We remember what Jesus said and did. Then we do what Jesus did at the Last Supper. This gives us the two parts of the Mass: the Liturgy of the Word and the Liturgy of the Eucharist. The Liturgy of the Word is focused on the Lectern, the Ambo, while the Liturgy of the Eucharist is focused on the altar. What we do today has evolved over 2000 years from what the disciples did in the days and years that followed Pentecost and the beginning of the preaching of the Gospel. They too remembered what Jesus said and did; and they did what Jesus did at the Last Supper. At first, it was a case of sharing stories about miracles, parables, teachings, and what happened on Good Friday and Easter Sunday. These stories were later put down in writing so that people who weren't there could hear about what Jesus did and said. The great apostles like Paul began to write to communities giving them teaching about how we are all one Body in Christ. People were also shown connections with what had happened in the past with the Jewish People and they began to read bits of the Old Testament in their meetings. After sharing these stories, they then did what Jesus did: they broke bread and shared wine together – his Body and Blood just as Jesus had done at the Last Supper.
Recently, I was saying Mass in St. Robert's School and in the homily I invited people to think what the situation would be like in school if there no bells rang, if people didn't know which lesson they had and when and where it was to take place, to imagine what it would be like if there were no rules about behaviour in the corridors, or the yard. Organisation and structure are essential for any big group, or groupings of people to be able to function. In the Church, first there came the Bible – "these and only these books are the Word of God – not those other false gospels and letters that are around". Then the Lectionary would evolve so that on each Sunday, every church and every Catholic gathering would be having the same readings from the Bible. Then a Missal evolved – the same prayers being said everywhere, the same doctrines believed, the same faith celebrated.
One of the rules that evolved and changed only in the last 20-30 years is the fact that we have Ministers of the Eucharist – an enormous help in distributing Communion here at Mass and in taking Communion to the Sick. Today we re-commission these ministers and thank them for their commitment as we thank God for the gift of his Son in Holy Communion.
"Believe what you see. Become what you receive." These are words from a homily given on an Easter Sunday morning by the great bishop-theologian St Augustine. Bishop of the Northern Africa city of Hippo he is a towering figure among writers in the Latin part of the Early Church. He is describing what happens in the Mass when the priest holds up the host just before Communion and says, "Behold, the Lamb of God..."
At the Easter Vigil the night before a number of people would have been baptised and received Holy Communion for the first time. They had been preparing for this for a long time. In some cases it was a preparation that lasted for a number of years. Two things strike us as odd about what is happening here on Easter Sunday morning at Mass. The first is that after the long Vigil Service the night before people come back for a second Easter Mass the next morning. The second thing is that it is only now that the newly baptised are told about what happens at Mass.
In the Early Church the Eucharist, the celebration of Mass, was something so precious, so important, that only those who were fully initiated, fully members of the Church, were allowed to be present when it was celebrated. The origins of that lie in the days when Christians face the real possibility that they might be betrayed to the authorities at times of persecution. You could only trust people you knew pretty well, and so anyone coming along interested in becoming a Christian didn't just pop in for Sunday Mass to see what it was all about, as happens today.
In Augustine's day persecutions were a thing of the past but they still kept to the old traditions at that time and so now the next morning Augustine explains what happens to them. What he is saying is as valid today as it was then. When the priest holds up the host we are invited to believe, to trust in Jesus' words that this is his body – "My flesh is real food my blood is real drink". "Believe what you see!"
The next step is an important one. Jesus gave his Body and Blood to be food for our journey through life, food for our faith. It is nourishment, in the same way that all food and drink are nourishment. In this case to help us really to become people who follow in Jesus' footsteps, in Jesus' way. "Believe what you see. Become what you receive!" As we are gathered here for our Mass we are already members of the Body of Christ, but we have a long way to grow into being that, not just here in church, but at every moment of the week. We need help. We need nourishment. Jesus' Body and Blood are food to help us to achieve our goal, "Become what you receive."
The feast of Corpus Christi – the Body and Blood of Christ – is celebrated each year as a reminder to us of what we are about when we come to Mass: part of the Body of Christ, the Church, and called to grow in the witness we give in our lives by becoming more and more like Christ every day. "Believe what you see. Become what you receive.
