hugely sig-nificant for us. At every Eucharist we make a very significant
statement about who we are, who
we want to be and how we want to live.
Fr. Don, cp