(This article courtesy of the Arlington Catholic Herald.)
That He will “give [his] flesh for the life of the world” alludes also to His sacrifice on the Cross for the salvation of the world. Together these two interpretations bring out two essential aspects of the Eucharist: communion and sacrifice. Or, perhaps better, communion in sacrifice.
True worship of God always has the character of sacrifice. Indeed, sacrifice is the highest form of adoration because it is the outward expression of our interior obedience. By fasts, mortifications, prayers, tithes, etc., we offer God something to show our obedience to His supreme dominion and our total dependence on Him.
However, the sacrifices we offer God cannot praise and thank Him sufficiently. Because we are creatures, our sacrifices cannot rise to the level of divine worship. Our finite offerings cannot reach the infinite. Because we are sinners our offerings can never be pure and unblemished.
So God Himself provides the necessary sacrifice. By becoming man and giving His life on the Cross, the Son of God has rendered the perfect sacrifice of obedience to the Father on our behalf. Further, in the Eucharist Christ has enabled us to participate in His sacrifice. At Mass the sacrifice of Christ on the Cross is made present sacramentally under the form of bread and wine. It is no mere gesture of sacrifice or symbolic offering that ascends from the altar. The priest at Mass offers the entire Christ — body, blood, soul and divinity — to God the Father. Because Christ is truly present in the Eucharist, the Mass is a true sacrifice.
Active participation at Mass therefore means that we unite our prayers, works, joys, sorrows and sufferings — our very lives — with Christ’s sacrifice to the Father. Joined to the Son’s perfect sacrifice, our sacrifices become acceptable and pleasing to the Father. Further, by participating in the Sacrifice of the Mass we conform our lives to the greatest act of love and adoration. Notice how the secular world commemorates the birthdays of great men to keep in our minds the ideals and principles they represented. At Mass a similar but much greater thing happens: the People of God not only commemorate the sacrifice of Christ but also stand at the foot of the Cross with Mary and unite their lives with His offering.
But the Mass is a meal as well as a sacrifice. It is, as St. Thomas wrote, a sacred banquet. The sacredness of this meal flows directly from the Sacrifice of the Mass. In fact, the Mass makes little sense as a meal if it is not primarily a sacrifice. Ancient Israel’s sacred Passover meal was always preceded by the sacrifice of the lamb, whose roasted flesh they had to eat. The meal expressed their union with the sacrifice and therefore with God. So also in the sacrificial banquet of the Mass, in which Christ, our Passover, [is] sacrificed (1 Cor 5:7), we consume the Lamb of God to deepen our union with His life-giving sacrifice.
“The bread that I will give is my flesh for the life of the world.” The Mass fulfills these words, because in the Mass Christ both continues His sacrifice to the Father for the life of the world and brings life to our souls by His Body and Blood.
