Corpus Christi: the Sacrifice that was and is

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. 

The first Mass of the Paschal Triduum is Maundy Thursday. 

On Maundy Thursday, Christ institutes the New Covenant in his body and blood, the Eucharist, and establishes his priesthood not only as a teaching and healing ministry but also as a sacrificial one.

Christ’s unique priesthood is realised in those powerful words of institution: this is my body; this is my blood. 

Corpus Christi is also traditionally celebrated on a Thursday, and in this way the Church makes that thematic link between the Eucharist that was first established on Maundy Thursday, to the Eucharist which is exalted on Corpus Christi as the Sacrament of Sacraments. 

But Maundy Thursday and Corpus Christi are also concerned with the priesthood itself, although their emphases are slightly different. 

Maundy Thursday reminds us that Christ, the Great High Priest, has offered himself for our redemption: a sacrifice that has fundamentally transformed the way humanity and God relate to one another. 

On Corpus Christi, we come to understand the second truth, namely the priesthood Christ established did not expire when Jesus died upon the Cross. 

Rather, Christ’s priesthood continues in the life of the church; through the ordained priesthood that was entrusted by Christ to the Apostles and through the universal priesthood of the baptised. 

Of course,  the priesthoods of the baptised and the ordained are not only different from another, they are also different from Christ’s priesthood, as they are both dependent on Christ’s institution. 

In other words, those who are baptised or ordained participate in the priesthood that Christ establishes in his body and blood, albeit in different ways. We who have been baptised, whether ordained or not, are a priestly people. 

Why? Because through baptism we are initiated into the Body of Christ, made disciples of Jesus and called to a vocation of divine worship and to the service of the Church.

But my focus tonight isn’t so much on the priesthood of the baptised but rather on the priesthood of the ordained, whom the Church has put at the service of the baptised. 

Why? Because the Church preserves and nourishes the priesthood of Christ through ordained ministry in a very particular way. 

Tonight, we celebrate not only the Blessed Sacrament itself as an immeasurably precious gift that Christ gives us in the Eucharist, but also the perpetual re-offering of this gift in the life of the Church, through the mediation of the ordained priesthood. 

The Church makes this existential claim, and one that is central to its mission on earth: that which was offered by Christ on Maundy Thursday continues to be offered in the here and now through the priesthood of the ordained. 

This speaks directly to the significance of Corpus Christi: not only are the priesthood of the baptised drawn into the Body of Christ through this sacrament of initiation, but Christ remains bodily in our midst through the ordained priesthood of the Apostles. 

The Apostolic roots of the ordained priesthood provide us with the guarantee that indeed these sacraments of the Church, including the Blessed Sacrament, are exercised and offered with Christ’s authority.  

This link between Christ’s priesthood and the ordained priesthood is made clearest in the Mass at the Words of the Institution. 

It’s true the Prayer Book does make specific reference to God the Holy Spirit as one of the means by which the Bread and the Wine are consecrated:

“We pray that by your Word and Holy Spirit, we who eat and drink them may be partakers of Christ's body and blood.”

In other words, we can understand, from the Prayer Book, that God the Holy Spirit works upon the accidents of the Bread and Wine so that they become the Body and Blood of Christ in a way that surpasses understanding. 

But the other element of the consecration, is, of course, the Words of Institution: 

“This is my body given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.”

“This is my blood of the new covenant shed for you and for many for the forgiveness of sins. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.”

It is important to understand that the Church understands these words not only as historical fact, but also as a unique commission bestowed upon the ordained priesthood that followed after Christ, whose words, modelled on Christ, have the same effect of consecration and sanctification. 

In other words, the Church believes, and has taught, that these words of institution, uttered by the ordained priesthood in persona Christi, bring to bear the same effects of Christ’s words at the Last Supper, in the here and now. 

This is a remarkable claim. 

It means what Christ sanctified and offered at the Last Supper is repeatedly re-sanctified and re-offered by the ordained priesthood he established, not as an additional or auxiliary sacrifice, but in total consonance with that one sacrifice. 

This is not because ordained priests, in and of themselves, are able to sanctify or offer any sacrifice, but because they stand at the altar as physical signs of Christ, sanctifying and sacrificing on his behalf until he comes again.

In continuing to re-offer this Sacrifice of the Eucharist the Church not only responds with obedience to Christ’s command, it also bears living witness to the New Covenant of Christ’s body and blood, and the economy of forgiveness and grace it has brought to bear in the world. 

Now, the purpose of this emphasis on the ordained priesthood is not to diminish the priesthood of the baptised. 

All Christians are called to ministry, mission and discipleship, because all have been initiated into the Body of Christ through the sacrament of Baptism. 

And ultimately, the purpose of the priesthood of the ordained is to serve the priesthood of the baptised

Rather, the purpose of this emphasis on ordained priesthood is to make the link between the sacrificial priesthood that Christ initiated on Maundy Thursday to the priesthood that continues until he comes again in Corpus Christi.

The most perfect gift the ordained priesthood can offer and which the baptised priesthood can receive is the Blessed Sacrament.  

Why? Because in the Blessed Sacrament Jesus promised his disciples that he was present, not symbolically, but really and truly. 

Yes, Jesus dwelled spiritually in the gathering of the disciples then and he does now. 

But Jesus made a greater claim at the Last Supper than a spiritual or symbolic presence in the sacred meal he shared with his disciples.  

As Jesus himself was flesh and blood, he made, explicitly, the claim that the bread and wine offered at the Last Supper--and now at this altar--were and are his flesh and blood. 

Having made these claims about the bread and the wine he commissioned his Apostles to continue re-offering his Body and Blood until he returns. 

The ordained priesthood, therefore, is the mechanism by which Jesus continues to dwell among us, not in a spiritual or symbolic sense, but in a physical sense, concealed by the appearance of bread and wine. 

This is the extraordinary, seemingly impossible truth that we celebrate on Corpus Christi: Christ that was at the Last Supper now is, in our time and place. 

That which was offered by Christ, now is offered through the mediation of the ordained priesthood. 

Christians, who are baptised into Christ’s priesthood, are given this wonderful Sacrament, where Christ himself is offered and received, until he comes back to us.

I’d now like to end my homily with a prayer to the Blessed Sacrament by John Henry Newman.

I place myself in the presence of him, in whose Incarnate Presence I am before. I place myself there. 

I adore thee, O my saviour, present here as God and man, in soul and body, in true flesh and blood. 

I acknowledge and confess that I kneel before that sacred humanity, which was conceived in Mary’s womb and lay in Mary’s bosom; which grew up to man’s estate, and by the Sea of Galilee called the twelve, wrought miracles, and spoke words of wisdom and peace; which in due season hung on the cross, lay in the tomb, rose from the dead, and now reigns in heaven.

I praise, and bless, and give myself wholly to him, who is the true bread of my soul, and my everlasting joy.

Amen.