When we think of the Eucharist, we usually focus our attention on Christ, our Lord. It is he who instituted this sacrament in the Last Supper. When we receive Communion, we truly eat the body of Christ and drink his blood.
This second year of the National Eucharistic Revival, convened by the bishops of the United States, gives us the opportunity to stop to contemplate, understand and further appreciate the eucharistic mystery in fullness. When I talk about “mystery,” I don’t mean something secret and impossible to understand. I speak of the salvific sense of this mystery, which we can define as God’s plan to save his people, traced from ancient times and that finds its fulfillment in Christ Jesus. If the incarnate Son of God instituted the Eucharist, it is, in principle, because it was the will of his father. And in order to carry out the transformation of the substance of bread and wine into his own body and blood, the action of the Holy Spirit is necessary.
It is the Holy Trinity indeed, every person, who intervenes in the Eucharist. This becomes evident at the time of the epiclesis for the transformation of the offerings.
While we kneel, the priest joins his hands and, holding them extended over the offerings, says: “Therefore, O Lord, we humbly implore you: by the same Spirit graciously make holy these gifts we have brought to you for consecration ...” He joins his hands, and makes the sign of the cross once over the bread and chalice together, saying: “...that they may become the Body and Blood of your Son, our Lord Jesus Christ...” and he joins his hands once more, as he finishes: “...at whose command we celebrate these mysteries” (Roman Missal, Eucharistic Prayer III).
If we pay attention to the priest’s words during this epiclesis, we can see how he asks God the Father to send God the Holy Spirit to transform the bread and wine consecrated into the body and blood of God the Son. That is why, during the epiclesis, we are on our knees. We are witnessing a Eucharistic theophany! God Triune manifests himself before our eyes on the altar at the sublime moment of the epiclesis for the transformation of the offerings. Kneeling at this moment, we fulfill one of the four purposes of the Mass, the latreutic one — to worship God. (The other three consist of asking God, thanking him and offering him a sacrifice.)
Christ instituted the Eucharist so that we can consume it and thus become one with him, and he, one with us. That is why, later in the Eucharistic Prayer, we find a second epiclesis over the communicants: “...grant that we, who are nourished by the Body and Blood of your Son and filled with his Holy Spirit, may become one body, one spirit in Christ. May he make of us an eternal offering to you.”
Let us revive our faith in the Eucharist by learning to contemplate every detail of the holy Mass. In this case, falling to our knees before the Triune God who manifests himself before us must be a reason to tremble in awe.
Be passionate about our faith!