The Blessed Eucharist as a Sacrament

Since Christ is present under the appearances of bread and wine in a

sacramental way, the Blessed Eucharist is unquestionably a sacrament of the

Church. Indeed, in the Eucharist the definition of a Christian sacrament as "an

outward sign of an inward grace instituted by Christ" is verified.

The investigation into the precise nature of the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar,

whose existence Protestants do not deny, is beset with a number of difficulties.

Its essence certainly does not consist in the Consecration or the Communion,

the former being merely the sacrificial action, the latter the reception of the

sacrament, and not the sacrament itself. The question may eventually be

reduced to this whether or not the sacramentality is to be sought for in the

Eucharistic species or in the Body and Blood of Christ hidden beneath them. The

majority of theologians rightly respond to the query by saying, that neither the

species themselves nor the Body and Blood of Christ by themselves, but the

union of both factors constitute the moral whole of the Sacrament of the Altar.

The species undoubtedly belong to the essence of the sacrament, since it is by

means of them, and not by means of the invisible Body of Christ, that the

Eucharist possesses the outward sign of the sacrament. Equally certain is it,

that the Body and the Blood of Christ belong to the concept of the essence,

because it is not the mere unsubstantial appearances which are given for the

food of our souls but Christ concealed beneath the appearances. The twofold

number of the Eucharistic elements of bread and wine does not interfere with the

unity of the sacrament; for the idea of refection embraces both eating and

drinking, nor do our meals in consequence double their number. In the doctrine of

the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, there is a question of even higher relation, in that

the separated species of bread and wine also represent the mystical separation

of Christ's Body and Blood or the unbloody Sacrifice of the Eucharistic Lamb.

The Sacrament of the Altar may be regarded under the same aspects as the

other sacraments, provided only it be ever kept in view that the Eucharist is a

permanent sacrament. Every sacrament may be considered either in itself or with

reference to the persons whom it concerns.

Passing over the Institution, which is discussed elsewhere in connection with the

words of Institution, the only essentially important points remaining are the

outward sign (matter and form) and inward grace (effects of Communion), to

which may be added the necessity of Communion for salvation. In regard to the

persons concerned, we distinguish between the minister of the Eucharist and its

recipient or subject.

(1) The Matter or Eucharistic Elements

There are two Eucharistic elements, bread and wine, which constitute the remote

matter of the Sacrament of the Altar, while the proximate matter can be none

other than the Eucharistic appearances under which the Body and Blood of

Christ are truly present.

(a) The first element is wheaten bread (panis triticeus), without which the

"confection of the Sacrament does not take place" (Missale Romanum: De

defectibus, sect. 3), Being true bread, the Host must be baked, since mere flour

is not bread. Since, moreover, the bread required is that formed of wheaten flour,

not every kind of flour is allowed for validity, such, e.g., as is ground from rye,

oats, barley, Indian corn or maize, though these are all botanically classified as

grain (frumentum), On the other hand, the different varieties of wheat (as spelt,

amel-corn, etc.) are valid, inasmuch as they can be proved botanically to be

genuine wheat. The necessity of wheaten bread is deduced immediately from the

words of Institution: "The Lord took bread" (ton arton), in connection with which it

may be remarked, that in Scripture bread (artos), without any qualifying addition,

always signifies wheaten bread. No doubt, too, Christ adhered unconditionally to

the Jewish custom of using only wheaten bread in the Passover Supper, and by

the words, "Do this for a commemoration of me", commanded its use for all

succeeding times. In addition to this, uninterrupted tradition, whether it be the

testimony of the Fathers or the practice of the Church, shows wheaten bread to

have played such an essential part, that even Protestants would be loath to

regard rye bread or barley bread as a proper element for the celebration of the

Lord"s Supper.

The Church maintains an easier position in the controversy respecting the use of

fermented or unfermented bread. By leavened bread (fermentum, zymos) is

meant such wheaten bread as requires leaven or yeast in its preparation and

baking, while unleavened bread (azyma, azymon) is formed from a mixture of

wheaten flour and water, which has been kneaded to dough and then baked.

After the Greek Patriarch Michael Cærularius of Constantinople had sought in

1053 to palliate the renewed rupture with Rome by means of the controversy,

concerning unleavened bread, the two Churches, in the Decree of Union at

Florence, in 1439, came to the unanimous dogmatic decision, that the distinction

between leavened and unleavened bread did not interfere with the confection of

the sacrament, though for just reasons based upon the Church's discipline and

practice, the Latins were obliged to retain unleavened bread, while the Greeks

still held on to the use of leavened (cf, Denzinger, Enchirid., Freiburg, 1908, no,

692), Since the Schismatics had before the Council of Florence entertained

doubts as to the validity of the Latin custom, a brief defense of the use of

unleavened bread will not be out of place here. Pope Leo IX had as early as 1054

issued a protest against Michael Cærularius (cf. Migne, P. L., CXLIII, 775), in

which he referred to the Scriptural fact, that according to the three Synoptics the

Last Supper was celebrated "on the first day of the azymes" and so the custom

of the Western Church received its solemn sanction from the example of Christ

Himself. The Jews, moreover, were accustomed even the day before the

fourteenth of Nisan to get rid of all the leaven which chanced to be in their

dwellings, that so they might from that time on partake exclusively of the

so-called mazzoth as bread. As regards tradition, it is not for us to settle the

dispute of learned authorities, as to whether or not in the first six or eight

centuries the Latins also celebrated Mass with leavened bread (Sirmond,

Döllinger, Kraus) or have observed the present custom ever since the time of the

Apostles (Mabillon, Probst). Against the Greeks it suffices to call attention to the

historical fact that in the Orient the Maronites and Armenians have used

unleavened bread from time immemorial, and that according to Origen (In Matt.,

XII, n. 6) the people of the East "sometimes", therefore not as a rule, made use

of leavened bread in their Liturgy. Besides, there is considerable force in the

theological argument that the fermenting process with yeast and other leaven,

does not affect the substance of the bread, but merely its quality. The reasons of

congruity advanced by the Greeks in behalf of leavened bread, which would have

us consider it as a beautiful symbol of the hypostatic union, as well as an

attractive representation of the savor of this heavenly Food, will be most willingly

accepted, provided only that due consideration be given to the grounds of

propriety set forth by the Latins with St. Thomas Aquinas (III:74:4) namely, the

example of Christ, the aptitude of unleavened bread to be regarded as a symbol

of the purity of His Sacred Body, free from all corruption of sin, and finally the

instruction of St, Paul (I Cor., v,8) to keep the Pasch not with the leaven of

malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth".

(b) The second Eucharistic element required is wine of the grape (vinum de vite).

Hence are excluded as invalid, not only the juices extracted and prepared from

other fruits (as cider and perry), but also the so-called artificial wines, even if their

chemical constitution is identical with the genuine juice of the grape. The

necessity of wine of the grape is not so much the result of the authoritative

decision of the Church, as it is presupposed by her (Council of Trent, Sess. XIII,

cap. iv), and is based upon the example and command of Christ, Who at the

Last Supper certainly converted the natural wine of grapes into His Blood, This is

deduced partly from the rite of the Passover, which required the head of the

family to pass around the "cup of benediction" (calix benedictionis) containing

the wine of grapes, partly, and especially, from the express declaration of Christ,

that henceforth He would not drink of the "fruit of the vine" (genimen vitis). The

Catholic Church is aware of no other tradition and in this respect she has ever

been one with the Greeks. The ancient Hydroparastatæ, or Aquarians, who used

water instead of wine, were heretics in her eyes. The counter-argument of Ad.

Harnack ["Texte und Untersuchungen", new series, VII, 2 (1891), 115 sqq.], that

the most ancient of Churches was indifferent as to the use of wine, and more

concerned with the action of eating and drinking than with the elements of bread

and wine, loses all its force in view not only of the earliest literature on the

subject (the Didache, Ignatius, Justin, Irenæus, Clement of Alexandria, Origen,

Hippolytus, Tertullian, and Cyprian), but also of non-Catholic and apocryphal

writings, which bear testimony to the use of bread and wine as the only and

necessary elements of the Blessed Sacrament. On the other hand, a very

ancient law of the Church which, however, has nothing to do with the validity of

the sacrament, prescribes that a little water be added to the wine before the

Consecration (Decr. pro Armenis: aqua modicissima), a practice, whose

legitimacy the Council of Trent (Sess. XXII, can. ix) established under pain of

anathema. The rigor of this law of the Church may be traced to the ancient

custom of the Romans and Jews, who mixed water with the strong southern

wines (see Proverbs 9:2), to the expression of calix mixtus found in Justin (Apol.,

I, lxv), Irenæus (Adv. hær., V, ii, 3), and Cyprian (Ep. lxiii, ad Cæcil., n. 13 sq.),

and especially to the deep symbolical meaning contained in the mingling,

inasmuch as thereby are represented the flowing of blood and water from the side

of the Crucified Savior and the intimate union of the faithful with Christ (cf. Council

of Trent, Sess. XXII, cap. vii).

(2) The Sacramental Form or the Words of Consecration

In proceeding to verify the form, which is always made up of words, we may start

from the dubitable fact, that Christ did not consecrate by the mere fiat of His

omnipotence, which found no expression in articulate utterance, but by

pronouncing the words of Institution: "This is my body . . . this is my blood", and

that by the addition: "Do this for a commemoration of me", He commanded the

Apostles to follow His example. Were the words of Institution a mere declarative

utterance of the conversion, which might have taken place in the "benediction"

unannounced and articulately unexpressed, the Apostles and their successors

would, according to Christ's example and mandate, have been obliged to

consecrate in this mute manner also, a consequence which is altogether at

variance with the deposit of faith. It is true, that Pope Innocent III (De Sacro

altaris myst., IV, vi) before his elevation to the pontificate did hold the opinion,

which later theologians branded as "temerarious", that Christ consecrated

without words by means of the mere "benediction". Not many theologians,

however, followed him in this regard, among the few being Ambrose Catharinus,

Cheffontaines, and Hoppe, by far the greater number preferring to stand by the

unanimous testimony of the Fathers. Meanwhile, Innocent III also insisted most

urgently that at least in the case of the celebrating priest, the words of Institution

were prescribed as the sacramental form. It was, moreover, not until its

comparatively recent adherence in the seventeenth century to the famous

"Confessio fidei orthodoxa" of Peter Mogilas (cf. Kimmel, "Monum. fidei eccl.

orient.", Jena, 1850, I, p. 180), that the Schismatical Greek Church adopted the

view, according to which the priest does not at all consecrate by virtue of the

words of Institution, but only by means of the Epiklesis occurring shortly after

them and expressing in the Oriental Liturgies a petition to the Holy Spirit, "that

the bread and wine may be converted into the Body and Blood of Christ". Were

the Greeks justified in maintaining this position, the immediate result would be,

that the Latins who have no such thing as the Epiklesis in their present Liturgy,

would possess neither the true Sacrifice of the Mass nor the Holy Eucharist.

Fortunately, however, the Greeks can be shown the error of their ways from their

own writings, since it can be proved, that they themselves formerly placed the

form of Transubstantiation in the words of Institution. Not only did such renowned

Fathers as Justin (Apol., I, lxvi), Irenæus (Adv. hær., V, ii, 3), Gregory of Nyssa

(Or. catech., xxxvii), Chrysostom (Hom. i, de prod. Judæ, n. 6), and John

Damascene (De fid. orth., IV, xiii) hold this view, but the ancient Greek Liturgies

bear testimony to it, so that Cardinal Bessarion in 1439 at Florence called the

attention of his fellow-countrymen to the fact, that as soon as the words of

Institution have been pronounced, supreme homage and adoration are due to the

Holy Eucharist, even though the famous Epiklesis follows some time after.

The objection that the mere historical recitation of the words of Institution taken

from the narrative of the Last Supper possesses no intrinsic consecratory force,

would be well founded, did the priest of the Latin Church merely intend by means

of them to narrate some historical event rather than pronounce them with the

practical purpose of effecting the conversion, or if he pronounced them in his own

name and person instead of the Person of Christ, whose minister and

instrumental cause he is. Neither of the two suppositions holds in the case of a

priest who really intends to celebrate Mass. Hence, though the Greeks may in

the best of faith go on erroneously maintaining that they consecrate exclusively

in their Epiklesis, they do, nevertheless, as in the case of the Latins, actually

consecrate by means of the words of Institution contained in their Liturgies, if

Christ has instituted these words as the words of Consecration and the form of

the sacrament. We may in fact go a step farther and assert, that the words of

Institution constitute the only and wholly adequate form of the Eucharist and that,

consequently, the words of the Epiklesis possess no inherent consecratory

value. The contention that the words of the Epiklesis have joint essential value

and constitute the partial form of the sacrament, was indeed supported by

individual Latin theologians, as Toutée, Renaudot, and Lebrun. Though this

opinion cannot be condemned as erroneous in faith, since it allows to the words

of Institution their essential, though partial, consecratory value, appears

nevertheless to be intrinsically repugnant. For, since the act of Consecration

cannot remain, as it were, in a state of suspense, but is completed in an instant

of time, there arises the dilemma: Either the words of Institution alone and,

therefore, not the Epiklesis, are productive of the conversion, or the words of the

Epiklesis alone have such power and not the words of Institution. Of more

considerable importance is the circumstance that the whole question came up

for discussion in the council for union held at Florence in 1439. Pope Eugene IV

urged the Greeks to come to a unanimous agreement with the Roman faith and

subscribe to the words of Institution as alone constituting the sacramental form,

and to drop the contention that the words of the Epiklesis also possessed a

partial consecratory force. But when the Greeks, not without foundation, pleaded

that a dogmatic decision would reflect with shame upon their whole

ecclesiastical past, the ecumenical synod was satisfied with the oral declaration

of Cardinal Bessarion recorded in the minutes of the council for 5 July, 1439 (P.

G., CLXI, 491), namely, that the Greeks follow the universal teaching of the

Fathers, especially of "blessed John Chrysostom, familiarly known to us",

according to whom the "Divine words of Our Redeemer contain the full and entire

force of Transubstantiation".

The venerable antiquity of the Oriental Epiklesis, its peculiar position in the

Canon of the Mass, and its interior spiritual unction, oblige the theologian to

determine its dogmatic value and to account for its use. Take, for instance, the

Epiklesis of the Ethiopian Liturgy: "We implore and beseech Thee, O Lord, to

send forth the Holy Spirit and His Power upon this Bread and Chalice and convert

them into the Body and Blood of Our Lord Jesus Christ." Since this prayer

always follows after the words of Institution have been pronounced, the

theological question arises, as to how it may be made to harmonize with the

words of Christ, which alone possess the consecrated power. Two explanations

have been suggested which, however, can be merged in one. The first view

considers the Epiklesis to be a mere declaration of the fact, that the conversion

has already taken place, and that in the conversion just as essential a part is to

be attributed to the Holy Spirit as Co-Consecrator as in the allied mystery of the

Incarnation. Since, however, because of the brevity of the actual instant of

conversion, the part taken by the Holy Spirit could not be expressed, the

Epiklesis takes us back in imagination to the precious moment and regards the

Consecration as just about to occur. A similar purely psychological retrospective

transfer is met with in other portions of the Liturgy, as in the Mass for the Dead,

wherein the Church prays for the departed as if they were still upon their bed of

agony and could still be rescued from the gates of hell. Thus considered, the

Epiklesis refers us back to the Consecration as the center about which all the

significance contained in its words revolves. A second explanation is based, not

upon the enacted Consecration, but upon the approaching Communion,

inasmuch as the latter, being the effective means of uniting us more closely in

the organized body of the Church, brings forth in our hearts the mystical Christ,

as is read in the Roman Canon of the Mass: "Ut nobis corpus et sanguis fiat",

i.e. that it may be made for us the body and blood. It was in this purely mystical

manner that the Greeks themselves explained the meaning of the Epiklesis at

the Council of Florence (Mansi, Collect. Concil., XXXI, 106). Yet since much

more is contained in the plain words than this true and deep mysticism, it is

desirable to combine both explanations into one, and so we regard the Epiklesis,

both in point of liturgy and of time, as the significant connecting link, placed

midway between the Consecration and the Communion in order to emphasize

the part taken by the Holy Spirit in the Consecration of bread and wine, and, on

the other hand, with the help of the same Holy Spirit to obtain the realization of

the true Presence of the Body and Blood of Christ by their fruitful effects on both

priest and people.

(3) The Effects of the Holy Eucharist

The doctrine of the Church regarding the effects or the fruits of Holy Communion

centres around two ideas: (a) the union with Christ by love and (b) the spiritual

repast of the soul. Both ideas are often verified in one and same effect of Holy

Communion.

(a) The union with Christ by love

The first and principal effect of the Holy Eucharist is union with Christ by love

(Decr. pro Armenis: adunatio ad Christum), which union as such does not

consist in the sacramental reception of the Host, but in the spiritual and mystical

union with Jesus by the theological virtue of love. Christ Himself designated the

idea of Communion as a union love: "He that eateth my flesh, and drinketh blood,

abideth in me, and I in him" (John, vi, 57). St. Cyril of Alexandria (Hom. in Joan.,

IV, xvii) beautifully represents this mystical union as the fusion of our being into

that of the God-man, as "when melted wax is fused with other wax". Since the

Sacrament of Love is not satisfied with an increase of habitual love only, but

tends especially to fan the flame of actual love to an intense ardor, the Holy

Eucharist is specifically distinguished from the other sacraments, and hence it is

precisely in this latter effect that Suarez, recognizes the so-called "grace of the

sacrament", which otherwise is so hard to discern. It stands to reason that the

essence of this union by love consists neither in a natural union with Jesus

analogous to that between soul and body, nor in a hypostatic union of the soul

with the Person of the Word, nor finally in a pantheistical deification of the

communicant, but simply in a moral but wonderful union with Christ by the bond

of the most ardent charity. Hence the chief effect of a worthy Communion is to a

certain extent a foretaste of heaven, in fact the anticipation and pledge of our

future union with God by love in the Beatific Vision. He alone can properly

estimate the precious boon which Catholics possess in the Holy Eucharist, who

knows how to ponder these ideas of Holy Communion to their utmost depth. The

immediate result of this union with Christ by love is the bond of charity existing

between the faithful themselves as St. Paul says: "For we being many, are one

bread, one body, all that partake of one bread" (I Cor., x, 17). And so the

Communion of Saints is not merely an ideal union by faith and grace, but an

eminently real union, mysteriously constituted, maintained, and guaranteed by

partaking in common of one and the same Christ.

(b) The spiritual repast of the soul

A second fruit of this union with Christ by love is an increase of sanctifying grace

in the soul of the worthy communicant. Here let it be remarked at the outset, that

the Holy Eucharist does not per se constitute a person in the state of grace as

do the sacraments of the dead (baptism and penance), but presupposes such a

state. It is, therefore, one of the sacraments of the living. It is as impossible for

the soul in the state of mortal sin to receive this Heavenly Bread with profit, as it

is for a corpse to assimilate food and drink. Hence the Council of Trent (Sess.

XIII. can. v), in opposition to Luther and Calvin, purposely defined, that the "chief

fruit of the Eucharist does not consist in the forgiveness of sins". For though