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Oddvar Moi
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THE SACRIFICE
OF THE MASS
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An essay presented for a course in Sacramental
theology at Allen Hall Seminary, London.
June 1998 - Oddvar Moi
INTRODUCTION
How is the Eucharist a sacrifice? From the perspective
of my background in the Lutheran church this is a very important question,
since Luther himself and his church after him very strongly reacted
to the idea that the Eucharist is a sacrifice offered to God. The
Catholic Encyclopedia points out that many of the reformers repudiated
the Mass as 'idolatry' while retaining the Sacrament of the true Body
and Blood of Christ. And it uses this fact to point out that the Sacrament
of the Eucharist is something essentially different from the Sacrifice.
And it continues:
The Eucharist performs at once two
functions: that of a sacrament and that of a sacrifice. Though the
inseparableness of the two is most clearly seen in the fact that the
consecrating sacrificial powers of the priest coincide, and consequently
that the sacrament is produced only in and through the Mass, the real
difference between them is shown in that the sacrament is intended
privately for the sanctification of the soul, whereas the sacrifice
serves primarily to glorify God by adoration, thanksgiving, prayer,
and expiation. The recipient of the one is God, who receives the sacrifice
of His only-begotten Son; of the other, man, who receives the sacrament
for his own good. [ 1]
Thomas Aquinas describes sacrifice as something offered
to God, and that it is most fitting to worship God and offer him sacrifices.
But since we are not able to atone for our own sins or offer a worthy
sacrifice, Christ is given to us. In him we "are given the possibility
of adequate worship and religion." [2]
BACKGROUND IN SCRIPTURE AND THE FATHERS
In his encyclical Mysterium Fidei, Pope Paul VI states
very clearly that the teaching of the Church concerning the Mystery
of the Eucharist is a "doctrine which the Catholic Church has
always transmitted and unanimously teaches". [3]
He goes on to prove this statement with quotes from Scripture and
the early Church Fathers:
Just as Moses with the blood of calves had sanctified
the Old Testament, [Exodus 24,8] so also Christ Our Lord, through
the institution of the Mystery of the Eucharist, with His own Blood
sanctified the New Testament, whose Mediator He is. ...
This intention of Christ was faithfully executed
by the primitive Church through her adherence to the teaching of
the Apostles and through her gatherings summoned to celebrate the
Eucharistic Sacrifice. As St. Luke carefully testifies, "These
occupied themselves continually with the Apostles' teaching, their
fellowship in the breaking of bread, and the fixed times of prayer."
[Acts 2,42] ...
Moreover, the Apostle Paul, who has faithfully
transmitted to us what he had received from the Lord, is clearly
speaking of the Eucharistic Sacrifice when he points out that Christians,
precisely because they have been made partakers at the table of
the Lord, ought not take part in pagan sacrifices. ... Foreshadowed
by Malachias, this new offering of the New Testament has always
been offered by the Church, in accordance with the teaching of Our
Lord and Apostles, "Not only to tone for the sins of the living
faithful and to appeal for their other needs, but also to help these
who have died in Christ but have not yet been completely purified."
[Council of Trent, Sess. 22, Eucharist, Ch. 2]
Passing over other citations, we recall merely
the testimony rendered by St. Cyril of Jerusalem, who wrote the
following memorable instruction for his neophytes: "After the
Spiritual Sacrifice, the unbloody act of worship has been completed.
Bending over this propitiatory offering we beg God to grant peace
to all the Churches, to give harmony to the whole world ... As we
do this, we are filled with the conviction that this Sacrifice will
be of the greatest help to those souls for whom prayers are being
offered in the very presence of our holy and awesome Victim."
(St. Cyril goes on to say:) "When we offer our prayers to God
for the dead, even though they be sinners .. we offer Christ slaughtered
for our sins, beseeching our merciful God to take pity both on them
and on ourselves."[St. Cyril's Catechesis, 23]
St. Augustine testifies that this manner of offering
also for the deceased "the Sacrifice which ransomed us"
was being faithfully observed in the Church at Rome, [Aug., Confession,
IX] and at the same time he observes that the universal Church was
following this custom in her conviction that it had been handed
down by the earliest Fathers. [Aug., Sermon 172] To shed fuller
light on the mystery of the Church, it helps to realise that it
is nothing less than the whole Church which, in union with Christ
in His role as Priest and Victim, offers the Sacrifice of the Mass
and is offered in it. The Fathers of the Church taught this wondrous
doctrine. [Aug., De Civit. Dei, X] [4]
MIDDLE AGES
The Church fathers spoke of the entire Christian life
as a spiritual sacrifice, but as we have seen, they were also willing
to use the word 'sacrifice' in a heightened sense for the Eucharist.
"The Eucharistic action enjoys a special relationship both with
the sacrifice of Calvary and with the abiding heavenly sacrifice of
Jesus Christ." [5] And with Augustine a reflective
theology of the "eucharistic sacrifice appears on the stage of
Christian taught for the first time". [6]
Later on, Gabriel Biel makes important contributions
to the understanding of the Sacrifice of the Mass when he describes
it as more than a commemoration. "In the Eucharist, the body
and blood of Christ are not simply present as a gift to us. They are
also present as an offering to the father, under the appearance of
bread and wine. This being so, the sacrifice of the altar is in a
true sense one reality with the sacrifice of the Cross. The difference
from the sacrifice of the Calvary lies only in the manner of offering
... the Mass is a sacramental, bloodless sacrifice." [7]
The "rational of the eucharistic sacrifice, for Biel, consists
in the mediation or application of the efficacy of the sacrifice of
Calvary to human persons." [8]
The early Christian tradition is very clear on the sacrificial
nature of the Eucharist, and anyone who denies it has the burden of
the proof. [9] But this was exactly what the reformers
did. Especially Martin Luther accused the Church of teaching that
the Eucharist is "a 'new and distinct' sacrifice. (He) saw it
as another 'good work' which people were urged to use to merit God's
blessing and eternal salvation." [10] This
is of course not correct, but neither side at that time had a strong
enough theology to clarify its view on how the Eucharist is a Sacrifice.
TRENT
The council of Trent, was of course an answer to the
Reformation movement, and one of the most important issues it discussed
was the Sacrifice of the Mass. And it may be said to have "canonised
the broad middle ground of the late mediaeval theology of the eucharistic
sacrifice, more or less as represented by Biel." [11]
This is how the Council fathers introduce the subject of the Sacrifice
of the Mass:
Since under the former Testament,
according to the testimony of the Apostle Paul, there was no perfection
because of the weakness of the Levitical priesthood, there was need,
God the Father of mercies so ordaining, that another priest should
rise according to the order of Melchisedech, our Lord Jesus Christ,
who might perfect and lead to perfection as many as were to be sanctified.
He, therefore, our God and Lord, though He was by His death about
to offer Himself once upon the altar of the cross to God the Father
that He might there accomplish an eternal redemption, nevertheless,
that His priesthood might not come to an end with His death, at the
last supper, on the night He was betrayed ... (He) offered up to God
the Father His own body and blood under the form of bread and wine,
and under the forms of those same things gave to the Apostles, whom
He then made priests of the New Testament, that they might partake,
commanding them and their successors in the priesthood by these words
to do likewise: Do this in commemoration of me, as the Catholic Church
has always understood and taught. [ 12]
The Council goes on to say the following in chapter
II:
And inasmuch as in this divine sacrifice
which is celebrated in the mass is contained and immolated in an unbloody
manner the same Christ who once offered Himself in a bloody manner
on the altar of the cross, the holy council teaches that this is truly
propitiatory and has this effect, that if we, contrite and penitent,
with sincere heart and upright faith, with fear and reverence, draw
nigh to God, 'we obtain mercy and find grace in seasonable aid.' For,
appeased by this sacrifice, the Lord grants the grace and gift of
penitence and pardons even the gravest crimes and sins. For the victim
is one and the same, the same now offering by the ministry of priests
who then offered Himself on the cross, the manner alone of offering
being different. The fruits of that bloody sacrifice, it is well understood,
are received most abundantly through this unbloody one, so far is
the latter from derogating in any way from the former. Wherefore,
according to the tradition of the Apostles, it is rightly offered
not only for the sins, punishments, satisfactions and other necessities
of the faithful who are living, but also for those departed in Christ
but not yet fully purified. [ 13]
Aidan Nichols makes this comment about the end of this
chapter: "Only if the Mass is a sacrifice can it benefit anyone
beyond the immediate partakers, and only if the Mass can benefit people
beyond the immediate partakers will the developed eucharistic sensibility
and practice of Catholicism make any sense." [14]
AFTER TRENT
In the post-Tridentine period Nichols identifies four
chief concerns about how the sacrifice of the Mass is to be understood.
[15]
1. The Sacrifice as ritual
In what ritual respect is the Eucharist a sacrifice?
Theologians specified four moments in the rite: The consecration of
the elements, their oblation or offering in the Eucharistic prayer,
the fraction of the host and the commingling, and finally the elements'
consumption. Gradually the most important of the four elements became
the consecration, specifically the separate consecration of bread
and wine.
2. The Sacrifice as reality
The question here is what does the Eucharistic sacrificial
character consist in ontologically speaking. Some theologians claimed
that not only the offering (oblation) was important here, but also
the destruction (immolation). The immolation is important because
it shows a recognition of God's sovereignty, it is a propitiation
of his offended righteousness and a plea for spiritual and temporal
blessing. By Christ's kenosis on the altar he does something analogous
to dying and this is what makes the Eucharist a sacrifice.
Other theologians found this understanding offensive
to the goodness of the Father. They claimed that it wasn't strictly
speaking the Son's death that makes restitution for human sins, but
the loving obedience expressed in the death. The sacrifice is thus
the bringing of Christ's body and blood on the altar as an act of
homage and honour, directed to the father.
3. The Sacrifice as made in heaven (which I will
not go into in this essay)
4. The Sacrifice as fruitful on earth
The question here is: In what sense does the celebrant
of the Eucharist have power to apply the fruits of the sacrifice to
particular ends within the economies of nature and grace? Gallican
and Jansenist theologians challenged the view that the priest had
any such power, but their opinions were refuted by pope Pius VI, in
his bull Auctorem Fidei. The pope argued that the church had always
acted as if there were 'special fruits' of the Mass, and in the 19th
century it became normal to identify three sorts of 'fruits of the
Mass'.
a) The general or universal fruit. Every
Mass is offered on behalf of the whole Church, and since all men
and women belong potentially to the church, then indirectly this
universal fruit can benefit them all.
b) The special fruit which pertain to the individual celebrant of
the Mass and those of the lay faithful who co-offer with him.
c) The intermediate fruit. The Mass can also be offered on specific
behalf of definite persons so as to obtain a given. limited end.
This fruit depends on the free disposition, or application, of the
celebrant. [16]
As a last example of pre-Vatican II material we look at pope Pius
XII's Encyclical from 1947, Mediator Dei. Here the pope explains
the meaning of the sacrifice of the Mass in great detail. First
he says that it is the same as the sacrifice on the cross, and the
same priest and the same victim, only the manner of offering is
different.
The august sacrifice of the altar
... is no mere empty commemoration of the passion and death of Jesus
Christ, but a true and proper act of sacrifice, whereby the High
Priest by an unbloody immolation offers Himself a most acceptable
victim to the Eternal Father, as He did upon the cross. "It
is one and the same victim; the same person now offers it by the
ministry of His priests, who then offered Himself on the cross,
the manner of offering alone being different."[Council of Trent,
Sess. 22, Eucharist, Ch. 2] ... The priest is the same, Jesus Christ,
whose sacred Person His minister represents. ... Likewise the victim
is the same, namely, our divine Redeemer in His human nature with
His true body and blood. The manner, however, in which Christ is
offered is different. On the cross He completely offered Himself
and all His sufferings to God, and the immolation of the victim
was brought about by the bloody death, which He underwent of His
free will. ... The commemorative representation of His death, which
actually took place on Calvary, is repeated in every sacrifice of
the altar.
Then he speaks about the four different ends of the
sacrifice:
The appointed ends are the same. The
first of these is to give glory to the Heavenly Father. (All) sing
immortal praise to God and give all honour and glory to the Father
Almighty. The second end is duly to give thanks to God. Only the divine
Redeemer, as the eternal Father's most beloved Son whose immense love
He knew, could offer Him a worthy return of gratitude. This was His
intention and desire at the Last Supper when He "gave thanks."
... The third end proposed is that of expiation, propitiation and
reconciliation. Certainly, no one was better fitted to make satisfaction
to Almighty God for all the sins of men than was Christ. Therefore,
He desired to be immolated upon the cross "as a propitiation
for our sins, not for ours only but also for those of the whole world"
and likewise He daily offers Himself upon our altars for our redemption,
that we may be rescued from eternal damnation and admitted into the
company of the elect. ... The fourth end, finally, is that of impetration.
Man, being the prodigal son, has made bad use of and dissipated the
goods which he received from his heavenly Father. Accordingly, he
has been reduced to the utmost poverty and to extreme degradation.
However, Christ on the cross offering prayers and supplications with
a loud cry and tears, has been heard for His reverence. Likewise upon
the altar He is our mediator with God in the same efficacious manner,
so that we may be filled with every blessing and grace. [ 17]
VATICAN II
The Second Vatican Council spoke about the Eucharist
in a variety of ways, in an effort to do full justice to what had
been said about it in the past. It follows, of course, the Council
of Trent, and says about the sacrifice that it is "the same one
now offering, through the ministry of the priest, who formerly offered
himself on the cross". [18] When discussing
the continuation of the sacrifice of the cross, the concept of memorial
is emphasised, as seen here:
At the Last Supper, on the night he
was betrayed, our Saviour instituted the eucharistic sacrifice of
his Body and Blood. This he did in order to perpetuate the sacrifice
of the Cross throughout the ages until he should come again, and so
to entrust to his beloved Spouse, the Church, a memorial of his death
and resurrection: a sacrament of love, a sign of unity, a bond of
charity, a paschal banquet in which Christ is consumed, the mind is
filled with grace, and a pledge of future glory is given to us.
[ 19]
In his Apostolic exhortation Eucharisticum Mysterium,
pope John Paul II speaks about the Eucharist in the themes
of foundation, sacrifice and presence. He points out the apparent
paradox that while the Church 'makes the Eucharist', it is the Eucharist
which 'builds up the Church'. [20]
The pope goes on to say that "while the experience
of eucharistic brotherhood indeed belongs to this foundation, it is
not the deepest reality. For the human koinonia of the eucharistic
assembly is not its own ground. We must look further, and here the
Pope comes to the other two principal themes of eucharistic doctrine,
the sacrifice and the presence." [21]
The Eucharist is above all else a sacrifice. It
is the sacrifice of the Redemption and also the sacrifice of the
New Covenant. ... Precisely by making this single sacrifice of our
salvation present, man and the world are restored to God through
the paschal newness of Redemption. This restoration cannot cease
to be: it is the foundation of the 'new and eternal covenant' of
God with man and of man with God. If it were missing, one would
have to question both the excellence of the sacrifice of the Redemption,
which in fact was perfect and definitive, and also the sacrificial
value of the Mass. In fact, the Eucharist, being a true sacrifice,
brings about this restoration to God.
.... Thus, by virtue of the consecration, the species
of bread and wine re-present in a sacramental, unbloody manner the
bloody propitiatory sacrifice offered by Him on the cross to His
Father for the salvation of the world. Indeed, He alone, giving
Himself as a propitiatory Victim in an act of supreme surrender
and immolation, has reconciled humanity with the Father, solely
through His sacrifice, "having cancelled the bond which stood
against us." [Col. 2,14] [22]
CONCLUSION
There has been some ecumenical progress in the understanding
of the Eucharist as a Sacrifice over the last decades. The reason
for this development is mainly a new and better understanding of the
Jewish understanding of anamnesis - memorial. This is how Faith and
Order's Paper on Baptism, Eucharist and Ministry expresses this new
understanding:
E5. The eucharist is the memorial of the crucified
and risen Christ, i.e. the living and effective sign of his sacrifice,
accomplished once and for all on the cross and still operative on
behalf of all humankind. The biblical idea of memorial as applied
to the eucharist refers to this present efficacy of God's work when
it is celebrated by God's people in a liturgy.
E6. Christ himself with all that he has accomplished
for us and for all creation ... is present in this anamnesis, granting
us communion with himself. The eucharist is also the foretaste of
his parousia and of the final kingdom.
E8. ... It is in the light of the significance
of the eucharist as intercession that references to the eucharist
in Catholic theology as "propitiatory sacrifice" may be
understood. The understanding is that there is only one expiation,
that of the unique sacrifice of the cross, made actual in the eucharist
and presented before the Father in the intercession of Christ and
of the Church for all humanity. In the light of the biblical conception
of memorial, all churches might want to review the old controversies
about "sacrifice" and deepen their understanding of the
reasons why other traditions than their own have either used or
rejected this term. [23]
There is still a long way to go, though, before the
Protestant churches are able or willing to adopt the fullness of the
Catholic teaching about the Eucharist as a Sacrifice. Typical for
this hesitation is the Anglican-Roman Catholic Commission's statement
on the Eucharist, where the Eucharist is called a Sacrifice of Christ,
[24] but is never called the Church's sacrifice
to God.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
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The Catholic Encyclopedia, The Encyclopedia
Press, Albany, USA, 1913, Article on the Sacrifice of the Mass
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Doors to the Sacred. A Historical
Introduction to Sacraments in the Catholic Church, Joseph Martos,
Image Books, New York, 1982
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The Holy Eucharist. From the New
Testament to pope John Paul II, Aidan Nichols, Dublin 1991.
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The Holy and Living Sacrifice.
The Eucharist in Christian Perspective, Earnest Falardeau, The Liturgical
Press, 1996.
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Sacramental Theology, Herbert Vorgrimler,
The Liturgical Press, 1992
HISTORICAL DOCUMENTS (ordered chronologically)
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1551 Council of Trent, 13th Session.
Decree Concerning the Most Holy Sacrament of the Eucharist
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1562 Council of Trent, 22nd Session.
Doctrine Concerning the sacrifice of the Mass
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1947 Mediator Dei, On the Sacred
Liturgy, Encyclical of Pope Pius XII
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1963 Second Vatican Council, Sacrosanctum
Concilium, The Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy
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1965 Mysterium Fidei, Mystery of
Faith, Encyclical of Pope Paul VI
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1971 Statement on the Eucharist,
Anglican Roman Catholic International Commission
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1980 Eucharisticum Mysterium, On
the Mystery and Worship of the Eucharist, Apostolic Exhortation
of Pope John Paul XII
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1982 Baptism, Eucharist and Ministry,
Faith and Order Paper No. 111, World Council of Churches
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1993 Catechism of the Catholic
Church. (Geoffrey Chapman, London 1994)
NOTES
1 The Catholic Encyclopedia,
Article on The Sacrifice of the Mass
2 Ernest Falardeau, The Holy and Living Sacrifice,
p. 3
3 Pope Paul VI, Encyclical Mysterium Fidei (document
doesn't have any paragraph numbers)
4 Mysterium Fidei
5 Aidan Nichols, The Holy Eucharist, p. 87
6 Nichols, p. 87
7 Nichols, p. 89-90
8 Nichols, p. 90
9 Falardeau, p. 4
10 Faraldeau, p. 4
11 Nichols, p. 91
12 Council of Trent, 22nd Session, Decree concerning
the sacrifice of the Mass, Chapter I
13 Trent, 22nd Session, Chapter II
14 Nichols, p. 93
15 Nichols, these four point are described on pp.
93-101
16 Nichols, p. 100
17 Pope Pius XII, Encyclical Mediator Dei, paragraphs
68-74
18 Herbert Vorgrimler, Sacramental Theology, p.
185, quoting Sacrosanctum Concilium, no. 7
19 Vatican II, Constitution Sacrosanctum Concilium,
no. 47
20 Nichols, p. 122
21 Nichols, p. 123
22 Pope John Paul II, Apostolic Exhortation Eucharisticum
Mysterium, no. 9
23 World Council of Churches. Faith and Order's
Paper on Baptism, Eucharist and Ministry, Eucharist E5, E6, E8
24 Anglican-Roman Catholic International Commission,
Statement on the Eucharist, Title of chapter II
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