Menu of Mass

Understanding John’s emphasis on the Eucharist

04/22/2021

John 6:44-51 Jesus said to the crowds: “No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draw him, and I will raise him on the last day. It is written in the prophets: They shall all be taught by God. Everyone who listens to my Father and learns from him comes to me. Not that anyone has seen the Father except the one who is from God; he has seen the Father. Amen, amen, I say to you, whoever believes has eternal life. I am the bread of life. Your ancestors ate the manna in the desert, but they died; this is the bread that comes down from heaven so that one may eat it and not die. I am the living bread that came down from heaven; whoever eats this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give is my Flesh for the life of the world.”

One of the startling things that makes John’s gospel decidedly different from Matthew, Mark and Luke is there is no “Institution Narrative.” What is that? The Institution Narrative is the retelling of what happened at the Last Supper, specifically, the Lord’s words of consecration that changed the bread and wine into his Body and Blood.

But nowhere do we find this Institution Narrative in the fourth gospel. The reason, I believe, for that omission is because John is not worried so much about the sequence of the Last Supper as much as with the substance of the Last Supper. That is, he does not want to share the mechanics of the Mass as much as the menu of the Mass, that is, the real meaning of the bread and wine.

John helps us understand the menu of the Mass – what was served at the Last Supper – in John 6 with the Bread of Life discourse, and in John 15, with the Discourse on the True Vine. The Beloved Disciple wants to teach us in John 6 that Jesus is the Bread of Life. And in John 15, he wants to convince us Jesus is the true Vine, the vine in which you find the grapes that make the wine of the Eucharist.

John wants to understand that the menu of the Mass serves Jesus himself. That is why we read in today’s gospel from John 6:51, “I am the living bread that came down from heaven; whoever eats this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give is my Flesh for the life of the world.” The menu of the Mass, therefore, consists of Holy Communion in Jesus’ Body and Blood.

Sadly, though, today many Catholics question, doubt or even deny what is on the menu; they lack faith in the Real Presence of Jesus in the Eucharist. That may be one reason God has blessed us with Eucharistic miracles up and down the centuries, to help our unbelief. Let me mention a few of the more notable miracles of the Eucharist. For example, some saints lived purely on consuming Holy Communion and fasting from every other food. Teresa Neumann from Bavaria survived on no solid food except the Eucharist for 36 years, from 1926 till 1962.

In Lanciano, Italy in the 8th century the Host (the Bread of the Eucharist) became human flesh. According to tradition, a monk who had doubts about the Real Presence of Jesus in the Mass said the words of consecration and the bread and wine changed into flesh and blood. He did not have trouble with the mechanics of the Mass, but rather with the menu of the Mass.

In 1263 a disbelieving priest celebrated Mass in Bolsena (a city north of Rome) and the Bread of the Eucharist began to bleed. The Blood from the host fell onto the corporal (altar cloth placed below the Bread and Chalice) and formed the shape of the face of Jesus as traditionally depicted. The priest came to believe immediately – and I think I would have too!

The following year, in 1264, Pope Urban IV instituted the Feast of Corpus Christi. Why? He wanted people to know not only the mechanics of the Mass – when to stand, sit, kneel and bow – but also what is really on the menu, the Real Presence of Jesus’ Body and Blood. The great Renaissance painter, Raphael, depicted this Eucharistic miracle in a huge fresco he painted in the Vatican.

Folks, let me conclude with a caution and a caveat. The Church does not require you to believe in Eucharistic miracles although she has verified their authenticity and declared them “worthy of belief.” They are good but they are not necessary for salvation. That is, such miracles may help you if your faith is faltering. Eucharistic miracles fall in the category of “private revelations,” like apparitions of the Blessed Virgin Mary. These miracles are not part of the “public revelation” which are necessary for salvation, and ended with the death of the last apostle, who incidentally was St. John, the author of the fourth gospel.

Public revelation is what we must believe in order to be saved. And that faith teaches us know both the mechanics of the Mass as well as the menu of the Mass. After all, it is in Jn 20 that Jesus says to Thomas: “Blessed are those who have not seen and still believe.”

Praised be Jesus Christ!