The Mystical Body and the Holy Eucharist

The Mystical Body and the Holy Eucharist

Breaking the barrier into the divinity. This is a good segue into my final point: The Eucharist in light of the Mystical Body. Here we have, to borrow St. Irenaeus’ word, a recapitulation of our own. We are returning to the theme on which we started. The point of the Incarnation was to make us gods, to bring us to the divinity. To do this, God became Flesh — flesh he took from the Virgin Mary. This Flesh He offered up on the Cross to his eternal Father for our sins and to purchase for us all the graces we would need to be saved. 

This same Flesh he offered to us as food, and as the principle of our divinization.

Reviewing the teachings of the Fathers on this subject, notably Sts. Cyprian, Hilary of Poitiers, Cyril of Alexandria, John Chrysostom and Augustine, I have found that they commonly quote St. Paul’s beautiful passage in 1 Corinthians (10:16-17):

“The chalice of benediction which we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of Christ? And the bread we break, is it not the partaking of the body of the Lord? For we, being many, are one bread, one body: all that partake of one bread.” In a footnote to these verses, Father Challoner comments, “For it is by our communicating with Christ, and with [one] another, in this blessed sacrament, that we are formed one mystical body; and made, as it were, one bread, compounded of many grains of corn, closely united together.”

St. Augustine asks, “Why is this mystery accomplished with bread?” He answers himself. “Let us offer no reason of our own invention, but listen to the Apostle speak of this sacrament, ‘We are one bread, one body.’ Understand this and rejoice. Unity, truth, piety, charity. ‘One bread.’ What is this one bread? It is one body formed of many. Remember that bread is not made of one wheat; at baptism water was poured over you, as flour is mingled with water, and the Holy Spirit entered into you like the fire which bakes the bread. Be what you see, and receive what you are.

“… Thus did the Lord Christ manifest us in Himself. He willed that we should belong to Him, and he has consecrated on His altar the mystery of our peace and unity.”

St. Cyril of Alexandria, the heroic defender of our Lady’s Divine Maternity at the Council of Ephesus, had much to say about her Son’s mystical members too, and how we are “one body.” He says, “For if we all eat of the one bread we all become one body, since there can be no division in Christ. For this reason is the Church called the body of Christ, and we severally His members, according to the teaching of St. Paul. 

Since we are all united with the one Christ through His sacred body, and since we all receive Him who is one and indivisible into our own bodies, we ought to look upon our members as belonging to Him rather than to ourselves.”

In the Mass, there are some beautiful references to this union we have with our Lord in the Eucharist. One is at the offertory, just before the chalice is offered. As a sacrament, the Blood of our Lord “effects what is symbolizes.” Listen to how the Mass itself explains the symbolism of the water and wine:

“O God, Who, in creating human nature, didst wonderfully dignify it, and still more wonderfully restored it, grant that by the Mystery of this water and wine, we may be made partakers of His divinity, Who vouchsafed to be made partaker of our humanity, Jesus Christ, our Lord, Thy Son: Who with Thee, lives and reigns in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God: world without end. Amen.”

Although the mingling of the water and wine has multiple allegorical meanings, the text of the Latin Rite itself seems to emphasize this mystery more than the others. The interpretation is probably very ancient. In a passage in the writings of St. Irenaeus, the Ebionites are chastised for their use of water only in the Mass. 

He says, “These heretics reject the mixture of the heavenly wine; they wish only the water of this world, and do not receive the God who has come to unite Himself with them.” (The Ebionites were also known by the name Aquarii, since they had an idolatrous worship of water as the source of life.)

Here we see the saint likening the water with “this world” and the wine to “God who has come to unite Himself with them.” 

In refusing the wine, the Ebionites have invalidated their consecration and have failed to Eucharistically unite themselves with Christ. Prescinding from the particulars of the Ebionite Heresy, we can learn the following lesson from St. Irenaeus: Since the Sacrament “effects what it symbolizes,” this symbol of our humanity being mingled with Christ’s divinity in the chalice is not only a symbol, but a true effect of the Blessed Sacrament.

Also of liturgical significance to our mystery is the placement of the “Our Father” in the Mass. By placing the prayer roughly midway between the Consecration and communion, the Church shows us the Eucharistic nature of our claim to call God “Father.” I already explained how we have no right to call God “Father” but by our incorporation into Christ. 

While I don’t wish to repeat myself here, I would like to point out that this sonship achieves its summit in the Eucharist. Think of when the Our Father takes place. The priest has effected the Sacrifice. While the Victim lies on the Altar and the people are preparing to receive It, the priest says that prayer most associated with the idea of being sons of God.

Two thoughts come to mind while considering this prayer in our present context. The first is the priest’s introduction, which impresses upon us how truly supernatural the prayer is. “Admonished by salutary precepts, and following divine directions, we dare to say…” Then follows the Our Father. 

In introducing the prayer this way, the priest reminds us not to take for granted the unique and inestimable privilege we in the Church have of calling God our Father. The second thought is that the Our Father beautifully unites the concept of our divine adoption as sons with the Eucharist. 

After all, the daily Bread — or, as St. Matthew puts it, the supersubstantial Bread — for which we ask the Father is the Blessed Sacrament.

I would like to mention something about the Father Mersch to whom I have referred so much and to whom I owe these beautiful patristic citations. It seems that in him, heaven wished to teach us a great lesson on the connection of the Mystical Body and the Eucharist. Early on in his priesthood, Father Mersch resolved to dedicate his intellectual life to the study and teaching of the theology of the Mystical Body. His effort produced at least three works on the subject.

At the end of his career, he was assigned to a Jesuit house near the Louvain to take care of elderly and infirm priests. World War II was raging. On May 23, 1940, Father Mersch was informed that in the town of Lens, there were some civilians dying alongside the Douai highway. He rushed to bring the sacraments to these people, and was killed by one of the German bombardments. That year, May 23 was the Feast of Corpus Christi — The Feast of the Body of Christ.

Permit me to finish with the words of another great priest of this century, also a Jesuit, and who also suffered martyrdom exercising his priestly duties, although his was a “dry” martyrdom. This priest is the great Father Leonard Feeney:

“No other sacrament unites us with the human nature of Jesus in substance — with His Body and His Blood. Our union with the physical Body of a Divine Person is what makes us members of the Mystical Body of Christ. The Word of God, antecedent to becoming flesh, had no body at all. He should not be spoken of as having one. When the Word became flesh, He took a Body — from the substance of the Blessed Virgin Mary. 

That Body is not yet the Mystical Body. When He assimilated the bodies of other men into His own, through the Blessed Eucharist in Holy Communion, when He made these bodies His members and Himself their Head — made them His branches while He remained their Vine — then, and only then, as the fruit of this sublime communion of Body with body, Flesh with flesh, and Blood with blood, can we speak of the Mystical Body of Christ…”