We are pleased to announce that our diocese will be participating in a three-year-long Eucharistic Revival sponsored by the Bishops of the United States. This initiative seeks to:
In taking flesh, the Son of God could become Bread and thus be the nourishment of his people, of us, journeying on in this world toward the promised land of heaven. We need this bread to face the fatigue and weariness of our journey. Sunday, the Lord’s Day, is a favorable opportunity to draw strength from him, the Lord of life. The Sunday precept is not, therefore, an externally imposed duty, a burden on our shoulders. On the contrary, taking part in the Celebration, being nourished by the Eucharistic bread, and experiencing the communion of their brothers and sisters in Christ is a need for Christians, it is a joy; Christians can thus replenish the energy they need to continue on the journey we must make every week.
[Benedict XVI: Heart of the Christian Life, p. 13]
The Christ whom we meet in the Sacrament is…the same Christ who is present in the Eucharistic bread of every place on earth. This means that we can encounter him only together with all others. We can only receive him in unity. Is not this what the Apostle Paul said…”Because the loaf of bread is one, we, many though we are, are one body, for we all partake of the one loaf.” (I Cor. 10:17). The consequence is clear: we cannot communicate with the Lord if we do not communicate with one another. If we want to present ourselves to him, we must also take a step toward meeting one another.”
[Benedict XVI: Heart of the Christian Life, pp. 15-16]
“We cannot communicate with the Lord if we do not communicate with one another. If we want to present ourselves to him, we must also take a step toward meeting one another. To do this we must learn the great lesson of forgiveness: we must not let the gnawings of resentment work in our soul but must be open to the magnanimity of listening to others, open our hearts to understanding them, eventually to accepting their apologies, to generously offering our own. The Eucharist is…the sacrament of unity.”
[Benedict XVI: Heart of the Christian Life, p.16]
The “Gloria in excelsis Deo” (Glory to God in the highest) is a most ancient and venerable hymn by which the Church glorifies God the Father and Jesus, the Lamb of God. It is not permitted to replace this hymn by any other. It may be intoned by the celebrant, cantor, or choir. It is a hymn sung or said on Sundays outside of Advent and Lent and on Solemnities and Feasts.
No one quite knows who composed the Gloria but we can trace the hymn back to the third century. Tradition holds that it was first composed as a prayer in the East and translated to Latin by Saint Hilary of Poitiers around the year 360.
Historically, the Gloria is known as the “Angelic Hymn” because it contains the words sung by the angels on the night of Christ’s birth. (Luke 2:13). At first the Gloria was sung as an Easter hymn at dawn after morning prayer. By the 6th century it became part of the Papal Christmas Mass. Gradually it was incorporated into Masses at which bishops presided. Priests were permitted to include the Gloria only at the Easter Vigil. However, by the 6th century, the Gloria was sung at all Sunday and feast day Masses.
The Gloria is an ancient prayer that is meant to point our hearts towards a spirit of awe. It reminds us that we are called to praise and glorify the maker of our hearts and souls.
Why do the priest and deacon kiss the altar at the beginning and end of the Mass?
The kiss is intended as a sign of reverence for the altar as the place of sacrifice and as a symbol of Christ Himself. During the Middle Ages, it was also directed to the relics of confessors and martyrs that were enclosed in the altar.Why is incense used at various times during the Mass?
The use of incense in worship started more than 2,000 years before Christianity even began. Incense is noted in the Talmud and is mentioned 170 times in the Bible. (e.g., Exodus 30: 1) It was a definite influence in the Church’s use of it in the liturgy. The burning of incense is an image of the prayers of the faithful rising to heaven. Incense is a sacramental, used to sanctify, bless, and venerate. The smoke from the incense as it rises upward is symbolic of the mystery of God Himself. The smell conveys the sweetness of Our Lord’s presence and the imagery reinforces how the Mass is linked to Heaven and Earth, ending in the very presence of God. At Mass incense may be used:An act of Penitence before Mass is appropriate because we are sinful. The invitation of the celebrant for all to acknowledge their sins should be followed by a brief period of silent reflection. This is followed by using one of the three forms of an expression of repentance. The rite is meant as a preparation to celebrate the mysteries and to draw down God’s mercy. This rite is not to be confused with sacramental absolution but should be seen as petitions for pardon. This rite may be replaced on Sundays with the blessing and sprinkling of holy water. It is a renewal of the memory of our baptism. It can rightly replace the Act of Penitence since Baptism is the basic repentance or change of heart.
Johannes Emminghaus: The Eucharist pp. 116-122
In saying that the Holy Eucharist is the greatest of all the sacraments, we are stating the obvious. Baptism of course is the most necessary sacrament. Yet, despite all the wonderful things that Baptism and the other five sacraments accomplish in the soul, they still are but instruments of God for the giving of grace; while in the Holy Eucharist we have not merely an instrument for the giving of grace—we have the actual Giver of grace himself, Jesus Christ our Lord, truly and personally present. The sacrament of Christ’s body and blood has had many names in the course of Christian history. Such names as Bread of Angels, the Lord’s Supper, the Sacrament of the Altar, are familiar to us. But the name which has endured from the very beginning, the name that the Church officially gives to this sacrament is that of Holy Eucharist. This name is taken from the account of the institution of the Holy Eucharist as it is given in the Bible. All four of the sacred writers, Matthew…Mark…Luke and Paul...tell us that Jesus, as he took the bread and wine into his hands, ‘gave thanks.’ And so from the Greek word, ‘eucharistia,’ which means a ‘giving of thanks’ we have the name of our sacrament: the Holy Eucharist.
pp. 347-348The Catechism points out that the Holy Eucharist is both a sacrifice and a sacrament. As a sacrifice, the Holy Eucharist is the Mass, that divine action in which Jesus through the agency of the priest, changes the bread and wine into his own body and blood and continues through time the offering which he made to God on Calvary—the offering of himself for mankind. It is at the consecration of the Mass that the sacrament of the Holy Eucharist comes into being (or is confected as the theologians say); it is then that Jesus becomes present under the appearances of bread and wine. As long as the appearances of bread and wine remain, Jesus remains present, and the sacrament of the Holy Eucharist continues to exist there. The act by which we receive the Holy Eucharist is called Holy Communion. We might say that the Mass is the ‘making ‘of the Holy Eucharist and Holy Communion is the ‘receiving’ of the Holy Eucharist. In between the two, the sacrament of the Holy Eucharist continues to exist (as in the tabernacle) whether we receive it or not.
The Holy Eucharist acts in the soul in the same way that ordinary food nourishes the body. Life in the body begins with generation, and then our body grows to full maturity while we keep receiving food for our sustenance. Similarly, there is a spiritual generation into the life of grace…We need spiritual food…our food is the Eucharist. The external form of food is most appropriate to signify the union with Christ which is effected in this sacrament. However, there is a discrepancy in the comparison of the Eucharist with food. Whereas food is assimilated by the person fed, in the case of the Eucharist the person receiving it becomes assimilated into Christ. The Eucharist also directs our eyes toward our last destination. The fullness of the New Covenant will reach its culmination in the new and everlasting Jerusalem, in heaven, where all the chosen ones shall be gathered in the eternal banquet.
pp. 16-17