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Gospel: Mark 14: 12-16, 22-26
On the first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread,
when they sacrificed the Passover lamb,
Jesus’ disciples said to him,
“Where do you want us to go
and prepare for you to eat the Passover?”
He sent two of his disciples and said to them,
“Go into the city and a man will meet you,
carrying a jar of water.
Follow him.
Wherever he enters, say to the master of the house,
‘The Teacher says, “Where is my guest room
where I may eat the Passover with my disciples?”‘
Then he will show you a large upper room furnished and ready.
Make the preparations for us there.”
The disciples then went off, entered the city,
and found it just as he had told them;
and they prepared the Passover.
While they were eating,
he took bread, said the blessing,
broke it, gave it to them, and said,
“Take it; this is my body.”
Then he took a cup, gave thanks, and gave it to them,
and they all drank from it.
He said to them,
“This is my blood of the covenant,
which will be shed for many.
Amen, I say to you,
I shall not drink again the fruit of the vine
until the day when I drink it new in the kingdom of God.”
Then, after singing a hymn,
they went out to the Mount of Olives.
The Gospel of the Lord.
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Many of you know, I’m a convert to the Catholic faith. I wasn’t raised with any deep religious foundation; I was only baptized in a Protestant church as a child.
But as I entered my teenage years, I started questioning, searching for God.
So, when I went off to college, I started going to Mass; it was a Catholic university. After 100 Sundays of watching others sit, stand, kneel, then proceed forth for Communion, I came to the simple conclusion: “That’s either Jesus, or it’s not.”
“And if it is, then I must have him.”
So, I became a Catholic … and, years later, a priest.
Often, we get caught up in the question of, “How can that be Jesus?” The Eucharist looks like just a piece of bread. Perhaps it’s better to focus not on how, but, “Why would that be him?”
It seems the stage was set from the very first pages of the Bible.
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In the Book of Genesis, how do Adam and Eve break their communion with God?
Through an act of eating.
As Satan the serpent slithers in the Garden of Eden, he convinces Eve to eat from the tree of knowledge. She then shares that fruit with Adam.
This breaks the command given by God to Adam: “You are free to eat from any of the trees in the garden, except the tree of knowledge of good and evil. From that tree you shall not eat; when you eat from it, you shall die.”
Christians understand this to be the origin of sin – and by extension the evil that is still present in our world. Once humanity’s relationship with God was severed through a disobedient act of eating, “all hell broke loose,” as it were.
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In today’s Gospel, Jesus reverses that ancient curse of Eden by establishing a new, final covenant, also through an act of eating.
“Take this, all of you, and eat of it,” he says. “This is my body, given up for you… This is my blood, the blood of the new and eternal covenant. Do this in memory of me.”
Adam and Eve ate from the tree of knowledge.
In the Eucharist, we eat from the tree of life.
As the Lord promises elsewhere, “Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him on the last day.”
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Pondering this truth that we receive Christ in the Eucharist is enough “food for thought.”
But receiving our Lord also comes with great responsibility. As Saint Augustine once taught, “Become what you consume.” Become like Christ in the Eucharist – bread broken and shared, offering nourishment for others.
So, each morning as I hold that sacred Host in my hand, I pray in union with the Lord, saying silently in my heart, “This is also my body, my heart given up for you – this community of faith.”
Every encounter, every homily written, every Mass, baptism, wedding, anointing, or funeral celebrated is my way of offering myself with Jesus … for you.
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Don’t we all attempt to satisfy that command in some way?
“Do this – be this – in memory of me?”
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I think of parents who sacrifice sleep and sanity to raise a family; those who care for an elderly parent or an aging spouse; those involved in parish ministry, and so on. We give ourselves freely for this community of faith, each in our own way.
As Saint Teresa of Avila once wrote:
“Christ has no body now but yours. No hands, no feet on earth but yours. Yours are the eyes with which He looks. Yours are the feet with which He walks. Yours are the hands with which He blesses. Christ has no body now on earth but yours.”
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His body becomes our body every time we receive him in the Eucharist.
So, “Do this – be this – bread broken, life for others, in memory of me.”
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Image credits: (1) Do This In Memory of Me, Andy Schmalen, Fine Art America (2) Aleteia (3) Roman Catholic Diocese of Burlington