The Eucharist – a life-or-death issue - 《生命恩泉》 Fountain of Love and Life

Solemnity of the Body and Blood of Christ

DT 8:2-3, 14B-16A
Moses said to the people: "Remember how for forty years now the LORD, your God, has directed all your journeying in the desert, so as to test you by affliction and find out whether or not it was your intention to keep his commandments. He therefore let you be afflicted with hunger, and then fed you with manna, a food unknown to you and your fathers, in order to show you that not by bread alone does one live, but by every word that comes forth from the mouth of the LORD. "Do not forget the LORD, your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, that place of slavery; who guided you through the vast and terrible desert with its saraph serpents and scorpions, its parched and waterless ground; who brought forth water for you from the flinty rock and fed you in the desert with manna, a food unknown to your fathers."

1 Corinthians 10:16-17
Brothers and sisters: The cup of blessing that we bless, is it not a participation in the blood of Christ? The bread that we break, is it not a participation in the body of Christ? Because the loaf of bread is one, we, though many, are one body, for we all partake of the one loaf.

John 6:51 - 58
Jesus said to the Jewish crowds: "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 Jews quarreled among themselves, saying, "How can this man give us his flesh to eat?" Jesus said to them, "Amen, amen, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you do not have life within you. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him on the last day. For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me and I in him. Just as the living Father sent me and I have life because of the Father, so also the one who feeds on me will have life because of me. This is the bread that came down from heaven. Unlike your ancestors who ate and still died, whoever eats this bread will live forever."

On the threshold of entering the Promised Land after 40 years in the wilderness of Sinai, Israel was asked by Moses to remember to observe God’s commandments, ordinances and statutes so that they might “have long life” (Dt. 6:2). “[N]ot by bread alone does one live”, he reminded them, “but by every word that comes forth from the mouth of the LORD” (Dt 8:3).

Before commencing the grand mission of establishing the Kingdom of God, and after fasting for 40 days and 40 nights in the desert of Judea, Jesus was tempted by the devil to change stones into loaves of bread. He responded by reciting the same Mosaic exhortation: "It is written: 'One does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes forth from the mouth of God'" (Mt. 4:4).

Although the two events are more than a millennium apart, they share more similarities than differences:

Moses is the liberator chosen by God to lead His people – Israel - out of the slavery of Egypt; Jesus is the Messiah anointed by God to liberate His people - the Church, the New Israel – from the enslavement of sin.
Both events have the hardships and dangers of the desert as the backdrop.
Both represent the dawning of a new era; one promises affluence and prosperity in a “land flowing with milk and honey”, the other guarantees eternal happiness and glory on the coming of the Kingdom of God in “the fullest of time” (Dt. 6:3, Gal 4:4-5).
Both Moses and Jesus stress the importance of the word of God as the true source of life, comparing it to bread and upholding its definitive supremacy in the comparison.
Most of all, life – how to live – is the dominant theme that penetrates and connects their messages.

Moses knew more than anyone else that observing the word of God – His commandments, ordinances and statutes – was the only way to live. A whole generation of Israelites - including Moses himself, who had to die on Mount Nebo, having seen from afar with his own eyes the land which God swore to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob - had to perish in the wilderness because they had failed to obey God’s commandments (Dt. 34:1-5).

Jesus, “the New Moses” as he is often called, also takes Moses’ position but extends its life-or-death implication to include eternal blessedness and damnation. After all, he is the Word of God (Jn 1:1); he is the “word that comes forth from the mouth of the Lord” that Moses referred to (Dt. 8:3). Like the Israelites who must observe the word of God or perish, we must listen to him or suffer eternal damnation. The Mosaic exhortation for Israel to love God “with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength” is pointing us to Jesus, the Word of God (Dt. 6:5). We must love him and unite ourselves with him until his very being – his Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity - is internalized in us, in the core of our being.

But how can we possibly do that? It’s not hard to see that this task is far beyond our human ability. In other words, it will take a miracle or some form of divine intervention to make it happen. Once again, it’s Jesus who has come to our rescue. To help us achieve this lofty and humanly impossible mission of becoming one with him, he has given us the Sacrament of the Eucharist, in which the whole substance of bread and wine is transformed into the substance of the body and blood of Christ through the mysterious power of transubstantiation (CCC 1376). We call the consecrated bread and wine the “Eucharist”.

Like Moses, Jesus - the New Moses - sees the observance of the word of God as a life-or-death issue, but the observance has been sacramentally transformed to enable us to accomplish what is humanly impossible to do: to share in his divine nature (cf. 2 Peter 1:4). “Amen, amen, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you do not have life within you,” he insists in this Sunday’s gospel (Jn. 6:53). On this Solemnity of the Body and Blood of Christ, let’s remember the cry of the martyrs of Abitene, who were killed in 303 A.D. for celebrating Sunday Mass: “We cannot live without Sunday”. Yes, the Mass liturgy – and its culmination, the Eucharistic celebration – is that important. This is no exaggeration or fantasy; it is our Lord’s teaching.

Edmond Lo

As a Catholic speaker, writer and RCIA Catechist, Edmond is very active in promoting and defending the Catholic faith. He has a MBA, a CPA-CMA, and a MTS (Master of Theological Studies) from U.T., St. Augustine's Seminary. Having worked many years as the CFO of a non-profit organization, he retired at 55 to follow his special vocation of evangelization. The activities he conducts include the CMCC Bible Study Program, the Catechism Revisited Program, the FLL Spiritual Formation Program, Living in the Holy Tradition, RCIA, family groups and retreats, etc. Edmond is a member of the FLL Core Team. He writes Sunday Mass reflections regularly for the weekly FLL NewSpiration. His personal blog: http://elodocuments.blogspot.com/

The Eucharist – a life-or-death issue

MORE ARTICLES