What is the Mass?
We look to John Paul II for help in answering this question.
He says the Eucharist is “at one and the same time a
Sacrifice-Sacrament, a Communion-Sacrament, and a
Presence-Sacrament, [Redemptor Hominis, 201]. All three
of these dimensions are necessary for a Catholic
understanding of the Mass.
The Eucharist is a Sacrifice-Sacrament
“The Eucharist is above all else a sacrifice”
[Dominicae Cenae, 9]. It is one and the same sacrifice
as that of Calvary; each day the priest stands on
Golgotha as he offers the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass (cf.
John Paul II, Holy Thursday Letter to Priests, 1988,
passim). This sacrifice of Calvary, which is permanent
and definitive, the eternal source of man’s Redemption,
is perennially re-presented through the ministry of priests
in a sacramental un-bloody manner at the Mass.
Thus, Christ’s definitive act of self-donation as Victim
for our sins is made present to the faithful that they may
offer themselves ever more perfectly in union with Christ
the Mediator between God and man.
What does this mean? It means that the “offering of
His own Body for us is not a long-ago act, committed to
the cold pages of historical chronicles, but it is an event
that is still alive even now, although in an un-bloody way,
in the Sacrament of the Body and Blood, placed on the
table of the altar. Christ returns to offer His Body and His
Blood for us now, so that the purifying wave of divine
mercy may spread once more over the misery of our
condition as sinners, and that the seed of immortal life
may be placed in the frailty of our mortal flesh” [John
Paul II, Address, 612183].
It means that daily, we have a place to go wherein our
sins are consumed and burned away in the holocaust of
love; that is in the Sacred Heart of Jesus.
Parts 2 & 3 will be published when space is available.